Octave in a triplet? How would I do that?

Question

I am learning the left hand of Blumenlied by Gustav Lange and I notice something very tricky in the left hand. An octave starting a triplet. Here is how I have been playing that rhythm in the F major section:

Octave staccato, 2 sixteenths in a triplet with the first eighth, extend last eighth.

Now I realize that is wrong but with all those leaps and octaves, I don't see any other way. The first leap is almost a whole octave.

Here is the part I am talking about:

You see that octave starting every triplet? That, I find is the trickiest part of the entire piece. Trickier than even the octave passages in the right hand of the Bb major section of the piece. Trickier than the 16th note rhythm in the D minor and Bb major sections.

How would I play a triplet that starts with an octave and then leaps to the 2 notes after that octave? I can only see playing the octave staccato which would not be noticeable since I have the pedal pressed. It would sound legato without being 100% legato. But that leads to me putting the first eighth note in the sixteenth note triplet and play that eighth shorter than a regular eighth and thus extending the eighth after that.

Answer 1

You are right, you have the pedal pressed so you can play the notes staccato.

I don't really understand the question. You play the octave and the following two notes of the triplet in exactly the same rhythm as if they were just three single notes. The only "problem" is that you have to move your whole arm to get from the octave to the following two notes.

Remembering your videos about playing a Chopin etude (sorry, I can't be bothered to look it up and post a link!) you seemed to be hung up about trying to reach notes with your fingers when that is physically impossible.

That is a very bad idea, because if your fingers are stretched out to the maximum extent in a futile attempt to reach the notes, the tension will lock up your wrist and arm so you can't reach them using a way that does work - i.e. moving your arm.

The fingering for the first bar left hand would be

1/5 (arm jump!) 3 2 1 1/2/3 (arm jump!) 
1/5 (arm jump!) 3 2 1 1/2/3 (arm jump!) etc

A video where you can see what the player is doing is worth 1,000 words of description - though it's not the most "musical" performance of the piece I've ever heard!