Content

• Steps
• Tips

Sight Reading is one of the most important things you need to know to be a good performer on the musical instrument of your choice. Only the ability to play is more important. At almost every audition where you will ever take part, the reading of the sheet music will be included in one form or another. Most of the reading of sheet music is not pure sheet reading. Sight-reading is playing music the very first time you play or sing from the sheet music. Sight-singing requires a completely different set of skills in addition to being able to read sheet music. Most often, you are allowed to view music for a time between thirty seconds and ten minutes. The method for correct sight reading is not entirely difficult. If you have time for each step, then this is a skill you can master.

Steps

1. 1 Find sight-reading music. You can find music for your instrument and difficulty level in books and music stores. There are even sight reading websites that offer music to help you practice sight reading. If you have a finished piece of music ...
2. 2 Nervousness causes the most problems in sight-reading. This can lead to an unclean note, excessive vibrato, or erroneous tempo - mistakes that you must avoid at all costs. Relax, take a deep breath, and start looking at the notes.
3. 3 Read the title of the piece. While you may think that this will not help you actually play the piece, it does help. The title summarizes the entire play in a few descriptive words. If you don't read the title, then you are missing out on a key advantage in understanding the mood of the piece and the emotion that you have to put into it. Provided there is a title, you must always read it before you read the sheet music. You can also think about the composer of the piece to get an idea of ​​the time in which the piece was written and the composer's style. Knowing the historical period can help you anticipate signs of alteration and strange dissonances.
4. 4 Look at the pace. Most often, the tempo will be given at the top of the piece, next to the composer's name. Sometimes the tempo indication will be more vague, like simply indicating "Slow" or "Jazz", and sometimes it will be much more accurate, for example "Moderately slow with a little swing, a quarter equals seventy-two." Regardless of how the pace is determined, every effort must be made to follow it. Some freedom is usually given to slow down or speed up in order to better express emotions or feelings. But when you play or sing a piece, you must be surethat people, listening to you, understand what you have done by looking at the pace.
5. 5 Check the size. Always look at the time signature, whether you are reading these notes for the first time or the thousandth. There is a huge difference between the 6/8 and 4/4 sizes. If you don't look at size and play at 4/4, people might think you don't really know how to play six-eighths.
6. 6 Check out key signs. Playing with the wrong signs on the key will create dissonances and the feeling that you cannot read the key signs.
7. 7 Look for changes. Is there a new key in the middle of the piece? What about time? Whether there is a accelerando(gradually increasing the pace) or ritard (slow down)? Pay special attention to them and do not forget to check all of them. If you are allowed to hold notes, you must emphasize them in the notes. If you are not the only person who will sight-read, never do not mark the notes. There may be places where you have to play faster or slower, quieter or louder to match the style of the piece. They cannot be marked in the notes. Add these small changes as long as it fits the style, because people will understand that you know when to change something to make the piece sound better.
8. 8 Check the dynamics. It is very important to start on forte (loudly) if it is written in the play, and not piano (quietly), because then the piece may need to be played more quietly, and if you are already on pianothen there is not much opportunity to move on until you can no longer be heard. Conversely, if the play requires you to start at piano, don't start louder! If a piece requires a certain dynamic, you can be pretty sure it is meant to be very obvious. If there is no marking at the beginning, look ahead to know what will happen later and decide on that basis. If there is no dynamics in the whole piece, then it is best to start mezzo-forte (moderately loud) and play louder or softer when needed.
9. 9 Look at the beginning. Pay special attention to the first few bars of the music — look at them at least three times before playing. A confident start is the key to making sure the music sounds right. The first line is often repeated several times in a piece, so it is imperative to understand this before moving on. Sing the first line in your mind. This will help you understand the style of music more easily than if you read the sheet music.
10. 10 Pay attention to simple rhythmic patterns. If you you knowthat you can play one rhythm, just watch it. If this is the rhythm you saw in the piece earlier, then you can compare them. This is a common mistake. You can see the same rhythms when the composer actually made changes to one of the notes.
11. 11 Read the very last line. This is the play's conclusion, and it tends to be very different from the rest of the play and purposefully harder than the rest of the play to make it stronger for a dramatic finish. The beginning and the end are vital. The introduction opens the music to a good start, and the ending guarantees the listener a strong music experience.
12. 12 Read the introduction again. After watching the entire piece, you have a dozen rhythms in your head and hundreds of notes, so the first thing you forget will be the very first thing you watched in the beginning. If you've forgotten the beginning so quickly, you might ask - why do you need to stare at the beginning so much in the first place? Simply put, a last glance at the beginning will remind you of everything that you remember at a glance.
13. 13 Start playing. If your instrument has tuning problems, such as the F tuning of the English horn, pay close attention to the beginning of the part. It is not uncommon for inexperienced readers to sight-start on a note higher or lower than the one written and continue to play the wrong notes in that part and even throughout the piece. If you start off on the wrong note, you need to fix it immediately.
14. 14 Play slowly. By using a slow, practice-friendly pace, you will actually learn a lot faster than if you play too fast, you will miss notes and make mistakes, from which you must then "relearn". However, if you make mistakes, keep playing! Dont be upset. Just do the best that you can do. Any of us can do it. Learn from your mistakes!
15. 15 Develop the habit of looking slightly ahead the notes you play. You always need to have a little time to look over the notes, to understand, and then to play. It's almost impossible to do it all at once, so good sight readers try to focus on the notes a little ahead of them to give themselves time to understand the notes. The good news is, you are already using this ability in many other activities (walking, cycling, etc.). When you master reading forward, you may find that you can see entire groups of notes, and even entire bars, as separate "chunks" in advance! And sight reading becomes much more natural and enjoyable.

