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Hello everyone

I'm Jess, and I would love to chat about Einaudi with you.

I've recently discovered him and it has actually changed my life. (In a non-creepy way LOL) I have really enjoyed looking back through this thread and finding some great song suggestions and techniques so thank you.

I played classical for 9 years then took a break, now back into it again as a multi-tasking Mom (play 5 minutes, feed kids, play 10 minutes, break up fights, you know how it goes)

I started and got hooked, with I Giorni, moved onto Primavera, Fly, then Divenire. They each took about a week to learn, then 3x as long to put the soul in, you know what I mean eh?
I picked up I Due Fiumi in a day today - what a sweet little song!

I'm now learning Andare and Oltremare. - I do have some technical questions about those if anyone plays them and can help?


My hubby thinks I'm a little possessed with how quickly it's taken off, but Einaudi is just so....refreshing after the classics. Not to knock my lovely Chopin but this music gets under my skin in a way that nothing else has.

Anyway, I have my last two on the go to tackle, but am now obsessed with finding the sheet music to Questa Notte. But ARGH I can't find the music online! My usual site Musicnotes doesn't have it, and I don't want to pay a billion $ to join another one

Does anyone have a pdf of it they're allowed to share? (Mods please let me know if this isn't ok)

ETA: It's really nice to be here, I'm finding it a bit lonely having no one in real life to talk with about this music!

Hi Jess and welcome to PW.
Nice to know that Einaudi's music "changed" your life I know what you're feeling and I'm also a big admirer of his work.

I'm sure you'll find here lots of members to talk about music (and other subjects, of course) and it's a great location to share your music and progress. We'd love to hear some of your pieces!

Take a look to: ABF Recital Index: Ludovico Einaudi , It's a great resource of pieces of Einaudi played by ABF members.
Good luck!

PS: I think I can help you with "Questa Notte". Check your Messages

Hi Carlos thanks for your welcome
I don't have a way of recording my stuff but will look into it. Thanks for the Recital Index, that will be interesting to go through!

Thanks for your PM, yay!

So happy to be here

Hi all, I've just listened to AnthonyB's rendition of Indaco on the Recital page and it doesn't seem too hard. Has anyone else played it? What did you think of it?

Oh and I have allllmost nailed Andare apart from a section which has totally confuzzled me, but I will conquer it, never fear LOL. How did you all find Andare?

Hi Jessiebear,

"Indaco" is one of the pieces I worked a lot. I can say that has some tricky rhythms but it's not too hard. As in many pieces of Einaudi, you just have to work "beyond" the printed notes.
The piece is beautiful but I did some adaptions...

I don't want to make comparisons, but you can listen the version I did for Recital 26.
Link: Indaco - CarlosCC, recital26

No clue about "Andare".

So devilishly difficult I haven't even attempted to tackle it.

Thanks Carlos, listening to that now. I just love this song!

Monica, the triplets in Andare aren't too bad, they run off the fingers It's just two bars on the second to last page where the timing goes all out of whack, to put it mildly, sounds great but BLEURGH! LOL.

Ok I've got the hang of the triplets in Oltremare that were totally stumping me. Turns out I needed to play it faster, doing it slow was too complicated.

But now I have fatigue in my right arm that is turning into a bit of RSI. And the culprits are the triplet sections of both!

Will have to limit myself to small blocks I think! Very frustrating when these two are so beautiful to play.

Has anyone here played La Linea Sicura? I tried looking in this thread, but it's so long! Anyway, I took a look at it yesterday and decided to put it into my practice menu. It's "easy" on some levels, but on the other hand, it will really challenge my ability to keep tension out of my RH. In that regard it's like the reverse of Yann Tiersen's Comptine d'un autre ete: l'apres midi.

After looking through some of the posts in this thread, I've also decided to start working on Nefeli (thanks Monica!

Anyway, if anyone is playing La Linea Sicura please share your thoughts.

I'm pretty sure AnthonyB played and recorded it at one time. I haven't tackled it myself.

From the looks of my "Work in Progress" folder on Box.net it appears I had been working on LLS around December of 2012...but I don't think I ever finished the piece for some odd reason.

I had made and uploaded 3 small recordings on Dec 12th which I likely shared with Monica and is likely what she's recalling me playing.

As far as hand tension I'm afraid I cannot recall. Maybe that's why I gave up the piece in the end before nailing the whole thing down...

Monica and Anthony, thanks for replying!

I practiced La Linea Sicura today (and also Nefeli, I couldn't help myself!

Anyway, I haven't played LLS enough to say yet, but I don't think it's going to be like Tiersen's Comptine was for me (initially I had a really hard time with it because I would get a cramp in my LH). But the key obviously is to have a very relaxed arm and fluid movement in the RH. Although Nefeli is more "work" to read/play through, I feel like LLS will be more challenging to polish and play. (Although we'll see if I say the same things about both of them a few weeks from now!)

One more question (please forgive me if this has been discussed in previous pages). I don't actually own a copy of Nefeli, and although I could just buy it as an individual recording, I was thinking of getting the album it's on, Islands. For those of you that have it, is Islands all solo piano, or does it have a lot of pieces with strings?

ShiroKuro I'm listenting to LLS now, wow what a lovely song! It would be a good challenge to play, and you're right about tension in the RH from stuff like that.
(I am finding it with Oltremare too. It feels better the more I roll my wrist.)

Would love to hear it once you're happy with it!

Shiro, "Islands" is a greatest hits collection for Einaudi. I would say that less than 1/3 of the pieces involve strings, with the rest being piano solos. It's an excellent choice for people who are going to buy only one Einaudi album, but you may find yourself with a lot of redundancy if you can't help yourself and end up going back and buying all the original albums.

Jessie, I haven't been doing much recording lately, not having an acoustic at home kind of takes away the motivation, and this piece is definitely one that requires the beautiful, 3-dimensional sound of a good instrument (sigh).

I can't figure out the right way to articulate the "tension" thing, but when I listen to the recording there's a softness, especially in the non-melody notes in the left hand. And I think if you can't get that in your own fingers, LLS will just sound bland. We'll see. At least I can hear it, and that's the first step to being able to create it.

Monica, I noticed that, but then I went ahead and bought Islands anyway! I have not had Nefeli to listen to before, so so far that's all I've been listening to, maybe on my walk home I'll actually listen to some of the other pieces I don't know yet!

I am really enjoying Islands! Especially Nightbook.

I guess it's time to get over my "solo piano only" snobbery

My sister finished college and has decided to pick up violin lessons. Can't wait to try playing some Einaudi together (but it will probably take a while - plenty time to get her interested in Einaudi, right?)

Allard: Plenty of time! Wish I could get my sister interested in piano again. Silly Ukelele has taken her over...

Ugh. I just bought Oltremare. (thank you, SheetMusicDirect). I am totally possessed.

But I can't start it until Nov. Because I'll be doing Nefeli in Oct.

La Linea Sicura isn't giving me too many problems... I'm even following the pedal markings (even though I don't like them very much on my digital, but this way when I play an acoustic I won't feel awkward).

If I don't finish my dissertation, it will be Ludovico's fault.