OH, btw, I forgot to mention...

After several warnings, Anthony was escorted out of the theater for violating the "no flash photography" rule.
And Monica bullied an innocent couple out of their premium seats so she could see the keys!!

Of course I am joking

LOL you had me going there for a second. Yep, pretty much the same reaction Sheryl had after seeing him for the first time. I mean she'd heard only some of his music up to that point. I'll be keeping a watchful eye on here and the Einaudi Forums to see where he's playing next.

Glad you all had a great time!
Steve

What a wonderful concert! Einaudi played for about 90 minutes, in his usual style for live performances, wherein he plays a medley of 2 or 3 pieces with improvised bridges joining them together. He must tinker with the pieces he plays a lot, because he doesn't play them exactly as performed on the albums, and (as best as I can determine) his improvisations were different than the last time I heard him play in SF.

The highlights of the show for me were Nuvole Bianche, I due fiumi, and Divenire. For "I due fiumi," he played the beautiful coda that's on the La Scala live album and that Anthony and I have been trying to figure out how to play by ear. Except this time he made the coda even longer and more complicated with all sorts of fast triplet arpeggios at the end! It's gorgeous but I don't have a chance at trying to figure out the new stuff.

I was greatly intrigued by how he played "Divenire." He played right-hand chords at the beginning, instead of the single notes shown in the sheet music. I think I'm going to try that myself because it sounded a lot better. And he played it much, much slower and mellower than the tempo on the recorded version, and I'm *definitely* going to try that out, too, as that's my only chance for playing the piece, I think.

Einaudi himself was the same charming, humble, gentleman that I remembered from San Francisco. He walked out onto the stage to be met by enthusiastic applause and cheers from the audience of about 350 people, no doubt inspired by his dapper outfit of dark grey sports coat and retro throwback apparently newly fashionable plaid slacks. As is his habit, he stayed after to sign autographs and patiently pose for photographs. I'll post mine later when I get home. I snuck in line twice, and the second time I gathered the nerve to say more than a word or two to him; I thanked him for making his sheet music publicly available so that even an amateur could have the experience of playing such beautiful music. He nodded and said "you're welcome" and gave me a big thumbs up.

All in all, a wonderful time was had by all. There were a fair number of piano forumites there, including AnthonyB and Triryche. I thoroughly enjoyed getting to meet Anthony's parents, who were enjoying a nice birthday celebration for Anthony's dad. AWTPP, alas, came down with the flu that morning and had to miss the show.

But Triryche wasn't joking about me sneaking into a better seat. My ticketed seat was way over on the right hand side of the auditorium, where I couldn't even see his face, let alone hands. And as I noticed that it wasn't going to be a sell-out and that there were plenty of open seats on the more desirable left side, I went to the ushers and explained that I had flown all the way from Kentucky to see Einaudi play, and by golly I wanted to see his hands. The ushers were very understanding and said that as long as I waited until right before the show started, I could move to any vacant seat I wanted. I think I ended up with the best seat in the house, actually. People started coming down and filling in the other empty seats around me, and I kept asking guiltily, "Did I steal your seat?" but they all looked equally guilty and said "no, we're just moving here to see his hands!"

The only downside to the evening is that the venue itself kind of sucked. The chairs were old and would creak if people shifted much, and--even worse--there was some kind of loose duct in the the air conditioning vents in the ceiling that rattled continuously throughout the whole concert. It was not all that loud, but a prima donna kind of performer (which Einaudi is most definitely not) probably would've pitched a fit. I personally thought it was inexcusable for a performing arts center. On the plus side, the piano itself (a Steinway D that looked like it had been around the block a few times) sounded beautiful, and in the end, that's all that mattered.

I agree, and here I thought I was being too critical.

Did you guys do anything after the show?
I was a bit star struck after he signed my book, so I put it in my car right away. Then I loitered out front for a while.

