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Just read the article Jeff - good one!

I had a most satisfying lesson today. (Yes, second lesson this week as it was a make-up for one my teacher had to miss in April... he was conducting in Vienna )

So my objective from my previous lesson was to make my third movement "humorous" and have it "dance"...right. In the first movement I had to fix a wobbly ornament, and straighten up some dynamics that I'd missed , and in the second movement I had to maintain my tempo for the last 8 bars, working with metronome to keep me on track.

Given that I only had 2 days I was feeling pretty good about the tweaking I'd done - and YIPPEE - so was my teacher. I've had three consecutive weeks of "very good" "that's better".

I also played my pieces at the venue where we're having the European Piano Party in a couple of weeks. It is in a lounge in a hotel and there were all sorts of people wandering about so it was good for playing in public, with a "public" that wasn't really paying much attention to me.

All in all, a very satisfactory piano day.

Oh my goodness, that article was beyond 'good' for me.... what a brilliant mind! How refreshing to read something online that was so absolutely personally meaningful to me, an aspiring pianist, a struggling pianist, who knows more than she can play. (at the moment)

I had a day off! And I played piano all day! And I discovered a whole bunch of new pieces I want to learn, including Schubert Musical Moments, and Beethoven Opus 79, been bashing it out a bit for the past couple of hours.

Love the article of the pianist being critical of the pianist: we are our own worst critics.

I hope you're all having a great day!
:-)

There is nothing like that in my city. I'd join one if there were. You'll have to tell us what you've learnt when you are back! Have fun.


My personal AOTW like two weeks ago was when my parents and niece came to spend one day home with me. Last Christmas I bought my 11-year-old niece a keyboard, mostly as a toy since I am not paying classes for her or buying books. So, with some sorrow, I gave her my first part of Thompson's Grade 1. She played some piece a bit and then I did.

My mother then said "Why does it sound better when you play it?"

LOL it was clear my mother expected my niece to play better just because she is a child and the comment showed how little faith she had in my learning at my age. Anyhow, that's the only time anybody has been here with me at the piano and has certified me a Grade "above clueless"...not yet Grade 1.

I had my first piano lesson in twenty years! My teacher has been playing since she was 4 and teaches at two local colleges. She's very enthusiastic about music and piano. We have a lot of common interests and I'm going to enjoy working with her.

She had me play several songs that I've worked on during the last three months from the method books. I only have two songs left in the Bastien beginner adult book, so she had me start on one of them, Brahm's Hungarian Dance No 5 and an easy throw away piece from another book I had. I'm not sure we're going to continue with the last few pieces I have in the Alfred book. Instead she added Bach's Minuet in G and gave me her copy of Snell's Level 5 Repertoire book. She told me to pick something I liked from it. I'm going to work on Streabbog's The Orphan.

It's been a challenging week, since all the music was new to me. I think I've accomplished quite a bit. I never would have picked the Bach piece if I was working on my own. I would have thought I wasn't ready for it. I've been pleasantly surprised as I've practiced this week. I guess one of the many benefits of having a teacher is their experience in having a better idea about what you can handle than what you think yourself.

Barbaram - I'd love to be doing voice lessons! That's so neat! Good for you

Albunea - nice to get some recognition finally!

SadieLady -welcome ! Which Minuet in G are you doing? The one that starts with arpeggios in the right hand or the one that starts with the block chords in the left?

(I've been working on both recently and they're so much fun to play!)


My ATOW was to have had a series of "very good" "good improvement" comments from my teacher. I had been working at improving the dynamics in my pieces and I knew they were better, but it is so lovely to hear him say it! He's very cautious with giving praise, so when I get it, I know its worth!

casinitaly, It's In G major, only two chords one at the beginning and one at the end. I had my second lesson today. She said I was coming along fine with it and the others, but gave me some tips for improvement.

I have been away from the forum for a few weeks. We drove from Switzerland to southern Spain the last week of May, and have decided to relocate here. So I am now "SwissMS in Spain"! We are taking Spanish lessons four hours a day, but a week ago I managed to rent a digital and get back to playing. It felt so good to get my hands on the keys again! Sadly I missed the deadline for submitting to the pop recital. The good news is the three week break seemed to refresh my pieces, and I feel like they are pretty solid for the EPP. I guess I will find out in about two weeks!

Estupendo, SwissMs! Que tengas mucha suerte con el traslado!

Well done on your Bach (and general) progress SadieLady

I went piano shopping on Friday and have more or less made my decision. It's going to be a CA67 or, just possibly, a CS8 (which is a CA67 in a nicer cabinet). I haven't actually made a purchase yet, that'll be an AOT Year when I do
But it was great to try out all the competing digitals in my price bracket (and a bit above and below), I'm really sure now that this is the right choice for me.

Albunea- maybe the youngsters learn it faster and easier, but YOU have learned to play more beautifully. And THAT is awesome!

SadieLady- welcome to AOTW. Sounds like your teacher sees plenty of skills retained, if somewhat hidden, from 20 years ago. It will be fun to watch you reawakening and extending those as an adult.

