TheBoringPianist with competitions over for the year, finally getting around to some of the pieces in my backlog. I guess I'll usually have a larger piece that will take on the order of a month or longer to learn — in this case, the Scriabin Fantaisie in B minor, Op. 28. I'm still trying to even finish reading through this to be honest lol. I've got the exposition mostly figured out and can read slowly through most of the rest, but the recapitulation B theme and coda A theme are giving me fits and I just end up skipping them every time in favor of the "easier" (read: less insane) parts. I'll probably need to dedicate significant time to each one separately.

Meanwhile, have been working through some smaller pieces as well over the last couple weeks:

  • Blumenfeld - Etude for the Left Hand Alone, Op. 36
  • Medtner - Fairy Tale in G# minor, Op. 31 No. 3
  • Scarlatti - Sonata in G Major, K. 14

"You're a smart kid. But your playing is terribly dull."

      In keeping with the upcoming change in season, I am working on my best imitation of Sangah Noona playing Autumn Leaves. (South Korean jazz pianist).

        Pallas

        I wish my Faber stuff was only 2 lines. Or less.

          I am working on Romance in G Major from the (translated) 6 Very Easy Pieces Op 52 by Johann Nepomuk Hummel. Very easy pieces my foot! Maybe for some, but definitely not for me. I thought a piece with many broken chords would be simple. Again, not for me!

          Also working on River Flows in You by Yurima. I specifically asked for this piece and it is kicking my butt almost right away. I love the piece, so hopefully I will eventually get it.

          Sometimes I wish for the days when I was doing the Faber Piano Adventures for the Older Beginner. Then at least I felt I was making progress.

          Player1 Those of us on the lower levels also have lesson pieces to contend with. These weekly or bi-weekly pieces, plus a short term piece, and a longer term piece, usually makes 3 things going on at once. Which for most people is manageable without burning out.

          3 pieces would be my ideal instead of the 5 I've been doing lately.

          I hope to finish the last of the Piano Adventures method book pieces next year. If the Dr. Molly Gebrian method works well for maintaining my mostly jazz standard repertoire, once I've relearned them, I'll only need to play through them and address any issues 3 days in a row every 2 weeks. That would leave just 3 pieces at a time; a sight reading quick study piece (some of them can be knocked out in a single session), a classical piece and a non-classical piece.

            kanadajin In keeping with the upcoming change in season, I am working on my best imitation of Sangah Noona playing Autumn Leaves. (South Korean jazz pianist).

            Yes! Next month, I plan to relearn Vince Guaraldi's "The Great Pumpkin Waltz" for a piano club meeting. I hope the section with all the octaves is more comfortable this time around.

              I've learned both hands for the first page of Balestrand. Amazingly enough I can carry the melody, on tempo, for most of the page! Yay!! There are a couple of spots giving me a bit of trouble but I'll get them worked out. Page 2 swaps the melody to the LH and that's harder for me to finger out for some reason. I'll get it, it'll just take more practice and I'm in no rush. It's such a pretty piece that I really want to play it properly.

              Always On My Mind is coming along. I'm not working on it that hard, 2 hours per week, but I can play 1 1/2 measures of the first line to tempo and make it sound like it should. Unfortunately, I can't make the second half of measure 2 sound like it should and that's creating problems with going on to measure 3.

              This is what I'm learning:

              You can see the treble 8th notes at the end of measure 2. When I play those and the F# in measure 3 I can't make my keyboard sound like the video does. Played alone, my F3# doesn't sound "correct." It's probably the difference in sampling but it throws me off because I always think I hit a wrong key. My mid-range bass never sounds quite right.

              The Faber stuff is still 🤮. I turned to a new page and it's an arranged Leopold Mozart piece - Minuet in F Major. Blah. At least I can concentrate on spotting and knowing my key signatures and spending some time practicing the FM scale - I need the review.

              12 days later

              Three new pieces since I last posted.

              quick study piece - Tansman - "Dreams" from Happy Time Book 1
              Piano Adventures piece - Hassler - Allegro in A minor.
              Non-classical piece - Michael Giacchino - Married Life from the movie, "Up".

