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

I doubt folks were scared off by faith, our thread goes in cycles. We have, though rarely, even ended up on page three!

I have no AOTW unless just getting to the piano counts. I am so out of steam after the EPP. I have been playing scales and arpeggios and doing a bit of work on trying to get back a piece I liked but was not fully satisfied with.

I could not post because I was busy! I feel God's presence all the time and would like to live my life worthy of his gift. Having said that, I respect everyone's God or no God. I try to be true to myself. If that offends someone, well, sorry, but won't be sorry enough to quit being me.

So Ragdoll don't feel bad about it. I like you to heal and think understand how you feel. When I was very young, I experienced hardship. I could not have gone through it without Him. That's when I rediscovered music too. I like to read what you write. Hang in there. I wish you get stronger and better at each note you press on the piano! I am also sure that He is with you all the time. (That does not mean you would be playing better instantly. Hahaha).

And thank you cas and Farmgirl. Ragdoll, the gift of music is a blessing indeed.

My AOTW is pretty subtle (translation: maybe it's just my imagination ). My Bach invention is starting to sound a little more confident and the tempo is gradually increasing. Ditto for the Beethoven. It has literally taken me a month, but I'm okay with that.

I've also been bringing back Brahms Waltz in A major (his own simplified version). I had not played it in months and the first time through was very rough, but it came back after a few times through. Now for some actual improvements!

Ragdoll, glad you are on the mend. Don't worry about the faith thing. I read back thru and didn't see a stray word from you.

For me, music is a religious/spiritual adventure. My music has helped me through some very dark times. As a composer, I often feel my original music comes from a higher source. When I play live and connect with an audience, and do near my best, I feel like I am plugged into the music power source of the universe. It is electrifying, amazing, dazzling. It is why I encourage virtually everyone to perform in public, so they might have that chance to feel that same overwhelming sense of connection. Some might tell me that it is grandiose delusion. However, I know that I have moved audiences with my amateur music.

My AOTW was playing at my local music group, Songmakers. I played a variation of an old Irish folk tune, The South Wind, and my brand new work in progress, Clear Blue Sky.

My achievement is played relatively well in the talented kids recital. It's not the real name of the recital. It's just my teacher, being a full time college prof, tend to get mostly talented kids and prodigies. My teacher suggested for me to participate in it since I have to play in a big concert for amateurs in Japan. I worried about my dress coming down due to flimsy straps but it stayed in its place. Thank goodness, I did not have. such embarrassing distractions. In spite of the chair making some sound and piano moving forward (not locked properly) I was able to pull it off. I made three mistakes in my Granados piece but able to cover it up rather nicely. My teacher asked me "you know the top of the third page of Granados, it sounded good but a little different than I heard it before. You may want to check the notes there". So I confessed that I hit wrong notes and covered it up that way. She was like, wow you are getting better at it, that's good. I knew the last page of the Rach piece was weak because I could not practice certain passages with my bad thump. So two hours before the performance I made a decision to drop certain notes. It worked well and my teacher did not notice this one. I was amused that talented children (11 years playing Chopin ballade etc) did not affect me at all. Maybe I got used to it.

I will practice the last page until the day of the concert 8/14. Oh.. Actually I'm playing one more time at our friends house on Th. I will not have any time up touch the piano before the party. So it will be interesting. My teacher said it will be a good practice for me.

Thanks to all of you for the encouraging words and wishes. I really don't have much of an AOTW other than playing every day since my last post. My computer went south a couple days ago and I just got it working again today. (battery and lockups) I blame that new Adobe patch

@SandTiger Oh it doesn't worry me at all. People who think I'm loopy or whatever, have a right to an opinion of their own; to me it's liked being stoned with popcorn.

My selection for the GASB is coming along OK, not sure if it will be good enough to record in time but I'm getting there. YAY! Part of my loss of this song is my reading but that is also returning with the playing again, and being off the pain meds. Can't wait to hear this recital.

I thought most of us around here exhibited loopiness to one degree or another anyway. Is there some doubt about that?

Not sure if it's an achievement, but just wanted to share Yesterday we attended a lecture on Vladimir Horowitz and had a chance to play on his piano (the famous Steinway D CD503), which my son and I took advantage of.

Cool stuff Moonshine!

Ragdoll
Sending prayers up for you. Hoping that the chemo does it job and then leaves you to heal and return to your piano. Glad that you posted so we can be with you.

