Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Achievement of the week - what got you excited?

SwissMS - gaining confidence in jumps is hard work - but so exciting once you've got it rolling.

Andy - congrats on getting that Nocturne submitted, I'm looking forward to hearing it! I listened to the Grieg piece you're going to do - it is a nice one indeed. I enjoyed hearing about your performances in the nursing home. I'm sure you brought a ray of sunshine into the place! I like the Clementi Op36 N2. We often hear N1 but 2 isn't played as much - you should have fun with it!

FarmGirl...or shall we call you PianoBomber...love it! I can't imagine why the felt you needed an escort. Get your boss to write you a permission slip to play the piano for next time! You must have been very Ticked off!!!

Saranoya: Great break through with the metronome. I've BTDT with "clicking" on something my teacher has been trying to get me to do for ages. I don't know why it takes so long sometimes, but it feels great when you finally get it, doesn't it?

ATallGuy: Reading from the sheetmusic without the piano and realizing what you're looking at is SO much fun! I remember the first time I did that, and it could very well have been the piece you're talking about - it was certainly Mozart.

hujidong: Nice progress on an interesting piece!

Teodor: How blissful to lose yourself in the music! I continue to follow your progress with great interest.

My AOT-middle-of-the-week, was to pretty well conquer the last tricky part in my Heller. I think I'll be ready to record this weekend.
Unfortunately the humidity has hit my acoustic in a nasty way and my fresh tuning already sounds significantly less than wonderful .:((((

rmaple: Nice dp! Blessed is the man who understands what his riches are!

Torquenale: A good lesson is a thing of joy! Sometimes it helps to have that little extra time, even though we hate missing a lesson.

Dulcetta ; congrats on finishing the book! It is great to have such a concrete sign of progress.
Sam Rose: ...and back to the books for you! Great idea to fill in some gaps in your training. You'll probably feel a bit frustrated with the simplicity compared to what you've been working on, but focusing on your technique is going to pay off big time in the longrun.

AoTW - made it back home safely, yay! I practiced my bach pieces and recorded them to see how I'm doing. Sadly it's not very musical. Very choppy. My fugue sounds like speech therapist's office. All my recurring theams arestuttering. This piece is one of the two double fugue in WTC. So it sounds quite confusing. I cannot believe I have to play these on Saturday evening in our recital. It shows that I did not practice for a while. Maybe because I'm sleepy. I took 6:30 am EST flight from NY that means ... I must've been up more than 24 hours. I go to bed now.

You really do have a busy schedule FarmGirl and boo to the silly security staff, what on earth were they thinking of ?

Thanks for the encouragement folks {hugs]

Saranoya; I can just imagine myself in your shoes and having that same attitude, listen to the teacher, smile and nod head and determine to do it your own way at home, that would so be me and has been me in comparable situations. Much as we need to learn to take advice though, I think when we discover the reality of something for ourselves, we learn it better.

1) I managed to play Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 19 in G minor, Op. 49 No. 1 with only two mistakes! And the two mistakes were because I psyched myself out - "Yes, THIS maybe the time I play it through without any errors..... <CLASH #1> .... Dang! ... <CLASH #22> <refocused>"

2) Learned another page of Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 5 in C minor, Op. 10 No. 1. Four-and-a-half pages in!

AOTW was submitting my first recital piece. Didn't come easy, there is sweat and blood in there. Good luck to everyone else practicing their pieces, man am I glad it's over, now I can get back to scales http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/images/icons/default/smirk.gif

LOL!
I am sure my office is much much worse sounding! Remember, slowing down is one of the tried and true treatments for stuttering.

...?

You'll love my recital piece Syblings raised apart -

On one of my recital pieces awhile back the only glaring error I had was the last chord. No one mentioned it

Cathy

I am full of piano stutters LOL. Just had my first lesson in awhile as teacher was away. Showed him where I'm up to with the Bach minuet and played him my recordings as well.

Now I have to practise the whole page and play it slowly not the first bar up to speed which I c an do, but play it all slow and keep going instead of first bar correct speed, stop and the rest plod plod! He also told me to start at different bars and practise the measures I struggle with more. I know I ought to be doing that but I always start at the beginning. I sort of knew that I was playing the first bar by memory/ear and was no longer "sight reading" it. I do have a tendency to play by ear.

Well done!

Yeah I just went to lesson and she told me the same thing, "Slow down". I think you all make good sense I will practice to play faster after the recital.

Sort of... I haven't had this as a goal, it just sort of happened, and I'm not convinced that I could replicate it consistently. Certainly, I don't think that whatever would be imagined in my head for a piece with which I was not familiar would bear anything but the vaguest resemblance to reality.

That said...

I would put credit on three factors:

1) When I listen to music on YouTube (which is my primary source of music when I'm not in the car) I try to seek out the versions that show the score. I try to follow along as best I can, it's tough on the fast pieces. The good news is that the page changes and then you know you're lost (or you reach the end of the page and realize you're ahead) and you get a chance to reset. Following on paper or PDF is harder for that reason, but I do that sometimes as well. For instance, I got a PDF of Chopin Preludes Opus 28 off of IMSLP the other day, then read it while listening. Very difficult in many spots to stay in synch, but educational -- subsconsciously perhaps foremost.

