Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Suggestion - a different type of e-cital

I have participated in quite a few e-citals lately. From the less prestigeous quarterly ABF-recitals to some themed recitals (Mendelssohn, Grieg and Chopin).

I have found this quite useful because it has helped me focusing on the stuff I have been working on. I think that having deadlines and the opportunity to present the music for qualified listeners has given me the necessary push to improve my own playing. And I believe that I'm not the only e-cital participant having this experience.

For the themed recitals most of the pieces available have been relatively short (with a few exceptions). Therefore I have been thinking about the possibility of arranging an e-cital with the deadline maybe some 6 - 9 months ahead where we could play longer pieces, maybe suites or sonatas. And not make any limitations to which composer or what kind of piece. Personally I have one particular piece in mind. It will take quite a lot of effort to learn it, and I'm almost 100% sure that if I don't "sign up" for playing it on a given date, I'm going to put it aside as soon as I encounter difficulties.

Of course, we have the "members' recordings" option. However I feel that this is not a playground for amateurs, but rather a place where advanced conservatory students or professionals post their recordings (maybe with one notable exception).

Do anybody have an interest in such a project? For instance sign up for a piece of own choice to present some time in September or October this year.

Wouldn't that just be the same idea as the ABF quarterlies? Play whatever you want?

Well, you may be right. Surely there have been some longer pieces represented there, like Chopin's first Ballade. But most pieces are short and relatively simple, and many are outside the classical repertoire. Probably the initial intention with the ABF quarterlies was to give relatively inexperienced players to present their stuff. And lately some of us old foxes have entered the scene and spoiled everything.

The piece I have been considering to study is maybe not as technically difficult as the Chopin Ballade, but it is more or less in the same league and a pretty long piece. I would think twice before submitting it for the ABF recital. I'm just afraid that many of the other participants would find it annoying.

So it's a quarterly recital where you have to play a long piece?

I like the idea, Ganddalf. The nice thing about e-citals is the way they collate performances and collect an audience.

As a frequent listener and contributor in the Member Recordings sub-forum, I assure you it is not just for pros and soon-to-be pros or even wannabe pros or accomplished amateurs. As I understood it when it opened, yea these four (!) years ago, it was for *enthusiasts*. There is a wide range of material posted there by people at varying levels of development, but finding listeners there can be a hit and miss thing, that's for sure. Post anything with "Chopin" in the title, though, and you are in for a ride! But there are regular listeners and chimers in, and its been interesting to see that community develop.

I think I understand the scope of what you are suggesting, but I wonder if it needs a little more focus. For instance, "pick a longer work that you'd like to share--whatever 'longer work' means to you." That is broad and inclusive, which, personally, I like. But, perhaps you want to limit it to the performance of a complete piece that has more than one movement. Or, perhaps the piece must be one that exceeds a certain duration.

I like the six to nine month preparation time idea.

Anyway, count me in. I have a couple of pieces in mind and I'd certainly consider sharing one (or two, or three). I haven't recorded them, yet, because I keep finding things to work on and/or tweak and/or re-shape. The deadline would be good!

--Andy

Perhaps people who want to participate could say so by a certain date, then, participants could decide together on the program? That way the program could be done with some amount of artistic thought, but participants would have more freedom to choose their own pieces.

I might even find these more interesting to listen to than a recital of all the same composer, as fun as those are.

I wonder, H, if we could get enough participants to create a program of suites and sonatas presented in historical order? That might be cool...

Sure would. I'd be up for playing in it too. With suites you'd have the option of multiple pianists playing a movement or two each, in cane some want to participate without learning something long.

I really like this idea - especially having selections from different style periods and presented in historical order, and collaborating with someone one movements of a sonata or suite is a great idea too.

I, too, have not participated in the ABF quarterlies because I didn't feel it was appropriate (although I'm sure no one would say anything if I did).

Just FYI - there are no official forum rules regarding e-vitals or the members' recordings forum. Anybody can start an e-cital if they're willing to do the work (host, organize, etc...), and anybody can post anything to the members' recordings forum (although I think the nature of the comments tend to scare a lot of people off.)

Gandalf, I like the idea very much as well. I have several pieces I'm working on this year fit in the category. It will be great to share a piece we worked on for a long time here. I so appreciated everyone's feedback.

The themed recitals were great but I had to defer a large piece (for me) in order to meet the deadline for the recital. It's worthwhile to learn a new nocturne but did not feel the same for Tchikovsky. Member's recording section is great but still a bit intimidating for me. Maybe because it's individual recording. In e cital so many of us share the stage!! It's wonderful.

