There's one last day for submissions, folks! 
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Beach L168, Wish, baCh, WOW Petrof, Fake Steinway, VS
TIME
PianoTell Recital #3 β Meta Feedback
Here's the final update before the recital goes live tomorrow!
- rogerch β Flutter by rogerch
- Nightowl β Frankie and Johnnie
- Peyton β A Dream of Far Away (part two)
- Animisha β To a Wild Rose by Edward MacDowell
- keff β Summertime arr. by Brent Edstrom (From Porgy and Bess)
- iternabe β MalagueΓ±a arr. by Faber
- Sophia + Special Guest Star β Just a "Good Old Tune" by Willard A. Palmer
- rach3master β Call of Silence: Attack on Titan OST by Hiroyuki Sawano
- plop_symphony β A Hermit Crab Surfing by Akira Miyoshi
- Player1 β Legend of Madrid by Nancy Faber
- MarieJ β I Giorni by Ludovico Einaudi
- hebele β Minuet in G by Christian Petzold
- Pathbreaker β Op. 116 No. 6, Intermezzo in E major by Brahms
- Calavera β Antipyretic by Hitoshi Sakimoto
- WieWaldi β Frisco Blues by Christian Fuchs
- Sam β Schumann op 15-6 - "An Important Event" from the Scenes from Childhood
- SalmonJack β Just Mist by SalmonJack
- Rob β Pembrokeshire Promise by Rob
- BicBic β Mazurka Op.6 No.2 by Chopin
- Sgisela β Danza de los ñÑñigos by Ernesto Lecuona
- Gooseberry β Nights in White Satin by The Moody Blues
- bSharp β Open Arms by Journey (arr. by Dan Coates)
- Greta99 β Berceuse, Op. 23 No. 1 by Mel Bonis
It's going to be a lovely recital! 
I'm still working on my own submission, but I'll get it done. 
I'll aim to publish the recital tomorrow morning before piano lessons!
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Beach L168, Wish, baCh, WOW Petrof, Fake Steinway, VS
TIME
PianoTell Recital #3 is now live!
Please comment on the performances directly on the recital thread.
- rogerch β Flutter
- Nightowl β Frankie and Johnnie
- Peyton β A Dream of Far Away (part two)
- Animisha β To a Wild Rose
- keff β Summertime
- iternabe β MalagueΓ±a
- Sophia & rsl12 β Just a "Good Old Tune"
- rach3master β Call of Silence: Attack on Titan OST
- plop_symphony β A Hermit Crab Surfing
- Player1 β Legend of Madrid
- MarieJ β I Giorni
- hebele β Minuet in G
- Pathbreaker β Op. 116 No. 6, Intermezzo in E major
- Calavera β Antipyretic
- WieWaldi β Frisco Blues
- Sam β "An Important Event" from the Scenes from Childhood
- SalmonJack β Just Mist
- Rob β Pembrokeshire Promise
- BicBic β Mazurka Op.6 No.2
- Sgisela β Danza de los ñÑñigos
- Gooseberry β Nights in White Satin
- bSharp β Open Arms
- Greta99 β Berceuse, Op. 23 No. 1
- ShiroKuro β Wind
- navindra β Over The Rainbow
Meta feedback on the recitals can be shared here if desired.
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Beach L168, Wish, baCh, WOW Petrof, Fake Steinway, VS
TIME
I was messaging with @ShiroKuro and I said, aside from not having anything ready to share right now, that I don't want to be the person who posts a video and then doesn't take the time to listen and comment to everyone else. She said (hope you don't mind me quoting you, SK): "as I recall, this was discussed at PW many years ago, and at the time the consensus was, it's better to submit even if you can't listen/comment on everyone."
Any thoughts? @navindra I would especially like to hear what you think since you're doing the bulk of the work to manage the recitals! And, whether I join or not, I love that the recitals exist and I think it's a wonderful thing
- Edited
twocats Another person who might comment on this is @Sam btw, since I'm sure he was part of those conversations at PW.
Obviously PT doesn't have to take the same approach at PW, but it could be helpful to know what the considerations were. My memory is that people were ok with the idea that some recital participants wouldn't listen to all the other participants.