              It took me a while to find an arrangement for "Married Life" on the musicnotes site. There were 4 pages of arrangements that were looked either too easy or too challenging for me before I found one that was a good fit.

              Pallas Yes! Sadly, I had to pass up a number of arrangements with all sorts of trills, chromatic scale runs and other assorted challenges for a far distant "someday'.

                5 days later

                I slacked off again for another short break and only returned to playing a couple of days ago. The good news is that page 2 of Balestrand is now under my fingers, without pedal. Unfortunately, I'm no further on either the Willie Nelson piece or my lessons. 🙁

                  The secondo part to a duet arrangement of Schubert's Serenade and a jazzy version of Over the Rainbow. Both are for my next piano group meeting towards the end of October.

                  I finished up the pieces I was working on when I last posted here, including one which I submitted to Recital #1.

                  Currently I'm working on probably too many pieces at once, though some are easier than others and so will get played to my satisfaction faster than others:

                  "Blind Mouse Dance" by Jakub Metelka - @lilypad was also working on this, I believe. The tempo indication in the RCM version is quite a bit slower than the tempo Metelka himself plays it at, so ultimately I'll just go with what sounds nicest to me, which is somewhere in between. My teacher also recommended alternate fingering in the last couple of bars.
                  Aria in D minor, K. 32 by Domenico Scarlatti - probably the easiest or second-easiest piece Scarlatti ever wrote, but it's also so lovely that it's part of many recordings by professionals.
                  "Ostinato" by Lowell Liebermann - the first atonal piece I've ever played. Because it's, well, an ostinato, it's a bit easier to understand than other atonal pieces.
                  Allegro in F major (arr.), Hob. III:73/4 by Franz Joseph Haydn - this is a bit of a nightmare. It's an arrangement (it's not clear who arranged it) of a movement from a string quartet and it features some terrifying jumps as well as a sequence of melodic chords that's difficult to voice properly.
                  "A Hermit Crab Surfing" by Akira Miyoshi - this piece really does sound like a hermit crab surfing, I'm not sure why. Some challenging work with phrases that share melody between the hands and lots and lots of thirds.
                  "Ticklin' Toes" by Florence Price - from the ABRSM Grade 4 syllabus. By far the most difficult piece and will probably take a few months. It's a bit longer than the other pieces, has multiple distinct sections that each have their own rhythmic challenges, and it's meant to be played blazing fast.

                  Here's the Liebermann piece (note: this isn't me playing), which really defied my expectations about atonal compositions.

                    plop_symphony
                    That's nice but it's not an atonal piece. The piece uses some atypical chromatics because it's in the Phrygian mode. A lot of Gypsy and Spanish music uses the Phrygian scale and it sounds a bit exotic.

                    Nice work! 👍

                        BartK Interesting! What parts of the piece make it clear that it's in Phrygian mode?

                          Player1 Good to know you are back. You've been a long time away from this forum. Tremor issues again?

                              WieWaldi

                              I've just been a slacker with my lessons. I do read the forum every day, I just don't post much because I haven't had much to contribute lately. I can only say my method book lessons suck so many times.

                              I managed to play the entire piece yesterday, including pedal. I have flow issues I need to smooth out before I can record it. When I do I'll probably upload it and maybe post it in the performance section.

                              Right now I'm playing off tempo, and very slowly, so that I can try and get the notes continuous. For example, the piece starts with 2 quarter notes in the LH to 4 eighth notes in the RH with a tie for all of it. The flow problem is that I'm adding a tiny bit of time between the LH and the RH while I switch my mental focus. It's not a hesitation or pause, it's a longer time period between notes while my head switches gears. When I try to shorten that space I start to rush the 8th notes and that only makes it worse because now there's 2 problems to deal with.

                              I'll get it fixed and be on tempo eventually. Maybe a week, maybe a month, maybe 6 months. It all depends on how discouraged I get over how much my method book lessons suck.

                                  I was just watching a video by DariaPiano on YouTube. When short of time or discouraged to practice, she recommends just do some technical exercise to keep fingers moving. But better to have even just a little practice every day than long gap followed by trying to make it up.