Yeah, the noisy ventilation was quite annoying and shouldn't have been tolerated. That reminds me that I was planning to email the center and complain a bit about that. Knowing them they'd then send me some sort of useless tickets to some future show that would never be worth driving 6 hours to go see...

I'll have to post my thoughts a bit later but we did stop at the Starbucks that was across the street from the main entrance of the performing arts center for a bit. I also hear that Monica took a bit of a tour of Milwaukee on the way back to her hotel.

Glad to hear you guys had a blast and tisk tisk at moving seats (jk!). Actually when Sheryl and I saw Billy Joel & Elton John in Anaheim we ended up watching most of the show from the 3rd floor bridge in between the seating areas. We had paid for pretty decent seats but when a wondering at the intermission.

From there we discovered a brilliant section where we could see their hands etc and just enjoyed from there.

I wasn't able to see his hands this time around but I did get a good view of him, the piano, AND the pedals. I now know where I can try the pedal differently and also the soft pedal (which he was using!)


- SC

If by "tour" you mean stumbling around dark, deserted downtown Milwaukee streets looking futilely for either (a) a taxi or (b) Milwaukee resident who had both heard of the Pfister Hotel and could tell me how to get there, you are correct. Maybe I'd better spring for that iPhone with a GPS app after all...

Quick review for now:

Ludovico was great and I might have even liked this concert better than the first. But maybe I was simply too excited during the first show to appreciate it as much.

The venue wasn't all that special. Actually, the Vogel Hall has some sort of noisy ventilation system that greatly distracted me during the show.

Here's a quick rundown of the tracks that I recall being played during the show:

Snow Prelude 15
Tu Sei
Berlin Song
Indaco
Nightbook

I think we went on to Divenere pieces at this point and here is where I forgot the playing order too!

Uno
Divenere
Oltremare
Ascolta
Fly
Resta Con Me
Nuvole Bianche
Lady Jane
I Due Fiumi (As Monica mentioned this had the nice bit before the ending pretty much like on the La Scala concert recording but with even more stuff added in at the end.)

Encore:
I giorni

Exciting news on the Einaudi front: A while back Anthony alerted me to the fact that a new live album for Einaudi will be released soon. It's coming out on November 1, and it's called the "Royal Albert Hall concert" and was recorded last March. Here's the track listing:

CD 1:

01. The Planets
02. Lady Labyrinth
03. Nightbook
04. In Principio
05. Indaco
06. Bye Bye Mon Amour
07. The Crane Dance
08. The Tower

CD 2:

01. Berlin Song
02. Tu Sei
03. Melodia Africana I
04. I due Fiumi
05. In Un’Altra Vita
06. Stella Del Mattino
07. I Giorni
08. Primavera
09. Divenire
10. Nightbook
11. Eros
12. La Nascita Delle Cose Segrete

The most exciting thing is that the European version of the album includes Einaudi's first-ever DVD recording of the concert. But when you go to amazon.com, apparently all they're issuing is a one-CD version, audio only. And even that is downright expensive; they're listing it as an out of stock import with a price of $48. But if you go to amazon.co.uk and order it from the Brits, you get the 2 CD + 1 DVD version for only about $25 bucks, shipping to the states included. I'm guessing the DVD format won't be compatible with US video players, but you should be able to play it on a computer okay. (At least, I have played European formatted DVDs on my computer in the past, so I'm banking on it working this time.)

Yep looking to pick that up myself also
- SC

(Grimly circles the dirt in front of him with his big toe...)

As I PM'd Monica and Anthony, this was not a good weekend for us. We missed the concert, spent the weekend ill (I originally included some details here, but it's better for all of us that I exclude those), then passed the illness along to our two youngest. Here we are Wednesday, and we're only now nearing 100%.

To top it off, this special night was supposed to be a bit of an anniversary present Sue and I gave to each other, as our 11th was October 8. So missing out was painful in many ways.

Two bits of good news: we're one less stomach flu away from our respective target weights, and it sounds like a good time was had by all.

