Practice Guide for Rachmaninovs Prelude Op. 23 No.

5
I. Jumps

Consider this jump:

Heres one way to practice this jump.

(1) Quietly play the third chord in the jump:

Mentally scan your fingers, hands, arms, and shoulders. Be aware of their positions.
(2) Once those positions are clear to your mind, play the same chord again, but this
time, by dropping your hands on the keys from a height of around three inches.
Make sure you are dropping your hands and not intentionally moving them - let
gravity do the work. Play the chord several times in a row without a mistake.

Each time you play the chord, again, mentally scan your fingers, hands, arms, and
shoulders. Be aware of their positions.
(3) Next, play the chords of the jump this way:

When moving from the second to the third chord, move your hands through the air
in an arc-like path. (The arc should be low.) The third chord should be played by
dropping your hands, as in the previous step.
Again, be aware of how your fingers, hands, arms, and shoulders feel. Do this at a
slow, relaxed speed several times, until you can consistently play the third chord
accurately and comfortably.
(4) Once you can do that, start playing the passage in the previous step faster and
faster, accelerating in small increments. Always make sure your hands follow an arclike path, and the third chord is played by dropping your hand.
Note that the faster you play the passage, the less visible the arc and the drop will
be.
Continue accelerating until you sense that your body is not ready to go any faster.
Tip: Between repetitions of the passage, stop and breathe. This helps
keep your mind relaxed and focused.
Tip: If you start missing the third chord, slow down to a speed where you
can consistently hit that chord. Repeat the passage several times at this
slower speed.

(5) Repeat step three. This helps your mind review in slow-motion how the jump
feels.
Go through these steps every day. Lasting improvement rarely comes from a single
day of practice.

The same steps can be applied to all similar jumps throughout the whole piece,
such as these:

Finally, fill in the following table to keep track of your progress.

June
20

June
21

June
22

June
23

June
24

June
25

June
26

June
27

June
28

June
29

June
30

July 1

July 2

July 3

July 4

July 5

Practiced
Jumps on Page
1
Practiced
Jumps on Page
2
Practiced
Jumps on Page
4
Practiced
Jumps on Page
5
Practiced
Jumps on Page
6

Practiced
Jumps on Page
1
Practiced
Jumps on Page
2
Practiced
Jumps on Page
4
Practiced
Jumps on Page
5
Practiced
Jumps on Page
6

II. Left Hand Arpeggios

Consider this left hand arpeggio:

Heres one way to practice this arpeggio.

(1) Play the arpeggio in this rhythm:

Make sure that you use the correct fingering and that your fingers, hands, wrists,
and arms are relaxed. Your wrists need to be especially loose and relaxed here. Play
this several times in a row without any mistakes.
(2) Next, play the arpeggio in this rhythm:

The comments from the previous step apply here too.

(3) Next, play the arpeggio in this rhythm:

The comments from step one also apply here.

(4) Finally, play the arpeggio as is, plus the first note of the next arpeggio:

Keep repeating the pattern until you can play it several times without any mistakes.
Go through these three steps every day. Again, lasting improvement rarely comes
from a single day of practice.
These steps can be applied to the arpeggios on page three and four. Feel free to
modify the practice patterns to suit the arpeggios on the score.
Finally, fill in the following table to keep track of your progress.
June
20
Practiced
Arpeggios on

June
21

June
22

June
23

June
24

June
25

June
26

June
27

Page 3
Practiced
Arpeggios on
Page 4

June
28

June
29

June
30

July 1

July 2

July 3

July 4

July 5

Practiced
Arpeggios on
Page 3
Practiced
Arpeggios on
Page 4

Other Practice Tips:

(1) Make a table similar to those used in this practice guide to keep track
which sections of the piece you have been working on. If you have a
metronome, you may fi ll in each box with the fastest comfortable speed
at which you practiced the corresponding section.
(2) Dont spend a lot of time practicing sections you are comfortable with.
Spend more time fi xing problematic spots or learning new sections.
(3) As much as possible, focus on the music while you practice. If you are
distracted by other thoughts, your practice time will be less effi cient.
(4) Always listen to the sound of your playing. You should always be
aware of how loudly or softly you are playing, of whether you can hear the
melody over the accompaniment, and so on.
(5) Practice shorter sections of music fi rst. Once these smaller sections
are mastered, put them together to play longer sections. If you cannot
play shorter sections of a musical passage, you will be unlikely to play the
whole passage itself.