Kreisler, by the way, I used to think I need to pass an audition of be a full member of Pianist Corner.

This may be a good idea, but whoever plans it should keep one thing in mind :

If ten, twelve or twenty people sign up for this suggested e-cital, and we end up with a performance that goes on for several hours, are we going to have any listeners? What would be the purpose of having such a lengthy recorded performance if - as I imagine the possibility - many would be so daunted by the sheer length of it that they would end up not listening.

That said, there would be nothing to prevent listeners from picking and choosing what they want to listen to, even if that should be only one or two performances. But then, why not just post individual performances in the Members' Recordings Forum?

Regards,

How would you come up with a program of suites and sonatas that can't be presented in historical order?

I don't understand the question. If one played a Prokofiev sonata, then a Handel suite, then a Rachmaninoff sonata, then a Mozart sonata, they would not be in historical - i.e chronological - order.

Regards

But if you played the Handel suite first, followed by the Mozart, Rachmaninoff, and Prokofiev, they would be in historical order. Cinnamonbear's original statement confused me because the number of participants would seem to have nothing to do with whether or not the program was in order.

I'm guessing that C-bear meant something that resembled a historical survey with representative works from the major musical periods - even if that's not what he said.

But, OTOH, given the level of miscommunication in this forum recently, I'm also guessing that I must also be totally wrong about that. Nothing that transparently obvious could possibly be what he meant.

Quite a few relevant issues discussed here.

Certainly there is a risk that of getting a too long e-cital if 20 participants sll choose to play a 15 minutes sonata. But 10 persons playing pieces of 10 minutes average length wouldn't be too much.

And even if the opportunity is opened for playing longer pieces, it doesn't mean that shorter ones also could be included.

A very simple approach would be if some of us just agreed upon a date and signed up for pieces (any piece - short or long) and put this together as an informal e-cital. The order of presentation could be made chronological or just random.

If the number of participants gets high and the total time gets long it could also be possible to split everything into shorter sessions and release these at different dates.

I can be open and tell you which pieces I'm considering myself. Actually there are four options:

Bach: Partita no.3
Beethoven: Sonata Op 10.3
Chopin: Rondo a la Mazur Op.5
Faure: Impromptu no.3

I will choose only one of them, of course.

I have already invested a considerable amount of practice into these pieces. I believe now that I could play any of them decently enough for an e-cital if I get the necessary push. Otherwise I'm going to practice for two weeks and then put them aside.

The Faure isn't even a very long piece. But I assume that I'll have to wait a long time for a Faure recital. I don't find it appropriate to play any of them in an ABF recital, and presenting it as a "member's recording" is something I feel uncomfortable with.

So.. are you basically suggesting is more of an beyond-beginner forum recital?

Sounds good! But why wait for over half a year? Most people who could play such pieces in half a year are probably playing similar pieces now, and might even like to join a recital to present them.

On a sort of related note, does anybody find the feedback forum for the recitals hard to sift through? They are all meshed onto one large thread and I'm sure I missed a bunch of comments and a bunch of people missed my comments because of that. Is there any way we can see all the comments per piece together?

I would also love to attach a rating system or something. It could be split among different dimensions, musicality, technique, interpretation/creativity. This might be unique to me though, since I don't have a teacher so I'm constantly looking for better ways of getting feedback.

There was no call for the unprovoked rudeness.

Thanks for your suggestions.

The reason why I suggest half a year preparation is that I believe some of us (including myself) need at least so much time. But, of course, it could be possible to arrange something on a shorter term for those who already have stuff ready or nearly ready.

I agree that the feedback threads often are messy. I assume that it is possible to figure out a solution to this. When comes to rating of the performances I'm a bit skeptical. There is a risk that this will lead to competition and some participants may also be scared off participation.
I'm in the same situation as you having no teacher. But I don't feel any real need for rating. In fact I have found that one of the most useful aspects of the e-citals is the making of and listening to own recordings. I think I have learnt a lot from this, and I'm probably the strictest judge to my own playing.

Gandalf -- for what it's worth, here are my reactions to your e-cital proposal:

1 Since some specific person or two needs to run the e-cital, I think that should be YOU, since you brought it up. That would give you the opportunity to call the shots on the format, and dictate the "rules"

2 I agree with a couple of other posts that there needs to be more specific focus than just an extended composition from any composer in any time period.

3 I'm not keen on the Sonata concept -- for me, Theme and Variations might be a more flexible constraint. For example, several Sonatas have Theme and Variations as one movement, and you could present that independently of the entire Sonata.

4 I think the Suite concept could work, if you're allowed to regard grouping of character pieces that aren't necessarily called "Suite" as legitimate entries. That would open the door for many Romantic and 20th Century compositions.

