Sight Reading.
A Major Input!

Sight reading, playing a piece of music at first sight with little or no practice, is a fabulous way to acquire new pieces of music and piano performance skills.

All too often it isn't practiced systematically, and even in the piano lesson we don't always have time to get to it. Having said that, let me say also that without reading at first sight, you are limiting yourself.

The real simple explanation is this:
Keeping your eyes on the music, find everything by touch, and verify correctness by ear.

Great! I can hear it coming .... "Just how do I do that?"
Very good question.

A Little Tip

The development of short term memory is a key factor necessary for this reading skill. One simple exercise you can do is to pick a short piece of music at half your level. Let's say two bars in length. Next, read it but don't play it. If you need to play lightly on the keyboard to give you a feeling, that's OK. It's important that you do not actually play the sound yet.

After you look this small section over a few times put it away. Now, try to play it. That's right .... without reading the music.

The first time I did this it was fun, but not easy. So, if you're finding it difficult, welcome to the club! Let me say something important here.
Like everything else on the piano, sight reading is a matter of conditioning.

If that little exercise was too easy for you, pick a more difficult piece of music. You can also pick a longer piece of music.

You can do the opposite if the piece was too hard for you. That is: use easier music and shorter sections.

Often, I see students improve over many piano lessons. More often, it's the people who practice systematically that are surprised by how much better they can play piano, overall.

Now, as you may already know, I'm going to say.........Practice Regularly!

Sight Reading

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