What Piece(s) Are You Working on Right Now?
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So many beautiful pieces! Thank you, all.
I'm still picking away at some RCM prep B stuff; currently "Carillon" and "Leaping the Waves with Dolphins". My teacher also has me doing some Dozen a Day exercises and mixes in some bits from Alfred's Basic Adult Piano. Some of the local teachers get student's together a couple times a year for a recital. I was working on a simple duet arrangement of Ode to Joy by Timothy Brown for the next recital, coming up soon, but it turned out that my partner will be unable to attend. I'll be doing the Carillon piece instead. It's a bit daunting to have so many of the young student's playing so much better live, but at least I'm not the only adult beginner there.
edit: Almost forgot another piece, an arrangement of Piano Man, but I'm struggling with the rhythm in it.
I'd probably learn faster with private instruction, but I love being in the company of other piano players and the ensemble work is fun. The class size is small enough that there is ample time for the instructor to address questions or difficulties that any of the students may have. I have to admit that I'm looking forward to the end of the semester in a few days when I can get back to working on my own stuff.
I am working on Sonatina in G by Muzio Clementi - also known as "Groovy Kind of Love" . I am just finishing up Page 3 of 4 and have been working on this since the end of January. I feel like I am never going to complete it!
Also working on an intermediate version of Sound of Silence. At least that one is a little easier for me!
TC3 I don't get too nervous in the class because we mostly play all at the same time. I'm pretty dedicated to practicing what the teacher has assigned and am relatively well prepared to play on the rare occasions that the teacher asks for a volunteer to play something. If no one else comes forward, I'll volunteer.
I'm also in a Meetup group of Portland (Oregon) Piano Players. I'm one of the least accomplished players there and I try to play first or at least early on in the meetings.
I'm working on the first piece in this video, called Music Box. I'm a sucker for pieces that use the far upper register of the piano.
I'm also working on a couple of other late-beginner/early-intermediate pieces that I can't find good recordings of: "Toccata-Rocket" by Jason Sifford and "A Lincoln Tribute" by Carol Matz. The latter is part of a suite of Washington, DC-themed piano pieces published by Alfred, and it turns out they have an intermediate-difficulty piano suite for every single U.S. state plus a number of other locations inside and outside the U.S.
Finally, I'm working on Kabalevesky's Etude in A minor, op. 27, no. 3. The version in ABRSM indicates the tempo at 100 to the quarter note, which is a bit ridiculously fast for me right now, but I'm working towards getting it to a satisfying level.
My teacher also wants me to work on Debussy soon. I'm a bit skeptical because the easiest Debussy piece I know, Page d'album, is still like way above anything I've ever worked on. Guess we'll see.
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I have been rather distracted away from piano practice since the weekend but seem to have got some mojo back today. This morning rehearsed a piano duet with a friend who was seeking more experience with duets. We hope to perform it at our piano group on Saturday. It is by Ernest Markham-Lee and called the Lost Lagoon depicting what he calls a sheet of water in Stanley Park Vancouver. Does anyone know Stanley Park?
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lilypad I'd probably learn faster with private instruction
You played jurassic park in one of the 'pw' recitals, right? I had never heard the jurassic park music before that, and the way it sounds ... progresses ... the 'chord' sounds/sequence combined with the piano timbre is very very powerful indeed. As in totally captivating. Every once in a while, I run through those sequences. It is amazing.
Update : just checked in google (lilypad jurassic park abf recitals. Thanking goodness my memory hasn't failed me hehe. Yes indeed ... that was you!
For the past few weeks, I've been working on:
My Funny Valentine, Autumn Leaves, Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise, Beautiful Love, and The Shadow of Your Smile.
I have been working on Beethoven Sonata F minor Op. 2 No. 1, and my first two Schubert pieces, Scherzo No. 1 in B flat, and Impromptu Op. 142 No. 2. All challenging for me, but I'm loving every minute and so grateful for my wonderful teacher who pushes me just enough! 
I'm glad I did it but not sure I could work up the courage again!SouthPark Yes. That was quite the stretch piece for me. Thanks to someone on PW asking for fingering advice on a piece, I discovered another arrangement from that movie that is even stretchier. It's called "Welcome to Jurassic Park". Almost twice as long as what I played before and has more of the themes in it. I found the sheet music for it on musicnotes.com.
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Here is the first part of "Stairway to Heaven" by Led Zeppelin:
Enjoy...
Beethoven's op.14 Nr.1. And it is very hard for me, especially the speed factor - I 'm not sure I will be able to play it as fast as it's mostly played.
Pallas > So I am considering adding an Ab scale to my Molly program. Surely I can treat a new scale like any other method book piece!.