2) Sight Reading apps. Even the sight reading apps can help because they play the note, so you get the benefit of associating the sound with what you see on the page. Playing the piano does this for us too of course, but the rapid fire repetition and focus on just the tone, and how it relates to the position on the staff, is different in terms of not being distracted by any other aspects (like, the next note(s) to come, dynamics, touch, phrasing, blah blah blah).

3) Ear Training apps. I've tried a number of these, but my favorite by far (recommended by SandTiger) is Piano Ear Training. Even the free version is completely worthwhile and you can get a lot out of it. Unfortunately it has sound issues on my phone, which is driving me crazy -- nevertheless, I would highly recommend giving it a try. It has the best piano sound of any that I have tried, and the most reasonable balance and flexibility when dealing with the conundrum of trying to take an 88-key instrument and model it on a 4.5" screen.

Let us know how it goes...

Not an AOTW per se, but...

My piano tech/tuner came today, tuned the spinet, and then took a trip with me to check out an old upright at my church that they want to get rid of. Key tops have been trashed, it's atrociously out of tune, and so on -- but -- it's a full sized upright. It has a fantastic tone... that unique old piano sound we were talking about recently, that just can't be duplicated in anything built in the last 50 years (maybe even the last 75 years).

Not sure if I mentioned this earlier in the thread when I first got this idea a few weeks ago? Anyway, I wanted him to evaluated if it was insane (or not) to get rid of my spinet and take this old pile of junk and rehab it.

Verdict: not insane.

It's a Hamilton, from the early 1900s. No cracks in the soundboard, no cracks in the bridge -- which he deemed "remarkable" for a piano of such advanced age. The original bridle straps/tapes have all been replaced (and "done very well"), various leather thingies (OK, I'm out of my depth on the terminology here) are also in very good shape, and the dampers are tolerable. The hammer felts are a wreck and the whole thing is terribly dirty, but that's about it. Oh yes, and it's been painted to match the room several times -- which is a travesty considering the antique finish that is under there -- but I really don't care about the cosmetics.

So, cleaning it up (not the finish, just the action), new key tops, and shaping & voicing of the hammers (there's enough felt there for now -- they'll need to be replaced eventually I think) looks like it would cost roughly about what my spinet is worth. I might be able to just swap them and come out none the poorer, except more tunings than I had planned on having otherwise.

Hmmm.... I have to clear this with you-know-who:




...and...




...she...



grumbled...

and she groaned...

and asked clarifying questions...

and said "really? when we just paid to get it tuned?!?"...

and pointed out that I never wanted the thing in the first place when she bought it 10 years ago (true, that)...

and waxed poetical re: memories of the kids playing it...

and insinuated that nobody would want to buy a spinet anyway...

and wondered how on earth we were going to lug this other beast into the house...


These are all good signs... inklings of the beginnings of acquiescence.

Tallguy good for you. She must be thinking it could be worse. Jokes aside, piano is a very good hobby and she must love your music.

FarmGirl - you make me laugh. A speech therapist's office! Get some sleep girl!
And as for the slowing down....when oh WHEN do we ever learn to really listen to that
excellent advice?

Maestro - excellent progress on your Beethoven!

Earlofmar - congrats on your first submission! woohoo!

Cathy- that's very interesting you know....I never noticed the error (should I go back and check? Nah, I don't think so!).... But it is another example of something that really stands out to the performer, but to the audience is not at all obvious.

TallGuy: interesting you are considering getting rid of the spinet and picking up the to-be-refurbished piano. I think it would be cool to have a spinet, but I'd want the piano AS WELL, not instead!
As for reading the music and hearing it in your head, it is interesting to read how you've been developing this ability. Albeit not intentionally! Another thing that can help - if you really want to move in this direction - is to sing your pieces.

My tuner will come back to tweak the piano - but suggested we wait a bit. I think the weather is settling down so the humidity should drop. Unfortunately I'm not sure that her schedule and my schedule and the weather will all work out for an acoustic recording for the recital. I did a take last night (also battling with a new computer which doesn't want to cooperate!, so used the old one).... it is ok, but I think I can do better so I'll try again today.

Yearly evaluation today run by the New Hampshire Music Teachers' Association. First time for me participating. We do performance, theory tests, etc. I chose only to do the performance part. I think I played very well. I got lots of positive comments. I played the Grande Valse Brilliante in A minor Op 34 no 2 by Chopin. The Bach D minor Invention. And the Chopin Nocturne Op 9 no 2 in E flat major. I think I got myself all worked up over nothing. The evaluator was very supportive not critical at all. Anyway, I think I was the only adult in the program who participated. I was told I was a "good sport" about stuff like this. Well, if I desire to perform, this program has the venues. I felt like I really accomplished something today.

Well done dynamobt terrific to be able to perform in front of others a music teachers association no less............a tough crowd if ever there was one

Well, not to mislead, it was only the "one" evaluator. Not a crowd by any stretch. Still, I feel it accomplishment worthy. My innards tell me I got all worked up over this!!!!!

Way to go Dynamobt! That is a big accomplishment and should be very proud of yourself.

Congratulations, that is quite an AOTW.