I had a lesson yesterday (my lessons have been pretty widely spaced over the summer) and my teacher assigned me a piece from Mendelssohn's Songs Without Words and several more of them to read through. So I ordered the book and should have it in a few days. I just love getting new material--so much possibility!

It's Beethoven's 15th sonata, opus 28, beautiful and elegant, and at first sight , not to much of a challenge.

I know I can only do very little practice in the summer - the odd 20 mins - grabbed from the day - and essential to my sanity. I didn't want to start anything too difficult that would take months of work........

I've really only look at the exposition, first 160 bars.
Lesssons , beacuse I am so limited in the work I have put into it, have been, nevertheless .extremely enlightening. My teacher really understand how to get the most out of the time even if I barely move along the pages.
Such simple things make such a difference. and only a teacher could point them out, a teacher who really knows the piece is even.
Just why in bar 7 is the fingering 12,15,32 for those those thirds (!) etc for that phrase - well if you really listen to fuddles made with other fingerlings - then Beethoven's way lets you float off the top, with that staccato lifting off the keyboard so delicately ....

As for the finger gymnastics in the section from bar 48, they don't feel natural at first but how sweet it is when it just flows!

What about bar 69 - who puts 215 on that chord....? and once I learned to really hear the difference in the sound that was produced when its done a different way - Beethoven knew what he was doing....
In that extended section 77 though 104 - come on - it looks so simple..... with the pinkie trying to hold on to the legato on top, it's a stretch and struggle, and exhausting for the hand..... lift it, let the pedal take the sound where it needs to go, and it becomes easy and more flowing, and what it is meant to be - beauttiful.....
but it took my teacher to show me the difference and for me to really listen to the way the sounds were produced.

I think Beethoven really love the keyboard and caressed those keys in a way that brought out a magical sound from the strings, the wood and the ivory.

Again my AOTW is to not have lost MOYD.
It has been unbearably hot for weeks, which sucks the energy right out of me.

I have been going through all my scales and arpeggios, and not much else , this past week.
I have added some new scales and am working at trying to remember hand positions for the chords so I can be fasterat finding them on lead sheets..... Something iI have recently started looking at.

Kind of a ^AOTW.

No practice for two weeks, no lesson for four weeks. Just when I was getting some momentum..

The real AOTW will be when I get back from vacation to see how long it takes to gets things going again.

Brian, you'll be surprised. For me, a break can be very refreshing. After a three week trip on the John Muir Trail, I was right back where I left off.

Gary, that is what I am hoping for.

Thanks

That has been my "first" Beethoven sonata to complete and It's almost time for me to give it a re-lecture.
If you allow me, I have few suggestions about it.
First the pedal, never all the way down, keep it shallow and think about the orchestration to bring out the voices, think the repeated D at the beginning as a double bass short bow strokes... they are not legato, in the same way the theme has specific breaths.
the quick figurations, careful, legato going up, slightly detached going down (bar 25)... I head a lot of interpretations that do use too much pedal and too much legato in this sonata where is not indicated, especially in the development passagework between the left and right hand... where a highly mozartean detached touch is sublime, but also hard as heck.
Have fun, this sonata is a blast. as well the last few bars of the last movement... start getting these into the fingers now, by the time you'll get there you'll thank me. Seriously that finale fireworks section takes quite a bit to get comfortable under the fingers and is a good idea to start reading it slow from the beginning because overall, this sonata can be learned pretty quickly.

I should have entered MOYd as well. I have not missed piano no more than 2 or 3 days this whole year. and that was due to physical condition/sickness or just being out of town and could not be near a piano.

I have had days where I could just do scales for a 15 mins and quit for the nite. I found that doing the scales daily at least fwiw allows me to keep my dexterity and fluidity in my pieces continuously even if I dont play them daily. But on the other hand, I recall, if I work on pieces only wihtout scales or some czernny technical work, the pieces I neglect for a few days I lose my fluidity/dexterity on those. Maybe due to scales, maybe due to my maturity in piano practice. who knows. fwiw.

Maybe not yet much of an achievement... but I decided to take on a fugue (never learned any before neither studied the theory). And after some heavy studying I actually think I got the basic idea of it

I've never had such patience before, but I wrote the voices separately and have studied them before even touching the piano. There are a few tricky spots to solve still (I'll need my teacher to help), but most of the ground work is done.

Now I only have to learn to play the thing...might take me a year, but I will!

Which edition of Beethoven op 28 are you using?