Advanced sight-reading: two staves, simplifying, accompanying

At an advanced level, sight-reading becomes an art of quick decisions: you read two staves, sometimes three (voice + piano), you look one or two bars ahead, and you choose in real time what is essential and what can be sacrificed. Professional accompanists don't always play every note: they always play the music.

Reading two staves: vertically, then horizontally

Read in vertical slices: on each beat, what sounds together in both hands? Then spot the horizontal lines (melody, bass). The eye moves back and forth quickly, but it gets used to seeing the whole as a single system.

• Read the bass first: it carries the harmony and the structure.
• Recognise the chord on each beat rather than isolated notes.
• The melody, usually the top voice, is read by intervals.

Reading one or two bars ahead

Train your "eye-hand span": while you play one bar, your eyes finish reading the next. Exercise: a friend (or a sheet of paper) covers the bar you are playing; you are forced to play from immediate memory what you have just read, while reading further on.

Simplifying on the fly

Here is a written passage, then the simplified version a good sight-reader would play if the left hand were too busy:

M:4/4
L:1/8
Q:1/4=76
K:G
%%staves {RH LH}
V:RH clef=treble
V:LH clef=bass
[V:RH] B2 d2 g4 | a2 g2 f2 e2 | d2 B2 c2 A2 | G8 |]
[V:LH] G,,D,B,D, G,,D,B,D, | C,G,E,G, D,A,F,A, | G,,D,B,D, D,A,F,A, | [G,,D,G,]8 |]

M:4/4
L:1/8
Q:1/4=76
K:G
%%staves {RH LH}
V:RH clef=treble
V:LH clef=bass
[V:RH] B2 d2 g4 | a2 g2 f2 e2 | d2 B2 c2 A2 | G8 |]
[V:LH] G,,8 | C,4 D,4 | G,,4 D,4 | G,,8 |]

The melody is intact, and so are the harmony and the harmonic rhythm: only the left-hand figuration has gone. Order of what to keep:

1. The pulse.
2. The melody (or the soloist's part you are accompanying).
3. The bass (at least the first beat of each bar).
4. The inner harmony notes.
5. Ornaments and doublings, last.

Accompanying

When accompanying a singer or instrumentalist, you read three staves: the solo part (on top) and the two piano staves. Glance regularly at the solo part to know where they are, breathe with them and follow their rallentandos. Your role: a stable harmonic carpet that never stops. If you lose your place, find the soloist and rejoin them on the next strong beat, even with a single chord.

Exercise

Take a two-stave piece you don't know (for instance a chorale or a piece from a collection). Play it three times: 1) melody + bass only; 2) melody + bass + one inner note; 3) everything, at the same tempo. Complement this with reading in both clefs and ledger-line reading.