ranjit This is one of my favorite pieces to play and I greatly enjoyed your version. Great playing! Very nice rubato!

      rogerch This is one of my favorite pieces to play and I greatly enjoyed your version. Great playing! Very nice rubato!

      Thank you! I find that this piece has many interpretive possibilities. The more I try it out, the more ideas I find.

        Beautiful! It's one of my favorite waltzes. I really enjoyed your performance!

        I think there’s a lot of lovely execution and musical ideas in your playing. I guess what doesn’t work for me from a listener’s standpoint is the variation in tempo, where sometimes you speed up, mostly in the descending passages, and then suddenly you slow down. I think if you maintained a more consistent tempo and added the rubato the piece would hang together better and not sound quite so disjointed.

        Very nice! I agree with PianogrlNW that the rubato is a little too much. Also, your sforzandos are a bit too 'in your face' for my taste. I would tone it down a bit. But your phrasing is very nice and overall it was very good.

        Which edition are you using? I'm asking because you mentioned wanting to audition and the judges can be pedantic about that. So, there are two versions of this waltz, the one published by Fontana and a later revised version. The National Edition prints the later version first as its "official" urtext. You seem to be playing the earlier version without the dotted rhythms. I'm just telling you so you're aware of that.

          Thanks everone!

          BartK

          Yes, I'm aware of the difference in the editions. I should switch over to the other one.

            9 days later

            I can't play this piece, and I've never tried. So, I can't speak to the nuances of how it should be played, or proper execution, etc. But, I will say, from a listener's point of view, it's more than just fine. Your interpretation has many facets. And I think that can be, and in this case, is a good thing. Unless, you want to play it differently, or better, or are still figuring out how you want it to sound. I sometimes suffer from "REC button syndrome"; play something fine a hundred times, then, when I want to record it, well.... it doesn't come out right.

            I once heard an interview with Andre Previn. And he said some of the things he liked about playing solo piano, as opposed to being with a rhythm section, even a trio, was that he had complete freedom to alter the tempo, the dynamics, even the melody, on the fly, however he wanted. So, you're in good company.

            OH I missed this until now... that's gorgeous ranjit. I have always loved this piece and your playing does it justice. It's so light and fluffy, it makes me think of a relaxing afternoon tea in the shade with my best friend. If only that little puppy would stop pulling my pants because it wants to play... oh good it went back to sleep so we can continue our chat 🙂

            P.S. my husband came in while it was playing and the first thing he said was "wow, that's pretty!". We're both very impressed that you didn't make a single mistake in the entire 5 minutes... material of a pro in the making for sure 🙂

              Sophia OH I missed this until now... that's gorgeous ranjit. I have always loved this piece and your playing does it justice. It's so light and fluffy, it makes me think of a relaxing afternoon tea in the shade with my best friend. If only that little puppy would stop pulling my pants because it wants to play... oh good it went back to sleep so we can continue our chat 🙂

              P.S. my husband came in while it was playing and the first thing he said was "wow, that's pretty!". We're both very impressed that you didn't make a single mistake in the entire 5 minutes... material of a pro in the making for sure 🙂

              Thank you so much! It means a lot to me that the playing conveys the emotion I would like it to convey. 🙂

                Yes beautiful music always releases a lot of emotion in me. I actually am sitting in our outdoors patio and it's playing again in the background. No puppies here though.

                I'm am one of those rare people who loves both classical music (especially pretty pieces like this) and jazzier stuff.

                Actually, today we went for a drive and in front of us a deer crossed the road right before a bridge. Luckily we were going very slowly... and so were the cars coming towards us. We all stopped...

                Then we saw the tiniest little bambi jumping all over the bridge. It was in a panic because it was surrounded by all those scary big monsters and couldn't find a safe way out. It even fell over a few times. We all felt so sorry for the tiny frightened baby...

                Finally the poor little thing darted past us and followed its mom into the verge. All the drivers smiled and waved at each other as we continued our journey.

                That's what your piece reminded me of 😊