May 4th and how to memorize intervals

iternabe

How did you memorize key/finger position of all common intervals? I think I am not so bad at 5th anymore. But this new Feuchtwanger exercise that has the interval of 6th is killing me. I had to think long where my thumb need to go for that 6th, and it cost me so much mental bandwidth that I often lose track of where I am in the sequence of that exercise.

I am trying to decode this with some intelligence. 5th is easier because it’s mostly white key to white key, and black key to black key, with only 2 exceptions. 6th, on the other hand, appears to be much more chaotic. Also, I suppose eventually this kind of things cannot afford to involve conscious thought but have to be instinctive?

pianoloverus

iternabe How did you memorize key/finger position of all common intervals?

I don't think you have to memorize anything. You can always write in fingering(which is what I assume you mean by key/finger position) if it's not given. In addition, there's no standard fingering for most intervals. A major third could be played with 1-2, 1-3, 2-4, 3-5, etc.

keystring

You refer to "this Feuchtwanger exercise" but there is no way of knowing what that exercise is.
I'm not sure that I think of it as memorizing, and maybe some other things are in the way?

Can you play all major and minor triads? If so you have all of the perfect 5ths for the outer notes.
You've said 6ths but not whether you mean major or minor 6th. If major 6th, that's two semitones above that 5th. Your perfect 4th is what you get in a suss chord. What are you present points of reference?

edit: I have the Feuchtwanger book (English version). Is there a page number?

iternabe

keystring Exercise 11, the extended version. Basically right hand play broken minor triad but in the span of a 10th. So in each sequence (e.g. E5-A4-C4), from finger 3 to thumb is going the distance of a 6th. The exercise sequence moves the broken triad down one semitone a time. There's not enough time for me to think which key the thumb need to hit as I go through the sequence.

BTW I purposedly did not want to include the above detail because my question is really about how do you internalized all these intervals in every key to the point that they are just instinctive.

keystring

pianoloverus I don't think you have to memorize anything. You can always write in fingering(which is what I assume you mean by key/finger position) if it's not given.

Th fingering is written in. I don't know if you're familiar with Feuchtwanger. 🙂 It is a system for retraining the hands. We cross-posted - I have a description above your post. (I happen to have the book and the CD).

keystring

It looks like the first challenge, before even doing the exercise, is to get the sequence, which is what you're trying to do. There are various ways to perceive it besides intervals. (1) What we actually have are descending minor triads: Am, G#m, Gm, F#m etc. all the way down to Am again. I just did that as block chords to check if I had my minor triads. (2) In the music, the middle note each time is skipped, and it becomes the bottom note. So if Am is ACE, that C is our bottom thumb note. So Am/C, G#m/B, F#m/A etc. I pictured my minor triad and stuck the middle note on the bottom. That's how I got at it. I don't know if that helps you.

The next challenge I found was that the same note gets played once with 3 and the next time with 2. I drummed that out on the table: 5, 3, 1, 2 (repeat) The actual point of the exercise is to not have your thumb help the pinky (making the hand stiff, I get). I might practise this in stages, slowly in small sessions. But the very first problem that you indicated is just getting the notes so that you can focus on what your hands are doing.

I've only done the very first exercise, the "finger tapping" one, and it helped me immensely. Thank you for bringing me back to the book. Does the CD show this one? (too lazy to check)

iternabe

Okay, guys, I sincerely appreciate your effort to help, and I really meant it. However, since I asked the original question, may I guide the discussion towards where I want?

Let me rephrase the question: if your teacher point to a single key on the piano keyboard, and ask you to play the key that's the interval of a major 6th above, and the key a major 6th below, how did you learn to do it instinctively, instantly, and almost without thinking?

What about the same question but interval of perfect 5th, and perfect 4th?

keystring

@iternabe - I'll go both ways.
When it comes to the exercise itself, I was trying to reframe your quest, because intervals might not be the only way of perceiving it. I gave the idea of seeing a series of minor triads descending chromatically, where the middle note is actually an octave below the middle note. I just tried it. I'm not super strong. I had to call out the name of my chord, and trying to play it through fine myself checking the score. --- A 2nd way I just tried was open 5ths and these are quasi automatic: then I only had to focus on the bottom note. This 2nd way may actually get to your question.

iternabe Let me rephrase the question: if your teacher point to a single key on the piano keyboard, and ask you to play the key that's the interval of a major 6th above, and the key a major 6th below,

I haven't been asked to do that, but I'll start with P5's which I just did, because a P6 is a whole tone away. So:

P5: You always have keys of the same colour, except for Bb F, and B F#. That's the same hand width every time more or less. The P5 is also the outer frame of any major or minor triad in root position. So if you can play your triads and leave out the middle, you have your P5s. If you can hear the quality, you'll also know whether you're correct. So: same colour keys except for the "odd fellows" Bb F, and B F#.

For the M6 for me it's P5 + two semitones (a skipped piano key). CA is a P6. so CG, then the next white key over skipping the black key. From the same CG, if I move down two semitones from the C I have Bb, so Bb G which is also a P6.

iternabe

keystring P5: You always have keys of the same colour, except for Bb F, and B F#. That's the same hand width every time more or less.

Bingo! We are on the same page here. Same color, a hand's width distance is something can be identified instantly without thinking.

However, to figure out major 6th by adding a whole step to the perfect 5th, that's too much thinking, and too slow. It's like learning a few land mark notes on the staff then count from them the other notes - too slow and don't always work in sight reading.

keystring

The P4, I think I expand it one semitone from M3. CE is m3. If I go up one more piano key from E I'll have CF. Or with the same CE, if I move down a semitone from the C then I'm no B and have BE.