Tips

• Most musicians are perfectionists. Sight-reading should be 85-90% happy. There is no time to fix bugs or stop!
• Be patient! Don't feel like you have to rush to play as fast as some of your colleagues and classmates! Reading music is very important, especially if you have plans for a music career in the future. If you are in a hurry, it will be more difficult for you to move forward as you would like.
• Relax, you will do better if you feel comfortable.
• Build, build, build! While most people can't tell the difference between slender notes and slightly out-of-tune notes, it is important to keep your instrument in tune. Your instrument is designed to produce the best sounds when it is properly tuned. If you are playing with an ensemble, it will be especially painful for the listeners if you play out of tune with other musicians.
• Keeping the tempo right is more important than playing the right notes. If you play a couple of wrong notes (it happens!), At least it will sound like a piece of music.
• Look at the sequences of notes. Does the piece contain arpeggios or is it organized around a single note? Are there repetitive rhythms?
• Focus on getting the rhythm right first. There is an endless mix of rhythms, but there are not many notes.
• Smile, be friendly and polite to the jury and audience.
• Try to read everything you can get your hands on. There are several excellent sight reading websites that offer exercises of varying degrees of difficulty to suit your needs.
• Wind instruments, empty your saliva valves before sight reading, woodwind players, eliminate saliva from your reeds beforehand.
• Practice creates perfection! If you practice for at least 30 minutes a day, the music will be much better. Start with scales and then move on to pieces. You need to warm up first.
• If you play brass instruments, lubricate the valves soon, but not immediately before sight reading.
• If you play the clarinet or saxophone, check your reeds constantly before sight-reading. Kicks anytime is bad, but sight-reading kicks can kill something that was pretty decent at an audition, even if it's not your fault.
• Although many instruments only play in one key, check the key in the piece. It may happen that you read the notes in the bass clef, although they are written in the treble, or read in the treble, although they are written in the bass.
• French horn players, (especially at orchestral auditions), check the key! Transposition is an essential skill. It is very bad to play a piece in the key of F major when it is written in the key of C major.
• It is recommended that you use a program such as PrestoKeys (a game that can greatly speed up the process of learning to read piano scores).