8. Continuity Rule

When practicing one segment, always include the beginning of the following segment. This continuity rule ensures that when you have learned two adjacent segments, you can also play them together. It applies to any segment you isolate for practice, such as a bar, an entire movement, or even to segments smaller than a bar. A generalization of the continuity rule is that any passage may be broken up into short segments for practice, but these segments must overlap. The overlapping note or group of notes is called the conjunction. If you are practicing the end of the first movement, then include a few bars of the beginning of the second movement. During a recital, you will be glad that you had practiced in this way; otherwise, you might suddenly find yourself stumped on how to start the 2nd movement!

We can now apply the continuity rule to those difficult interruptions in Für Elise. To practice bar 53, add the first note of bar 54 (E played with finger 1), which is the conjunction. Since all the difficult sections are for the RH, find some LH material to practice, even from a different piece of music, in order to give the RH periodic rests by switching hands.