Die Schwalbe - Friedrich Bergmüller

Seeker

I'm starting another playlist of pieces for students and advanced beginners through intermediate level players.
I think I've hit the "sweet" spot on the microphone placement, and I've opened the piano just a bit with a little wooden block that you can see highlighted in this screenshot.

Quoting from the text I posted with the video: "The Vienna urtext for this piece has a metronome mark of quarter = 138. I confess to pushing past that to 146. Was that `Bergmüller's own mark? Probably not, what he did write in the score was "Allegro non troppo", which might have been better said as "Allegro ma non troppo", but I digress. In any event, I have opted for a spirited Allegro close to the middle of the metronome range known as "Allegro".

Seems like once I hit 138, my fingers just wanted to go a little faster😅.

I'm a big fan of the Bergmüller Etudes. They have repetition in them, like Hanon, but Bergmüller combines repetitive passages with other musical elements in a rather engaging way. It's not just exercises.

Hope you like it.

Sophia

Seeker It's not just exercises.

I hear that! Very pretty indeed, doesn't sound like an exercise whatsoever. The second one you linked to is even prettier. Thanks for sharing - once I finish my Alfred book I now have even more options to choose from for further learning. Not sure if I should be grateful for having so many options, or frightened of having too many options (joking! joking!!!) 😃

Josephine

Thanks for your performance, I really enjoyed it! The tempo sounds perfect to me.
I never played Burgmüller. I do have sheetmusic I think.
I just checked, I have Op. 109. I should play one. But which one 🤔🙂

Gooseberry

Josephine I have Op. 109. I should play one. But which one

From Op. 109 I like Berceuse (no. 7), La cloche des matines (no. 9) and La serenade (no. 11), but these are too difficult for me to even try. But you are much more advanced, so I'm sure you could play them 🙂
I am now learning L'Arabesque from Op. 100, and then Ballade from the same opus.

Seeker

Gooseberry Thanks for the recommendations. I like "La cloche des matines" too. I'll add that to my learn list. I did see a nice recording by pianist Fausto Bongelli on YT here:

I posted to his comments that I liked the performance and asked him about the very nice Yamaha piano he was playing. I'll see what I can do with the piece.

As to what you might learn - definitely start with Op.100. The very first one is useful, and if you were studying with me, after you proudly came to a lesson with it prepared, I would shake up your day by asking you to play it in 3 different keys... Do consider giving that sort of thing a try. If you keep what you are playing simple enough, it saves brain cells for the transposition, and you will give yourself the advantage of knowing what those keys feel like under your fingers, too.

Josephine

Gooseberry

I really like the pieces you mentioned, especially la cloche des matines. I do think you can try Op 109 by the way. Your recordings are always so good. And you have a very beautiful touch and tone.

Gooseberry

Seeker Yes, I believe Fausto Bongelli recorded the whole opus 100 and 109 by Burgmuller. I’m very much looking forward to listening to your interpretation of La cloche des matines! 😀

Seeker I would shake up your day by asking you to play it in 3 different keys... Do consider giving that sort of thing a try.

Thank you for the hint, I will try transposition at some point for sure. For now though it might be too big a shake-up for me – the mere process of learning the pieces as they are is sometimes quite overwhelming...

Gooseberry

Josephine Thank you so much, you are too kind! 🥰
But I have already crushed and burned trying to play too difficult pieces several times, so at least for this year I have decided to stay in the more or less safe zone by tackling pieces that I know I can learn with a reasonable amount of effort, and only sometimes adjusting (i.e. slowing down) the indicated tempo to my own abilities and preferences (like in Burgmuller, where the original tempo seems sometimes quite crazy or even unpleasant to me).

Seeker

Gooseberry I don't know how you learn new pieces, but... if you take a phrase, or a motif at a time, that can be helpful. And, e.g., if something is in C major, doing just one hand of that C major 2 or 4 bar section at a time in say, D, becomes possible. Keep the fingering the same. You'll get dividends from tactile awareness of the other key.

Gooseberry

Seeker Yes, transposing only a small section, such as one hand of a single phrase, of something simple, sounds much less overwhelming. I will try it this way. Thanks for your advice, I really appreciate it 🙂

Seeker

Gooseberry ...and, over time, if you work regularly a little at a time, your ability to do longer phrases, go to more remote keys, will grow organically, and you will surprise yourself with how much more fluent you have become.