PianoTell Recital #2 Is Now Live!

iternabe — O mio babbino caro
That was beautifully and fluidly played, you have made amazing progress in just 10 months. I love this gentle arrangement - in fact I prefer this to the original version!
keff — Over the Rainbow
A different take on a popular film classic, very well played.
plop_symphony — The Midnight Ball
A fun piece for Halloween, with suspenseful passages. You play very well.
Schubertian2 — Ballade 4
This is Chopin - so enough said, it's not for the faint hearted but you rose to the challenge and that was a stellar performance. Your lifetime of playing piano has not been wasted. The featured works of art were perfect to accompany this Chopin masterpiece.
WieWaldi — Quick Five Blues
I enjoyed listening to this selection from your Blues lesson pieces, you play in a very relaxed and confident manner. Ironically, this music made me feel far from blue - it's more like a cure for the blues.
Nightowl — What A Wonderful World
Having listened to some of the other submissions, the limits of my skill are painfully evident. In fact, my playing sounds so stilted here that I'm tempted to remove the video from YT, but that would be against the spirit of what the recital is about - players of all abilities putting their work forward in a safe space where they can receive feedback.
Sophia — A Classy Rag
That was very well played, with precision, confidence and flair - you nailed it! Your playing is in a different league to what would normally be expected after less than a year of playing (although I know you had previous attempts to learn piano, but even so this is something else). You never fail to impress me.
rogerch — Slow Steps
That was beautiful, melancholy and melodious. You are incredibly talented. I love your piano too, the colour of the wood is beautiful and it seems to have a very rich, mellow tone. After watching your performance I am full of envy and admiration, on so many levels.

Well, that's enough for now. More comments later.

rogerch You had in mind to use minor subdominants? Your thinking about improvisation is getting more sophisticated. Glad to hear more of your progress!

Sam Love your use of inversions. The deceptive cadences continually surprised me! Hope your hip is doing better. What a chair!

Rob First section flows so well. The middle section sounds like it's going to be a change of mood, but it returns quickly to the original theme. Loved it.

TC3 I think this is my favorite recording of yours so far. Good arrangement--simple and varied. Your singing voice is also really good on this! It sounds relaxed and confident.

diretonic I can see why you think it's a little busy in places, but I hope you don't tweak it too much because it sounds really good. I particularly like the way you juggle in the middle voice(s).

@TC3 I didn't expect the singing! Great and entertaining!

And @rsl12, that song brings me back to the original Frasier series. Good job!

I hereby declare TC3 and rsl12 as the twin peaks of piano+singing entertainment here.

Rubens I hereby declare TC3 and rsl12 as the twin peaks of piano+singing entertainment here.

I haven’t listened to either yet, but the fact that both feature such a happy, lovely smile tells me you are on to something!

rsl12 Bravo Major General!

TC3 Bravo

thepianoplayer416 — When You Wish Upon a Star
That's a pretty piece, which is harder to play than it first seems. There were some slight irregularities with the tempo but it was nonetheless enjoyable.
Sam — The Never Finished Piece
That was a nice relaxing piece which could be used as the music score for a romantic drama series. Your experience shows and is paying dividends.
MarieJ — Waltz in F minor
I love a waltz and this one was no exception. Beautifully played and the artwork was great too.
Player1 — Ashokan Farewell
That's a lovely piece which I'd never heard before and it's just the kind of music I enjoy. There were some hesitations but you played with a delicate touch and I liked it very much.
Rubens — Sonata no.2, Op.36 (1913), 2nd movement
Another piece that was new to my ears, which you played very well. You captured the mysterious mood of this piece beautifully.
Cratersmash — Sonata No. 3 in A Minor
This piece is so complex that I'd not be able to play it in a million years. You played it well - impressive work.

Congratulations everybody! What a great playlist for listening to in the next few days!
Also, thank you @navindra for all that you do – this forum with its recitals is one of the best things ever

navindra I never tire of this tune, it’s so cheerful and energetic! I like your tempo and dynamic choices. And listening to your highly enjoyable playing has made me smile and want to jump and go to the piano and try to play it too!

plop_symphony — The Midnight Ball
This one was really spooky - a very nice match to Halloween. I just couldn't tell if you played here and there a mistake, but it sounded so off, to be good again. Guess this was the way the sheet music told you to play.

@Nightowl Thank you!!

Nightowl WieWaldi — Quick Five Blues
I enjoyed listening to this selection from your Blues lesson pieces, you play in a very relaxed and confident manner. Ironically, this music made me feel far from blue - it's more like a cure for the blues.

Thank you for your kind words , Nightowl. It is interesting that someone like you, never getting tired to claim that Blues isn't the genre of favour, quite often likes a Blues. I could consider this as a compliment (thank you again), or state the following:

Nightowl — What A Wonderful World

This is indeed a very nice song - love it. And it contains:
(drum roll)
A Blues Scale!
Actually I heard besides the Blues scale a lot of Blues elements in your piece. And I had to look up in wikipedia about its genre: It says "pop". Ok, we can forget about pop, because you can basically consider every song as pop, when it was popular at its time. Same is true for Mozart - back in his days his music was pop music.
The second mentioned genre is:
(drum roll again)
Rhythm & Blues . A progression of the Blues genre! Blues itself is IMO the easiest genre of all - except of nursery rhymes maybe. But the children of Blues (Boogie, Rock, Jazz, R&B) aren't that easy anymore. You played a quite long piece from a not so easy genre, I mean over 2¹/₂ minutes. Here and there, you hesitated a bit and some notes came a bit late. Still, you hit the essence of this piece. With less than 1 year of self-teaching, I call this really impressive. Give yourself a big hug and then some taps on your shoulder, you can be proud of your progress.

One thing I can not tell for sure is your sitting position in front of the piano. I can't tell for sure because I see only your hands, but I have the impression you are sitting quite low. This makes playing a lot harder, especially for beginners. I don't want to step into this deeper, but if you need help, there is a wonderful piano forum with a lot of amazing players, willing to help you, if you ask...

rogerch — Slow Steps

Roger You know you are my living example to get to improvisation, right? But every time you set that bar higher because you are improving in strides Very nice and you are right, the chord is beautiful and fits well into the piece. Very impressive!

rogerch — Slow Steps
One can really tell, you are enjoying to improvise. It looks like a fish in the water. I've heard this style of impro already from you, last time it was good, this time it is good again. Just different, but still with your own signature.
I enjoyed to listen to the beautiful sound, the warmth, the harmony, you did very well changing between Major and minor, here and there (at least I believe, you did). You made a good mix between repeating the known melodies to please the listener and introducing new themes to keep in interesting. I'd call this well rounded improvisation again.
Well done, Roger, I bow to you in respect!

thepianoplayer416 — When You Wish Upon a Star

Such a lovely melody (one of my favourites) and well played! And you did that robot voice thingie again It was also nice that you provided the lyrics. Very enjoyable performance, thank you!

Sam — The Never Finished Piece

It sounds very familiar and yet it isn't... because it came straight from your brain And even though you called it "Never finished piece", it finished all too soon ^_^ I half expected you'd just stop mid bar, but no, you did give it a proper ending, haha. Very nice and gentle piece!