So sorry to hear that..

Side subject (I gironi)
This semi-dyslexic stuff will kill me. I was all happy and almost ready to record when I watched Monica's video again. Then I went and looked at the sheet music again!

On the very last measures (end of 133 to end of 169) I had been playing..
(LH) D,F#,B - A,E,A - B,F#,B - G,D,B (10th stretch)

But now I see that is really is..
(LH) D,F#,B - A,E,A - B,F#,D! - G,D,B (2x10th stretches)

Now I've got to learn that tail section all over again and get some serious stretches in. I was actually doing very well with the G,D,B following the B,F#,B but now it's all going to change. At least is repeats for a few measures (sigh)

- SC

Do TV shows use Einaudi a lot as background music?

I'm pretty sure I heard Nightbook (or, 20 seconds of Nightbook) in tonight's episode of CSI (House of Hoarders).

It seems that way.

A clip from the track Ascolta from Divenire was used at the end of the most recent Stargate Universe episode.

While I like that Einaudi's tracks get used I'm not sure it does much to attract fans because it is usually pretty difficult to find out where the music came from.

Yeah, thanks to IMDB I can tell you who was the gaffer, best boy and hair stylist for that episode, but I couldn't find any song credits.

This is the one I'm currently learning, but in that same bit I play it:

LH: D-A-D, A-E-A, B-F#-D, G-D-B

I haven't got the sheet music in front of me so I was wondering if I missed something...? As you have D-F#-B

D-A-D is correct (geez I'm a wally).

SO... you're playing the B-F#-D, G-D-B? which is (for me anyhow) 2 large 10th stretches.. I've gone back to it and I may just play..

D,A,D - A,E,A - B,F#,B, G,D,G OR..
D,A,D - A,E,A - B,F#,B, G,D,B,

I'm all for the stretching and all but in the very last measures that sequence is played quite fast. I'll have to see how it goes..
- SC

Yeah I play the two 10ths. It's a pain, but recently my hands seem to have stretched considerably. About 4 months ago I found some 10ths exercises in a book I borrowed from someone and it was a joke. I can play them as block chords now though (well... only just).

I've been working on this one everyday for just over a week now and I nearly have it down (it's far from perfect though). I'm finding the faster bit with the 10ths ok because my hands have been teaching themselves where to go in the block chord section just before it where it seems much slower.

How much nice is this passage of "Giorni Dispari"?

from 2.00 to 2.24
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UM93jXFgQvg

so nice I went on and on hundreds of times until I learnt it without being bored.
and so nice to be able to play it now!

A.

I did the same thing when I first started working on that piece, ashat. The bridge toward the end (4:00 - 4:25 on the video you linked) is my other favorite part of the piece... those ethereal high notes, coming out of nowhere and going nowhere, just send a chill down my spine.

Yes, I like it very much too!

Curiosly I am in trouble with an apparently easy part, the right hand in 1.34 - 2.00.
The 3 fingers vs 1, argh!

But I will find a way.

A.

Sorry, I actually couldn't resist to share this record of my preferred sections of Giorni Dispari.

I am playing just since 2 months now and my recording abilities are even elementary, but hope you all enjoy.

And obviously any comment is appreciated.

http://web.mclink.it/MD3012/P85/odds_4.mp3



A.

Just got mine out of the mail box 30min ago. Looking at Tu Sei now. They show a great closeup shots of his hands while he is playing.

BTW the DVD does work in the computer.

I think you're doing incredibly well for only two months of piano experience.

As for the 3-note chords vs. 1 in the right hand section, I always found that part difficult. You've got to squeeze your fingers in between the black keys to play it well, and it took me a very long time before I stopped messing the chords up. One thing that helped me was to consciously try to pivot my hand like a see-saw, in other words, try to rotate your wrist rather than depress the fingers down individually, if that makes any sense.