Great idea! I haven't been sufficiently motivated to practice scales, chords and arpeggios except whatever new key I'm learning. The Molly Gebrian experiment might do nicely for learning new keys while also imposing a schedule to keep the old one in my fingers.
Now that my community college class is over, I'm working on the following motley collection of 3 new pieces:
Nancy Faber's "Great Barrier Reef" 2-page piece from Piano Adventures Level 4 Lesson book.
Jacob Metelka's "Mouse Dance" 1-page piece from RCM Level 3 Celebration Series Piano Etudes
Herbie Hancock's "Watermelon Man" 3-page grade 3 arrangement from My First Jazz Standards Songbook.
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3 Romances for Oboe and piano by Robert Schumann (my wife is the oboist).
A selection or two of Rossini's "Quelques Riens" (a few nothings) from "Sins of my old age". Right now #11 (Andantino).
Schumann certainly loves his octaves in the bass, and it's full of big chords and jumps. There's also the kind of situation where you have a melody in the right hand, a bass line in the left, and traded between both hands, a rolling accompaniment figure, often in triplets. It's challenging for me, anyway, especially at the tempos indicated.
It's the first time I've ever played any Schumann, with the exception of a couple of the "Scenes of Childhood" when I was a child myself.
I'm in a weird post-competition spot where I'm trying to figure out my next milestone. If I decide to go to WIPAC, will probably try to resurrect one of the bigger pieces I've played before and whatever pieces I need to round out the program. If I'm done competing for the year, I'm definitely going to start chipping away at the Scriabin Fantasy!
In the meantime, have just been noodling on some smaller pieces that have caught my ear:
- Bach-Petri - Sheep May Safely Graze
- Fauré-Wild - Improvisation on 'Après un rêve'
- Handel-Kempff - Minuet in G minor
"You're a smart kid. But your playing is terribly dull."
lilypad Metelka is fantastic. If you're inclined, I recommend looking into Metelka's full collections - "Modern Piano Studies" (which Mouse Dance and the RCM 6 Little Nocturne are from), "Little Virtuoso", "The Secret Garden", and "Illusions".
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Earlier I posted that my piano teacher wanted me to work on a Debussy piece. She changed her mind and said it might be best to leave that for later, and gave me Cecile Chaminade's "Idylle", op. 126, no. 1, to work on instead.
She also wanted me to find something from the Classical era, but I'm not a huge fan of the easier material from the stalwarts of that era (Mozart, Beethoven). Haydn is a possibility. I found a Sonatina in A minor by the Czech composer Jiří Antonín Benda's (1722-1795), one of 34 sonatinas he wrote and somewhat of a fixture on syllabi, so I might tackle that too. Piano lessons are going on summer break for two months.
Schubert Sonata #18 in G Major D.894 - just the first movement so far
plop_symphony Thank you for the tip on Metelka. I listened to the first 2 studies from "Modern Piano Studies" and liked them a lot.
I don't take exams, but I use exam board repertoire books to find graded music for my level. I've really enjoyed discovering modern composers that I find in their books.
@"plop_symphony"#p688 Oooh, I like the Benda sonatina! I'd never heard of him, am going to look it up. Every time I log in here I find another piece to distract my squirrel brain.... 
Well, I finished the motley group of 3 pieces I started in early June and started another motley group:
"Manhattan, 1928" from Piano Adventures Level 4 Performance book.
Beethoven - Ecossaise no. 4 WoO 83
Miles Davis' "All Blues" arrangement from "Jazz Easy Piano Solos" book.
I'm also relearning Burgmuller's "Limpid Stream" from Op. 100 for a fast pieces recital on "that other forum". It's currently at a very sedate 72 bpm.
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Fiesta Espana. in my Faber 3B book is on my music desk. Yuck. Seriously, yuck.
Still working on Wolf but going to put it down for a bit because I need a break. I might pick up Beautiful in White but I'm still just thinking about it and haven't decided.
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I couldn't take it anymore so I did a Bob Seger and "turned the page." It's just a rehash of syncopation anyway. Most of this book is going to be review and filling in the theory gaps that Faber Adult book 2 didn't include. Both book 2 and 3B end with Cannon in D as the last piece, and some of the other pieces are repeated verbatim, so at that end point you're at the same place regardless of which book you use.
Next new piece is "Snowfall." It looks playable. Haven't checked it out at all yet so I could be wrong.
I can play Wolf with pedal (poorly) all the way through and it's memorized because I've played it so much. My tempo for the jumps is still off but I'm setting is aside for now rather than work on it any more.
I have 4 books of music to pick from and I don't seem to want to play any of it. I really want to learn Beautiful in White but the version I want to play doesn't have sheet music so I'll have to transcribe it from a video. Do-able but tedious and that tedium is the reason I haven't transcribed Ailein Duinn and Smoke Rings in the Dark yet. (Not that I'm ready for either of those.)