@Sam am I remembering wrong?
twocats I don't want to be the person who posts a video and then doesn't take the time to listen and comment to everyone else. She said (hope you don't mind me quoting you, SK): "as I recall, this was discussed at PW many years ago, and at the time the consensus was, it's better to submit even if you can't listen/comment on everyone."
I agree with SK!
Submitting a performance is a significant contribution all by itself already and I don't think anyone should feel like that obligates them any further. Sure, feedback is nice and motivating in general, but it's completely optional. Everyone can contribute by listening and commenting at their discretion.
Else, just enjoy!
For me personally, the recitals have been very motivating and it has definitely been a net positive for me to participate, listen, and learn from others as well. I definitely find huge amounts of inspiration from folks here in more ways than one.
Do what's fun, what's motivating, or what works for you. PT is here to support the community.
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Beach L168, Wish, baCh, WOW Petrof, Fake Steinway, VS
TIME
As I always said at PW, there are no recital police. No one wanted the job of policing them anyway. Lots of people over the years just showed up for the recitals and never posted or commented. No one kept track of them or cared if they were not commenting. That's fine.
Part of the value of the recitals is hearing other people play and learning to listen critically. Maybe someone will hear something that you play and want to play it someday. Maybe someone will learn something by listening to your performance and making decisions about what they like and don't like. Maybe you will inspire someone! There is also the value of keeping the recitals going. If you have time to record and submit that is great, since it boosts everyone else and helps keep the recitals alive.
And the biggest value of the recitals is the discipline required to learn something, polish it, and go through the trauma of recording, knowing that someone is going to listen. That is a value you get without making any comments.
I just did my 65th quarterly recital at PW - you would think I would be a better player than I am...
Sam @twocats Just wanted to add a +1 to Samβs response.
I will add β I do listen to all the recital pieces. I try to respond, but I donβt always get to everyone. My life right now is a little crazy and thereβs a lot that feels overwhelming. I do appreciate everyone who comments, but I also more than understand that not everyone will be able to comment, and I just appreciate whatever level of participation anyone is able to bring to the table. I hope that others feel similarly about my participation.
I do enjoy hearing everyone β from beginners to semi-pros and full professionals.
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Sam And the biggest value of the recitals is the discipline required to learn something, polish it, and go through the trauma of recording, knowing that someone is going to listen. That is a value you get without making any comments.
Thank you for your insights, especially this one. Trauma is very accurate!
I am very happy with this discussion, because, even when it was clear for me at PW that no comments were required, I still felt many times that I should at least comment those who commented me.
The problem for me with commenting is that unless I see the notes and listen to several people playing that same piece, I cannot come up with any good comments - except when a piece really captures my heart. And that is not very often the case.
But just like Sgisela, I do listen to all the pieces, and I enjoy listening! So thank you all of you who submitted. 
*
... feeling like the pianist on the Titanic ...
Sam I pay professionals to tell me how bad I play
OMG this comment made my morning! 
Itβs so true though!!
I don't want, or need, critical comments from my peers.
This was always my feeling at PW so I was happy we when implemented the thing where you state the kind of comments you want. Which weβre now doing here as well, of course.
I have a teacher who knows where Iβm at, what Iβm good at, what I struggle with. And who knows the best of my playing as well as the worse. But one time at PW someone made a comment about one of my pieces that, to me, sounded like they thought I didnβt know some detail about how to play. I did, in fact, know that thing they were telling me, but wasnβt able to do it in the recording (red dot syndrome and all that). So rather than being helpful, the comment just made me feel frustrated and bad.
I also always wanted to treat the recitals as a recital, not as a piano lesson. So if someone liked the piece, liked my playing etc., then I would love to know that. But feedback? No, thank you, thatβs what I pay my teacher for.
For those who do treat the recitals more like a piano lesson, great, I have no problem with that. So thatβs why specifying the kind of comments we each want works so well.
5 days later
- Edited
twocats I don't want to be the person who posts a video and then doesn't take the time to listen and comment to everyone else.
You are already not that person! You give support and feedback to so many people.