Oh man, I've been so busy with work I haven't had time to watch the show. (And for some inexplicable reason, when it was time for us to pick a family movie to watch over the weekend, my nomination of the Einaudi DVD was voted down. )

I have, however, listened to the CD portion of the box set several times. One of the highlights so far for me is the improvised transition between Lady Labyrinth and Nightbook on the first CD. The only disappointment is that he did not play the coda on "I due fiumi." I was hoping to hear the even newer variation he played in Milwaukee, but it was not meant to be.

Hi Monica,

thanks for your positive comment.
Sure you are not "too positive" because you like too much this piece and these specific subsections?
If I hear at it I find a lot of mistakes... something like left hand notes not enough well-defined...



I will surely try. I actually stopped worrying about it and just play the corrisponding single note when I want to play the whole piece It is the only missing part...

But if I want to complete it for the recital I have to fix this. Maybe not enough time, but let see. Thanks!

A.

Prompted by all the chat about concerts and live cds/dvds I have just checked the tour dates and have discovered Einaudi is in my neck of the woods at the end of November [excitedly grabbing the phone to get my tickets]

I do recall reading a fan's review of the La Scala cd where they had one minor criticism (if it could even be called a criticism). They said that his live performance was so skilled that it almost perfectly replicated the studio recordings on the albums and the audience were so quiet until the polite applause at the end of each piece. So as it became difficult to determine whether you were listening to a live or studio recording they wondered whether the purchase had been worth it.

So I wondered, is this a bad thing or not? Most bands cannot reproduce their studio sound in a live concert but skilled pianists certainly can. When we see somebody like Einaudi live do we want to hear our favourites performed accuratley such as how they appear on the albums (they are, afterall, the arrangements that originally inspired our interest) or would we prefer alternative enhanced arrangements?

I'm kind of torn between the two ideas. On one hand, I've been to different kinds of shows over the years where they ruined a favourite by doing an alternative version . At the same time, I can see that sometimes a performance needs to be kept fresh and, as originally suggested, not to sound exactly like the album recording.

cgyan, I can understand where people are coming from in discussing the La Scala CD. The show on that CD was actually rather atypical of his usual live performances, in that he basically performed his pieces, discretely, much as they sound on the albums. But the live performances I've seen, and heard others (e.g., Euan) talking about that they've seen, are much different, with the pieces having improvised beginnings and endings and merged together into long medleys. The Albert Hall CD is more like that, too.

Like you, I enjoy hearing the variations.

Well, I'm looking forward to listening to the Albert Hall recording as I see from videos online that he is accompanied by a small orchestra which I suppose he needed if he is to do the tracks from Nightbook justice. It's also interesting to see how his other pure solo pieces are embellished with the orchestra. I'm hoping the shows he performs here in the UK will follow suit and will feature the orchestra.

I think ultimatley its nice to hear a slight variation in a live performance if only to distinguish it from the recording in the ways that you mention (improvised beginnings/endings etc) as long as it doesn't deviate completly from the original. Years ago I went to see a popular band and in the encore they did their 'big hit', usually an up-beat, lively pop song. This time they did it as a slow, warbling ballad that made the audience look at each other with mixed expressions...

Heck, for my first time seeing Einaudi, I'd be chuffed just to hear him play Chopsticks!

My hubby gave me an iPhone for my birthday, and I have been trying to figure out how to use it. My project today was to create a custom ringtone. And what better music to use for a ringtone than Einaudi?!?

So I recorded a brief snippet of "Divenire," converted it to mp3, and then used a site I found on the web (Myxer) that promised it wouldn't charge me any kind subscription fee to convert the mp3 file to a ringtone. (I'm crossing my fingers and hoping this will turn out to be the case, but I always get a little nervous clicking on those "accept terms and conditions" boxes, even if I've read them.) After a little bit of experimenting I figured out how to get the ringtone into iTunes and then onto my phone. So now whenever anybody calls me, I hear this:

http://www.box.net/shared/lyh7icce3x