Personally I'll also hear it like a V-I cadence as "So Do" so like C, F in the key of F major, but that may only be me.

iternabe

Maybe everyone is different. Here is how I get to do this for the interval of perfect 5th. Basically, I realized most of the perfect 5th is going to the same colored key, i.e. white to white, or black to black, with only two exceptions Bb->F, and B->F#. Knowing that, finding the key of perfect 5th above or below a given key I can do just by almost by instinct (well, there still is the eyeballing of distance, but that does not seem to require much thinking, either).

The goal is to be able to do the same for perfect 6th. If given time, I can figure out where they are without problem, by counting semitones, or by finding the 5th and add/subtract a whole step to it. But that's too slow!

I looked at this problem again tonight, and have found some rules that might help. Still, it's about first determining whether the 6th lands on the key of same color of different color, then finding the distance. If I look at the 12 keys in an octave as two parts, each is symmetrical with white keys on outside (C-C#-D-D#-E, F-F#-G-G#-A-A#-B), then:

for white keys, going up a 6th
-- the first two of each group will land on white key (e.g. C-A, D-B, F-D, G-E)
-- the third and fourth of each group will land on black key (E-C#, A-F#, B-G#)
for black keys, going up a 6th
-- the first one of each group will land on black key (C#-A#, F#-D#)
-- the other black keys in each group will land on a white key

Then, going down a 6th is a mirror image of this. The rule remains the same, but when I think "first" of each group, it's "first from the right side".

As I write this, I realized this is harder to write but actually not so complex when looking and poking at the keyboard. But if you try, you might get an idea what I trying to internalize.

And I am not sure if this is the most effective way to achieve instinctive identification of any interval's destination, hence my original question.

keystring

iternabe However, to figure out major 6th by adding a whole step to the perfect 5th, that's too much thinking, and too slow.

Not sure. For me it's an instant visual. However I have another ace up my sleeve which comes from my teacher.
If you can play fully diminished chords, the outer shell gives you a P6 (ignore spelling)
If you can play an augmented chord (again, ignore spelling) the outer shell gives you an m6.

(I've said to ignore spelling because we're after the distance in a pure way, by piano key and hand. I'm aware that for a Bm7b5 that Ab is a "dim7" as enharmonic equivalent to M6 but we're after the thing in the hand. Same for Caug where CG# is an aug5 but also enharmonic equivalent of m6 which we're after physically.)

BartK

First of all, I think you're way overthinking this. It's an exercise so you're supposed to practice it until the muscle memory of it becomes automatic. That's the whole point. Don't try to think through the logic of each interval. Just move your hand slowly to the next position and eventually it becomes automatic.

Second, I would never think of this in terms of intervals but in terms of chords. I always approach things like this, whether it's an exercise or an actual piece, by playing it blocked first. Granted you might not be able to reach a 10th to play it blocked but mentally you can still picture it as a blocked chord (imagine all three notes at once in your mind). Then, just note that your thumb goes down by semitone and let the remaining fingers follow.

iternabe

BartK Second, I would never think of this in terms of intervals but in terms of chords. … mentally you can still picture it as a blocked chord (imagine all three notes at once in your mind).

Thank you so much! What you suggested exposed another deficiency of mine that I also need to figure out. I can visualize triads that has all notes within one octave (closed position I believe they are called?), and the inversions if I think harder. But if any note of that chord is moved farther away (open position), recognizing it become so difficult for me.

For that exercise, I think in my earlier attempts I did try to see the chord in closed position the mentally pick the middle note and move it down one octave, but felt that mental gymnastics took too long, too. That’s what lead me to think interval.

@BartK so here is the new question: how did you learn to recognize open triads and inversions, like the second one in each measure here?

BartK

iternabe so here is the new question: how did you learn to recognize open triads and inversions, like the second one in each measure here?

Uh, tough question... I'm not sure actually. I suppose I did a lot of practicing of chords in all keys and sight read a gazillion hours of music. I really don't know how I did it. 😂

But perhaps contradicting my earlier statement if I were to sight read that I would recognize that the LH is just playing broken octaves and take the upper two notes with the RH. Maybe I'm misunderstanding how the exercise is to be played so sorry if that's the case.

iternabe

BartK Thank you again!

And don't worry about misunderstanding. I purposely avoided giving out details about that exercise. I am learning it from my teacher, and I feel there is a lot to that exercise that's hard to convey comprehensively just by showing the score or even the text of instruction. And I'd regret if anyone try it incorrectly and cause harm. But I felt safer isolating my difficulty to a simpler question - might be a wrong question now it seems, but you guys' answers help a great deal as always.

And I am having my weekly lesson with @Seeker today, so we will surely discuss this again.

keystring

BartK Maybe I'm misunderstanding how the exercise is to be played so sorry if that's the case.

I don't know if I can help. I have the book and have an idea. The point is kind of to train and retrain movement, reflexes for the body to work in a more optimum manner. This particular exercise focuses on movement, on what happens in the thumb and pinky for example, and gives certain things to aim for. Therefore in terms of "muscle memory" - you are in a sense building a memory or reflexes in the body by working in a particular way. Were I to first play this as block chords, then the stretch might itself became an association or memory which could then interfere with the exercise.

I understand Iternabe's wish to first own the notes before doing the exercise, because otherwise part of your focus will be away from the movement and reflexes. (if that makes sense)

My thinking is maybe to get a handle of a group of 3 or 4 - practice the exercise as intended for those - then another group of 3. If one can't hold on to all 12, can one hold on to less? (My original thought had also been along chords as a first step. Then had some other variants.)