I will find something to learn but right now it's back to lessons.
Player1 My memories of "Fiesta Espana" aren't good either. Both difficult and and possibly a least favorite piece in the book.
After two not very inspiring pieces in the Level 4 book that teach E major chord inversions, I'm working on a piece from the Performance book of the series that I absolutely love, "Manhattan, 1928". It's like Nancy Faber has somehow channeled George Gershwin to write the piece. It's not easy with lots of jumps, hand-over-hand, etc., but worth it in the sound that comes out. Whatever doesn't kill me makes me stronger?
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It's been a months since I turned the final page of Faber Adult AIO Book 1. Instead of going straight into Book 2, I decided to take a gap month (or two). I am going back through Book 1 again and try to practice things I skipped, such as counting out loud, or singing the lyrics, etc. I also added Faber's Classic Companion book 1 to my practice, to learn some new piece on my own without help from YouTube teachers (although Faber do have demo videos for this book).
Today I am going through Rise and Shine, which I learned to play 2 months ago. There's lyric in the print. With some practice I can kind of hum along. Then I thought, maybe I should go on YouTube and find some performance of this song to see how it's reallly done. What I found made me really laugh out loud:
Looking back, my playing needed some major cheering up 
iternabe I remember seeing a YouTube teacher that recommends taking a break between method books. I'm two pieces away from the end of the set of books that I'm on. I was going to continue on to the next set without a break, but now I might take a break before starting the next set and see how many grade 3 bucket list pieces I can manage before the new year. Then I'll start on the new series and also start on grade 4 wish list pieces.
I recommend the Angeline Bell books for extra curricular music. She has several so you can choose one that matches your musical preferences and style. Between those and the extensive number of Wunderkeys books there's a lot of music out there suitable for early learners up to level 4 or so.
Most of it sounds better than the arrangements in the method books too.
I think Bell's pieces are better. Dow's music certainly is. A lot of Robertson's stuff sounds like the same basic RH melody, played on the same keys. It's all a monotone musically. At least to me.
One thing I was really wanting was music I could use to improve my technique and musicality. Some call this being more lyrical, and it is to some extent, but it's actually more than just that. If you look at videos of people playing beginner music you start to notice one thing they all have in common - choppy fingering. If you look at more advanced players you start to see something different - a lightness where the notes are played almost by stroking the keys. It's that difference which I was looking for.
If you look at your own videos (and mine too) you'll notice that it's almost like you're playing stacatto all the time. Your fingers go down then up, move to new keys, go down then up, move, etc. There's no fluidity because the music is broken into pieces rather than being a whole.
Part of that is because beginners have no technique and this is the only method we can use to hit the notes. But, when I played Bell's Butterflies it was different from that in both the musicality and physical movement of playing.
https://rumble.com/v4lvex0-butterfiles-by-angelina-bell.html
Watch the last few seconds of my LH in the video. You'll see that it's much lighter and more graceful than anything I'm playing in my method books. The RH is like that too but it's not as noticeable.
This lyrical quality is what makes the music sound better and makes it more attractive to me. Robertson's music that I've sampled doesn't seem to have that. It still might have it in stuff I haven't listened to, but I've yet to find it.
I am doing the most basic HT Root 5th version of Let It Be—a slowed-down version at that! If I stare at my hands, I can do it okay, but I'm trying really hard not to develop a bad habit. It is incrementally improving.
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I've been working on the "3 Romances" by Schumann for oboe & piano (with my wife). The greatest challenge is to play at the (quick) tempo, and for it not to sound panicked. I had never played Schumann, and had been told his music is sometimes awkward to play (but beautiful).
Initially I thought there's no way that can play these pieces, but over the weeks I've been working on them, they've gradually become "doable".
As a contrast to the generally serious Schumann, I'm also playing a piece of fluff by Rossini, what's probably the shortest selection (in Eb) of "Quelques Riens" (a few nothings) from his collection of piano pieces "Sins of my Old Age". Apart from getting used to some jumps, this one won't take a long time.
Haven't touched my piano in more than a week. I'm going to try and find the time to sit down with it today and work on a new method book piece. Hah, it's been so long I don't even remember the name of the piece I'm supposed to play.
grin just went and looked - Snowfall.
I will probably continue later today working on "House of the Rising Sun." I need to practice playing and singing at the same time. This is for early next week when our practice group meets again. Yesterday I already added the chord chart and sheet music (ultimate-guitar.com/Musescore.com) to forScore on my iPad. What is interesting is my wife and I each have an iPad with forScore installed, and because of the forScore syncing ability, if new sheet music (or annotations) are added to forScore on one iPad, it automatically syncs that new sheet music (or annotations) to forScore on the other iPad. I really like that convenient syncing feature.