5 I certainly like the idea of presenting from the 17th through the 20th century in chronological order -- that would be a most instructive way to listen.

^^^Emphasis added. That's exactly what I meant, wr! So, thanks for the translation. And, I was thinking that it would take a fair number of participants to get it to work, in the manner that Tim just said:



I mean, we could just do potluck, and put everything on the table in order by historical era. If we get lots of participants, Ganddalf could use Poly's idea from the Mazurka e-cital of doling out performances in groups perhaps by era, if he has time to manage it. If Ganddalf doesn't have that kind of time, I'm sure we can figure something out. There seems to be a lot of brain power represented on these pages. (BTW, I found Poly's trickle-out method to be a helpful and refreshing way to enjoy that e-cital.)

Also, personally, I like the long lead time, because, while I do have several things I could share at fairly short notice, the thought of preparing it for an e-cital would give me the impetus to smooth out the rough places with a purpose by a given date. But I do have a life in which I have to earn money somehow to keep a roof over my head while supporting my piano playing addiction, and there are only so many hours in the day. I, too, shoved some things aside in order to participate in the Mazurka e-cital. That was my choice, and I'm glad I did it, but I like the thought of having more time than three months to polish and fluff and buff.

I'm not in favor of a rating system for an e-cital. The way I see it, recitals are celebrations of accomplishment and appreciation, as opposed to competitions, which are... different than that... ( ...celebrations of criticism and nitpickery? ) Competitions have their place, for sure, but I would suggest that unless stated as such, it would be best to avoid a competitive or critical atmosphere in an e-cital. I suppose one could always ask, when introducing their selection, for critical feedback to be given by PM. I assure you, neuralfirings, you can post any recording you wish in Member Recordings, and ask for a rating on a scale of 1 to 10 of any of this:



..and you will get all the feedback you can handle!

--Andy

I would definitely be interested in joining this, but I like the idea of 6-9 months to prepare. Learning a whole sonata or suite is tough...

You have enough interest. Let's do it.

Forget it. I took a wrong turn and ended up in the wrong forum with this reply. Sorry.

I really liked how the Grieg recital was handled as far as keeping things clean and easy to find. There was a sticky post with the music only as it was presented and no comments could be left there, and then there was a separate comments thread.

I also agree that a rating system would probably deter many people from participating. If a competition is something that is wanted that can always be a separate thing. I don't mind constructive criticism, though.

The rating system could possibly scare away a lot of people, and I don't very much like the idea. I do think we should make it an option for participants to ask for a rating if they want though

Here's my two cents or more:

Yes to a recital for longer pieces
Yes to 6 months prep time (would like to set a goal to learn new one by due date)
Yes to separate feedback thread
Yes to splitting up the recital presentations by period or something
Yes to technical feedbacks and reviews. I appreciate anyone who takes time to listen and write feedback. I think we all mean well. Me too. English is not my first language so I try my best when I write mine - please forgive me if it sounds crude.
No to rating system that is applied to everyone.
Yes to give an option for well formatted rating system for those who desire such rating for exam etc

There seems to be sufficient support for the idea of arranging an e-cital where the main focus is on longer compositions/pieces. I believe that I could take on the responsibility of running it. I assume it can be done in a way similar to the Mazurka recital where the participants provide links to their music, and allow both audio and video links.

But I would still like to have some additional ideas from you how we can limit the scope a bit. Possible options are:

- a sonata recital
- a suite recital
- a "theme with variations" recital
- a recital with signle movement pieces form the romantic era (e.g. pieces longer than 5 minutes)

Other ideas? Any preferences?

If you all agree that I'll be main responsible for this, I would also like to set the rules and select a date for deadline. In case I'll not make many complex rules, but I suggest that we stick to one participant per piece, one piece per participant and no rating system, but the option to give constructive feedback.

What do you think?

Less prestigious? To whom? By what standard?

A mildly derogatory comment that certainly belongs, if anywhere, in this forum...

I think we should just have a recital where each piece should be at least ___ minutes long, or something like that. I don't like restricting the type of music we play.

I think it will be most enjoyable for listeners if a recital of longer pieces is carefully curated, both for length and for flow, either by all participants working together or by 1-2 organizers.
An all-comers play-whatever-you-want recital would be most enjoyable to listen to if the pieces are short.

But perhaps I am thinking too much like a real-life recital where one must be courteous to those who have decided to spend their evening in a seat listening. For an e-cital, listeners can always deal with an overly long recital by not listening to most of it/only listening to the parts that interest them.