I've said in the past that I don't care much for posters who like to receive attention but never give it. My strong-ish emotions stem partly from my time as a mod on r/piano, where we had to moderate many Youtube pianists trying to promote their channels. So they would contribute their music to the forum, but not contribute to conversations (other than about themselves). And of course the conversations are what makes forums nice to visit!
Speaking as a regular person and not a mod, the things I like to see recital participants do are:
- Comment on at least some of the other recital submissions. Not necessarily all.
- Leave comments that make people glad that they participated in the recital. That may be in the form of compliments or in the form of helpful and appropriately sensitive feedback.
Anyways I enjoy hearing you play, reading what you've written, and if occasionally you don't have time to contribute in the form of feedback to other recital participants, that's totally understandable.
These are the stats for the February 2025 recital (#3 / #77):
28 PianoWorld total submissions
25 Piano|Tell total submissions
5 equal submissions in both forums
7 performers submitted different pieces in both forums
(48 different submissions in both forums)
a month later
- Edited
navindra You may use the ABF template to specify the Comment Policy:
No Comments Please!
Polite Comments only: no suggestions for improvement please.
General Comments only: Polite, supportive, suggestions for improvement.
Critical Comments: Anything goes!
I have always been confused by "General Comments only: Polite, supportive, suggestions for improvement."
Is general comment the opposite of a specific comment? Then what is an example of a specific comment that people might not like?
Up until just now I interpreted the second part to mean "Polite [comments], supportive [comments], [and] suggestions for improvement." It didn't quite make sense, but I left it alone. I just now realized that it probably means "polite and supportive suggestions for improvement". And maybe "general comments" means "you can also make other kinds of comments that are not suggestions for improvement".
But if so, then I think it needs to be reworded in the template to be clearer. How about "Polite and supportive suggestions for improvement, but no criticism."
With a few more small edits:
You may use the template to specify the Comment Policy:
No Comments Please!
No suggestions for improvement please.
Polite and supportive suggestions for improvement, but no criticism.
Anything goes!
rsl12 I wrote that comment policy for the online recitals in the Adult Beginners Forum at Piano World. It was in response to some of the performers getting upset over what they perceived as unwanted critical comments. Before that we had no comment policy, so it was definitely an improvement. I always wanted to encourage participation as much as possible, with an emphasis on those people afraid of participating because of fear over what commenters would say.
Of course, PianoTell is free to develop its own comment policy if the one I came up with for PianoWorld is too confusing!
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@rsl12 maybe itβs because Iβm used to the comment options since theyβve been used at PW for so long, but I feel like theyβre clear. Also, with your edits, you removed the parts before the colon, but I think those parts are crucialβ¦
For example, with the second option (the one I always choose), if it just said βno suggestions for improvement,β we lose the sense of saying, comments are encouraged.
To me, the core is:
γNo Comments Please!
γPolite Comments only
γGeneral Comments only
γCritical Comments
Then the parts after each descriptor function as extra info. So if you think that extra info needs tweaking, Iβm ok with that, but I would suggest we keep the descriptors out at the front. How about just adding βno criticismβ to the third option? IOW:
γNo Comments Please!
γPolite Comments only: no suggestions for improvement please.
γGeneral Comments only: Polite, supportive, suggestions for improvement, but no criticism.
γCritical Comments: Anything goes!
- Edited
ShiroKuro No Comments Please!
γPolite Comments only
γGeneral Comments only
γCritical Comments
I don't have the history with PW that you guys had, so in my mind, all comments should always be polite And personally I can't imagine not wanting any comment when you take the trouble to participate, though I appreciate not everybody thinks like me (thank goodness for that).
I confess, I'm extremely partial to rsl's suggestion. Or even, given that "be polite and supportive at all times" should be a core policy and thus a given:
No Comments Please!
No suggestions for improvement please.
Suggestions for improvement, but no criticism.
Anything goes!
Since everyone can post what they want anyway as a comment policy on their own pieces (it's not a drop down selection is what I'm trying to say), if someone wants to add something specific, they can do so anyway right?
That said, I'm okay with anything that gets decided. Just spouting some suggestions here