Lesson 273

The Wild Horseman: B Section: Right Hand

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Hello and welcome back. I'm Joseph Hoffman, and in this lesson we're going to learn how to play the right hand part for the B section of Schumann's "The Wild Horseman," which is his Opus 68 No. 8. Let's check out the score to get started. It's time for some chord analysis. I'd like you to first figure out what is the name of this chord? If you said F major, you're correct. How did I know that's an F major chord? Well, we've got a C on the bottom, F, A, and if I see that fourth, that tells me I've got an inversion. I can put the C on top, and that shows me, aha, F major chord. Then I have another F major triad, and then more F major we're just leaving off the C this time. Why is that? Well, the left hand is playing a C, and Schumann knew that the right hand would be getting in the way of the left hand and so Schumann left off the C for these three chords there. Now it's no big surprise that Schumann is using an F major triad here because what is the left hand doing? Remember, we saw last time that the left hand was also just going through an F major arpeggio through measures nine and ten. Now let's check out the rhythm for the right hand part. Can you tap it with me while we count each beat? Remember, since we are in 6/8 meter, eighth notes equal 1 beat. That bottom number of a time signature tells you what kind of note equals 1 beat. So an eighth note equals 1 beat, and eighth rest will also get a beat. So this would be 1 2 3 4 5 6. Quarter notes now get 2 beats. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Tap it with me, ready go. 1 2 3 4 5 6, 1 2 3 4 5 6 Now pause the video and try to play measures nine and ten right hand alone using the correct fingering. Notice you've got to shift your hand here. Fingers 1 and 3 your finger 1 was on middle C here, but you're going to shift up and that will get you ready for the next line. So follow the fingering, follow the notes while you count the beat out loud. Play the right hand part alone on your own, then press play and we'll look at it together. Let's check out measures nine and ten. The right hand is right here, and we have 1 2 3 4 5 6, and then we have to shift fingers 1 and 3 up to here. 1 2 3 4 5 6, let's try that together. I'll count 6 beats to get us ready, and then we'll start right here at the beginning of measure nine. 1 2 3 4 5 6, 1 2 3 4 5 6 , 1 2 3 4 5 6 Pause if you need more practice with that, otherwise let's go on. What do you see here in measure twelve? What kind of chord? Can you tell me its name? If you said C major first inversion, you're correct! This is a C major first inversion chord. 1 2 3 4 5 6. Now your turn. Ready, go. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Let's try it together. Ready, go: 1 2 3 4 5 6 Now what chord do you see here on the downbeat of measure thirteen? This is an F major triad. Is it root position, first inversion, or second inversion? If you said root position, you're correct. This is root position. Now you try. Let's do it again. 1 2 3 4 5 6. Your turn. Now pause the video, and on your own work from measure nine all the way to measure thirteen. And I'd like to count the beat out loud as you play to work on the rhythm as well as the notes. Play measures nine through thirteen while counting the beat, right hand part, and then press play to go on. Now let's take a look at measure thirteen hands together. We just learned the right hand part here is and notice how you have to shift your finger 1 down to this E to get this last chord 1 2 3 4 5 6, and on 5 make sure you lift up for that eighth rest. 1 2 3 4 5 6 What is the left hand doing here? We have 1 2 3 4 5, and we're going to leave off the pickup note, which brings us into the next measure. Then hands together we get 1 2 3 4 5, and we'll stop there on beat 5. Now this is what I call a challenge zone. A challenge zone is a really tricky spot. That is a challenge, but if you conquer the challenge you can make a challenge zone an easy spot. You just have to do it enough times. I find that this is really tricky at first, but eventually if you do it 20, 30, 40 times you're going to get really, really good at it. So I'd like you to pause the video and work the right hand alone, the left hand alone, and then in slow motion play this. I'd like you to do it 10 times, which is going to kind of drive you crazy, but hey I promise if you'll really attack and work hard on these challenge zones, you're going to be able to play it amazingly well. Pause to do that 10 times, and then press play to go on. Now let's go back to the pickup to measure nine, and look at the rest hands together. We have: Now I'm going to give you a choice. You can pause now to work on some of that or all of that hands together, or if you'd like to save that for later in the week that's fine too. It's up to you. If you're ready to keep going, let's look at the next phrase hands together. And this I would also call a challenge zone here in measure seventeen. So let's look at it. What is the right hand doing now? We have this F major second inversion chord. So try playing that. And it's staccato. And then what? What interval do you see here on beat 3? If you said a fifth, you're correct. So we have C and G, and since we already used finger 5 on the A, I'm going to use finger 4. That's what the score is telling us a ...