Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Ludovico Einaudi

Yes, I apply the una corda where marked in the score.

Aha... THAT D and E. I play the chord with 5 and 1, and then hit the lower D on the next note with the thumb again. I started out playing the piece trying to do the D and E with 5 and 2, but it was too much of a stretch, and I found myself squishing other keys down while playing. Using the thumb for both the lower E and D is not optimal (I feel it comes off a little too jerkily) but seems to work the best of the options for me thus far.

Monica,

I just listened to your "I Giorni" It was fantastic. That's why I want to learn the piano.

Thank you, it brightened up my afternoon

This slacker did listen to your Limbo clip. Yours is much more interesting than mine in terms of dynamics and tempo changes. I fall victim to making sure I hit the notes, and as a result, as Danny suggested (not speaking in my case, but in general) mine sounds sort of boring. Sort of like if it were being played with a metronome clicking. Which, incidently, it was.

Glad to see this thread up and running. Still working on getting a clean take on Ombre for the recital. For some reason, I just can't make it the whole way through without losing concentration.

I found "Ombre" to be a tough one to record, too, AW2PP. Something about jumping down and hitting those left hand octaves consistently is tough to do perfectly. (And you can't hide or overlook a blooper involving loud left hand octaves the way you can other wrong notes! )

p.s. I loved your "live blogging" entry on the delivery and setup of your new Casio, especially the non-picture of the pedals installed upside down. ROFL!

Good old lack of concentration gets just about everyone. You just end up listening to what you're playing and forget that you're the one that's supposed to keep playing it. Always laugh at myself when I lose concentration like that. Of course, lack of concentration is usually the cause for flubs in places that are simply on "autopilot" most of the time. Since you hardly have to think about what you are doing in the first place it is that much easier to lose your concentration completely.

Good luck on getting Ombre finished in time for a recital submission, aw2pp.

This is an astute point. The octaves begin in measure 53, and just about when my LH has comfortably assumed the shape of an octave, he throws in a GC (a 6th, is that?) followed by a DF. I have a lot of trouble with this for some reason. It's hit or miss.

Sure, we did...

It's simply beautiful. I wish my next recording sessions could be similarly successful!

Quick update... fired up the iPod and tried to play Ombre alongside the La Scala recording of same. Wow. Over the course of the last several months, I got so focused on what I was doing with the piece, I had developed a completely different (and much less interesting) take on it. In comparison, my in-process recordings were slow, plodding, and (how to put it?) tentative. There is nothing tentative about Ludovico's recording, I'll say that. But to play it boldly requires precision, for reasons Monica discussed earlier. Those jumps, those octaves... these need to be met decisively.

AnthonyB, hope it's ok to ask this out in the open... what's your impression of Tracce? When I listen to it, it sounds serious, but really easy. But the sheet music is unexpectedly daunting.

Yeah, the sheets for Tracce do indeed look a bit daunting. The beginning parts aren't all that bad but they can be quite the finger twisters. I've yet to fully work out the latter sections which are the interesting parts of the piece. There is one Tracce video currently on youtube which actually sounds pretty nice. That's not me playing it though.

Tracce on youtube

I likely would have finished learning this piece if I wasn't distracted by the piece I ended up picking for this recital. I'm sure the part that starts bringing in the left hand can be worked out fairly quickly once I really get started on it.

By the way, I stand corrected, there is no version of Ombre on La Scala, just on Le Onde.

I'm greatly pleased with my "Best of" book. The feeling that comes from playing Einaudi's music is magical.

I'm getting some Einaudi converts already. Just for fun I played Nefeli for my piano teacher (first time for anything not classical) -- she really liked it and was thinking she might order the "Best of" book herself. A couple of weeks later we had a group piano class at our house and one of my teacher's teen-age students tried out some Einaudi pieces - her mom has added the "Best of" book to her Christmas list!

And today at last I downloaded the mp3 files of all of the tracks in the "Best of" book and they're playing randomly on my computer now ... wow! I'm making a list of all the new pieces I want to learn - it's a long list - guess I'd better go get started!

Thanks for the update! Feel free to let us hear any recordings once you're happy with them. We absolutely love recordings. Of course, you have the right to save one for the recital.

Thanks, Anthony. I'm not set up to record yet - and I'm not sure I can play anything flawlessly enough to attempt to do so - but I'm thinking this might be a good project for 2009.

Today I discovered "La nascita della cose segrete" ("The birth of secret things" I think, but my Italian is rusty) and have flagged it to start working on. Interestingly, it doesn't seem to be one of the popular ones on the ABF, as I found just one reference to it when I did a search. But I think it's quite beautiful.

Carol

I feel an hole in my stomach anytime I listen to Nefeli. There's something absolutely mystical in this music. It is joyfully beautiful but at the same time disturbing and deeply aching.

What I've found to be unique about Einaudi is that it rates high on two scales: beautiful music to listen to, and a pleasure to play. With my usual classical repertoire, I find that the some of the most beautiful pieces are just not all that much fun to play! It's not just about difficulty . . . maybe it's the broad freedom of interpretation and expression that's possible with Einaudi's music. It's so easy just to get lost in the sounds coming from the piano.

Carol

Yeah, La Nascita Delle Cose Segrete is a pretty piece. That's one that I've been playing around with. Here's me messing around with the first page of the piece:

La Nascita Practice

Anthony, that was beautiful!

It was exactly what I needed to hear this morning. I just now made the mistake of getting drawn into a post-election-day debate with a work colleague whose views are the complete opposite of mine. Never a good idea.

Hearing your lovely playing has restored my good mood.

Carol

Ditto! I gotta say that what you call "messing around" with a piece I call "just about ready to record."

Heh, I can tell you that didn't take just one attempt. Plus I haven't really gotten around the other sections of the piece yet. I'm going to really have to give this one some effort as I like to play that part quite a bit. For some reason I've still got a hard time with the chord change in the left hand even though I shouldn't. Oh well, practice will fix that up given enough time. I spent some time this afternoon going over the rest of the right hand parts.

I think we could invent a new beginner learning method based on Einaudi music alone. It is based on the three most important patterns of music (arpeggios, chords and scales), it is slow enough but require a steady rhythm, it is that beautiful to trigger motivation and boost self-esteem, it requires a great care for dynamic and phrasing.

I got the idea from a piano student who learned to play on Final Fantasy tracks. After two years he had become so good, to choose to apply for grade 8 piano. Not only he passed the exam, but was congratulated for possing a magnificent touch and musicality that normally students at that level don't possess.

Would you choose Einaudi over Bastien?