(45) Sight Reading, Sight Singing, Composing
Sight reading means playing unfamiliar music, by reading the sheet music at the correct speed, and is a skill that is distinct from mere reading at slower speeds to learn a new composition. Beginning students should be taught reading first, then memorizing, and then sight reading. At advanced levels, sight reading involves the application of basic music theory, such as chord progressions and harmonies. Here are the basic rules for sight reading (see Richman for more details):
(1) Keep the eyes on the music; do not look at the keyboard/fingers. Glance at the hands occasionally when necessary for large jumps. Develop a peripheral vision so that you have some idea of where the hands are while still looking at the score, and can keep track of both hands simultaneously. Feel the keys before playing them; although this applies whether you are sight reading or just reading, it is critical in sight reading. Try to "get there ahead of time"for jumps; therefore, practice the jump maneuvers [Jumps, PP, FF].
(2) Learn all the common musical constructs: Alberti bass, major and minor scales and their fingerings as well as the arpeggios, common chords and chord transitions, common trills, ornaments, etc. When sight reading, you should recognize the constructs or phrases and not read the individual notes. Memorize the locations of those very high and very low notes as they appear on the score so that you can find them instantly. For those notes high above (or below) the staves, start by memorizing all the octave C's, then fill in the others, beginning with notes closest to the C's.
(3) Look ahead of where you are playing, about one bar, or even more, as you develop the skill at reading the music structure. Get to the point where you can read one structure ahead so that you can anticipate fingering problems and can avoid getting yourself into impossible situations. Although fingering suggestions on the music are generally helpful, they are often useless for sight reading because, although they may be the best fingerings, you may not be able to use them without some practice, and may not have time to figure them out. Therefore, develop your own set of fingerings for sight reading. Learn sight-singing (below).
(4) Play through mistakes and make them as inaudible as possible. The best way to do this is to make it sound as if you had modified the music -- then the audience does not know whether you made a mistake or changed it, especially because you will often have to simplify things that are too complex to sight read. This is why students with basic music theory training will have an advantage in sight reading. Three ways to make mistakes less audible are (i) keep the rhythm intact, (ii) maintain a continuous melody (if you can't read everything, carry the melody and omit the accompaniment), and (iii) practice simplifying those parts that are too complicated to sight read. For advanced sight readers, the most powerful tool is the ability to simplify the music: eliminate ornamentals, fish out the melody from fast runs, etc.
(5) "Practice, practice, practice". Although sight reading is relatively easy to learn, it must be practiced every day in order to improve. It will take most students from one to two years of diligent practice to become good. Because sight reading depends so heavily on recognition of structures, it is closely related to memory. You can lose the sight reading ability if you stop practicing; however, just as with memory, if you become a good sight reader when young, you will be good all your life.
Keep adding to the "tricks of the trade" as you improve. Practice the art of scanning through a composition before sight reading it, in order to get some feel for how difficult it is. Then you can figure out ahead of time how to get around the "impossible" sections. You can even practice it quickly, using a condensed version of the learning tricks (HS, shorten difficult segments, use parallel sets, etc.), just enough to make it sound passable. I have met sight readers who would talk to me about some sections of a new piece for a while, then play through an entire piece with no trouble. I later realized that they were practicing those sections in the few seconds they had while they were distracting me with their "discussions".
Gather several books with easy pieces. Because it is initially easier to practice "sight reading" with familiar pieces, you can use the same compositions to practice sight reading several times, a week or more apart. This will familiarize you with common constructs and phrases. "Sonatina" books, Mozart's easier sonatas, and books of easy popular songs, are good books for practicing. For the easiest pieces, you might use the beginner books, or the easiest Bach pieces. Although you can develop a lot of sight reading skills with familiar pieces, you must eventually practice with pieces that you had never seen before in order to develop true sight reading skills. The most useful skill for help with true sight reading is sight singing, or solfege. Learning absolute pitch is one of the best ways to develop sight singing.
Sight singing and composing: To be able to write down a music or your composition, it is necessary to study dictation (solfege [(68) Theory, Solfege]). Practice dictation by practicing sight singing. Take any music and read a few bars and sing it or play it using MP. Then check it out on the piano. If you do this with enough music that you had never heard before, you will learn sight singing and develop the dictation skills. You just have to keep doing this until you get the hang of it, because it will be of invaluable help to you as a pianist all your life.
For practicing to play "by ear", practice sight reading. Once you become fairly good at sight reading (this may take over 6 months), start playing out your own melodies on the piano. The idea behind learning sight reading is to familiarize yourself with common runs, chords, accompaniments, etc., so that you can find them quickly on the piano. Another way is to start playing from fake books and practicing improvisation. Every teacher should incorporate sight singing and play by ear lessons into every lesson session, even for just a few minutes, and encourage the students to practice them at home.
When composing, don't worry if at first you find it difficult to start a piece or end it – there are simple solutions you can learn quickly later. Start by building a collection of ideas that you can later assemble into a composition. Don't worry that you have never had any lessons in composition; it is best to develop your own style first, then study composition to help you to nurture that style and to solve problems such as making your music longer or finding an ending. Music never comes "on demand", which can be frustrating; therefore, when ideas come, you must work on them immediately.
Composing at a good concert grand can be inspirational. Although digital pianos are adequate for composing popular music and practicing jazz improvisations, a quality grand can be very helpful when composing high level (classical) music.
Once you have composed for several years, start taking composition lessons. Don't try to learn all the composition rules at once, but learn them as you need them. Mental play skills are necessary for composing; not having absolute pitch will be a major handicap.