Even if the recital was too long, if we broke it up into sections and released the recital one section at a time, it would be good IMO

Sorry for my statement. Stupid of me. I have made the majority of my posts under the ABF, and I have great respect for what goes on there.

Bump... So when is this going to happen?

Give me a week or two to figure out exactly what to do and how to do it. There are many ongoing projects right now, and I was actually thinking on a longer term.

The last option is not necessarily the best one but it would be the easiest to manage and the easiest for the average person to participate (including myself). It's also the least interesting because it's not a clearly defined theme.

May I ask WHAT is an ABF???

Adult beginner forum

The Adult Beginners Forum has a long-running quarterly recital. The next one (Feb 15) will be the 33rd in a row. Details are here:
ABF Quarterly Recital

And we have an interesting index to all the past recital performances:
ABF Recital Index

Sam

I have spent some time thinking about possible ways to focus a long piece recital and have come up with two quite different proposals.

Alternative 1: A Bach suite recital. This could include the French and English suites, the partitas. Probably other compositions of Bach could also be included.

Alternative 2: An Impromptu recital. This would be mainly music from the romantic era and could include those written by Schubert, Chopin, Faure and others.

(Just one reservation: There is an upcoming Tchaikovsky e-cital under the ABF where a few pieces have the title "Impromptu". Before giving the opportunity to select any of these for "our" e-cital I suggest that we clarify with the organisers and those who are currently practicing these pieces if it is ok to use them here. I try to avoid stepping on anyone's toes here, but personally I would really like to include them here if we decide to go for the impromptu alternative.)

I think both proposals give the opportunity to select music in the range from "moderately difficult" to "advanced". Let me hear if this has any interest?

Hi, Gandalf! Well, of these two alternatives, I would definitely vote the Impromptu option -- the Bach Suite option feels TOO specialized to me, and restricts the entries to one musical era. That, and my general sense that the pianists who frequent this site strongly gravitate to literature from the Romantic era to the present, and so the chances of getting varied submissions from different eras are really pretty good.

Well, let's see if there is enough interest in the Bach Suite idea -- speaking for myself, I have a couple of things in mind for either of the two possibilities.

I would prefer the Suite option, especially if it were opened wider to include other composers along with Bach, but that is only because I have been working on some Handel for the last two years...

"Baroque suites" could be an alternative.

If we were to do those options, I wouldn't be able to participate, since I have enough on my plate for competitions without adding to it.

If we go with the "Impromptu" suggestion - we'd pretty much be limited to the Romantic era - right??

If we consider "suites" other than those written during the Baroque era, then we'd be able to find works by such composers as Grieg, Albeniz, Raff, Schoenberg, Bartok, Poulenc, Ravel and even Faure (4 hands). Personally, I'd be fine with the Baroque Suite idea.

A general "suite recital" is an excellent idea. Of course we don't need to have an ambition of covering every suite in the piano literature, but there will be lots of interesting music to choose from. This is perhaps the best suggestion so far.

Comments? Other ideas?

Who's going to submit the Godowsky Java Suite?

I like this idea a lot, too, because it would present so many interesting things to listen to! (Actually, it's kind of what I had in mind when I said, "other than Bach," despite my desire to share Handel! )

Ah Must we play the entire Suite? Could we do Prelude and a couple of dances instead of all of them? I am thinking of Bach English Suite.

I think the idea was that everyone present a full suite.

Although I'm sure a few people could collaborate on presenting a movement of a suite and collaboratively present the entire quite that way.

If its English Suite II I can probably pull it through all of them within 6 months (by the end of the year) since I have done the prelude before. I appreciate collaboration if it's a new Suite I have to learn. I have other pieces I am working on and I don't want to abandon them.

My thought about this is that a group of piano-playing friends agree upon making an e-cital without being too formalistic. If anyone wants to participate but will not be able to play a whole suite I think we should accept this. We could also open for collaboration where e.g. two pianists play different movements of the suite.

I suggest that we start right away.

It is now up to you to choose a suite. This can be any composition with "Suite" in the title. I think we should also open for Bach partitas, the French Ouverture of Bach and other "suites" containing the common movements (Allemande, Courante, Sarabande etc.)

Those of you who want to participate, please decide what you want to play and inform me through a PM. I'll open a thread where I make a list of selected works and keep it updated.

I propose November 3rd (Monday) as the deadline. I prefer not to receive audio or video files, but just links to box, YouTube or whatever. You decide if you wish to make a video or just an audio recording.

I suggest that we open for playing parts of the suite, but it would be desirable if the whole suite is played. Collaboration projects are welcome.

Let us just start and see what comes out of it.