Cheryl - You must be very busy with final preps for EPP... One of these years I will make it. And you played in a public hotel lobby?... now tell me you'd have done that a few years ago... Vai ragazza!

SwissMSinSpain - Lol, Good to see you back. How long before your regular piano migrates to espana?

Barbaram - wow, voice lessons and a new digital...summertime fun! Lookout cocktail circuit, Barbaram is on the way


We held an adult students piano soiree on Sunday. Only four of us played plus our teacher. It was held in one students' home, and the piano was the smallest grand I've ever seen.... very hard to control and almost no sustain. I revived Keith Jarrett's transcription of All in the Game, and also played an on the fly arrangement of the 60's pop song Hey There Lonely Girl straight from a fakebook.

This is the first time I've revived a former recital piece (the Jarrett from 2 years ago). It took about a month, but I felt able to work on it at a much deeper level which I found very satisfying. I'm going to do more revivals.

Lonely Girl was another self-revelation, as something seems to have "clicked" for me with leadsheets lately. Although there were some things I'd worked out in advance in the week before the event, I really did make up parts of it on the fly.

Then I shocked myself by launching into the Lizst Consolation, which I had never even been able to hack my way through at weekly lessons. She had asked me to bring the music and maybe we would each show what we're working on, but I don't think she really expected me to do it. It wasn't pretty, but I managed to get all the way through. She told me later with a big smile that the Liszt is like a shiny penny that is slowly getting revealed each week. I liked that

Giacomo - congratulations on your recital! Liszt's Consolation is a really gorgeous piece! And not simple by any stretch of the imagination. Good for you!

Yes, I played in the hotel lobby... and didnt get too fussed. I was more fussed playing for my teacher today in our last lesson of the year.

We had the lesson at my house -(first time we've done that ) - and it was fun, but also odd. I got some good feedback from him and some pointers on what to expect while performing at the EPP. We also had a chat at the end, with my husband present (first time they'd met too) - and we talked about how long I'd been with him, and how long with the previous teacher.
He said that with six years experience I was at a very good level.

I felt really pleased.

Yesterday, I had a VERY nice day.

I'm one year into self-taught piano, and, have recently undertaken the RCM Piano Odyssey series, mainly for the purpose of getting a measure of how far I have progressed. If I can play the Level 1 Repertoire and Etudes, I will content myself that I have achieved approximately Level 1 proficiency.

I am now at Study Unit 2 of Level 1, and it offers a piece called Bourree in D Minor, by Graupner. I fell in love with it the first time I heard it. So, I focused on it and have been working on it for about a week.

I've been unsatisfied with my progress, though. For several days, I have had the tempo, timing, and note correctness down, but, mine did not sound anywhere near as nice as the recorded version. They were miles apart.

I was able to identify the source of the differences. The piece makes heavy use of slurs, and, in the professionally recorded version, the slurs are clearly one of the piece's unique and attractive sounding features. In my version, the slurs were bland, and frankly, sucked big time.

Over the course of a couple of days, I messed around with the slurs, listening intently, and trying to analyze what the recorded artist was doing that made his/her slurs so beautiful. To my dismay, I was not finding the answer.

Then, yesterday I stumbled onto a post by NorwichTim that referenced this thread: https://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1603614/After%20Alfred's%20Level%201%20-%20Am%20I%20.html
I read that thread and came to the realization that some of the technic books that are part of the many method book series might be of help to me. One of the credible posters in that thread spoke highly of the Schaum Fingerpower and Catherine Rollin, Pathways to Artistry technic books.

So, I went to a couple of my local music stores to take a look, and to see what these "technic" books are all about. I took along an unhealthy dose of pessimism, as, I had rejected technic books when I first started playing a year ago due to what I perceived to be their low level information, or, fluff.

I found the Fingerpower books first, and was not impressed, as they did not offer verbal explanation of what I considered to the be actual technique involved in executing any piano play. It contained scores that were well thought out, and clearly designed to practice and develop specific skills, such as forearm rotation, etc. But without the explanations of how to execute, the book would not be helpful to me since I don't have a teacher to provide that missing information.

At another store I found the Pathways to Artistry books. And, what a relief. Not only did it contain scores with which to practice the skills, but it also presented well written explanations of how to execute those skills in the first place. Among the skills explained in the Level 1 book was the slurs that I had been failing at for the past several days.

So, I bought the book. And, within minutes at the piano, my slurs were very noticeably closing the gap on those of the professional pianist featured on my RCM recording. By the end of the evening, my version was capturing the qualities that I had been missing, and which are the lynchpin to this lovely Bourree.

My Bouree is now sounding quite nice, yet still has room for considerable improvement. I'm excited about the prospects.

Yesterday was a very good day!

Yesterday, I had one of the most moving piano lessons in my 3 years of piano lessons. It was my second lesson after a two-month hiatus while my teacher recovered from an illness. I played "Come Sail Away" by Styx; then "Somewhere My Love" and "Lara's Theme", both from Dr. Zhivago. The Dr. Zhivago pieces are very dear to me because they remind me of my own tragic love story, which is a lot like that of Zhinu and Niulang (Weaver-Girl and the Cowherd), from Chinese mythology.

Well, I found myself choking back tears as I struggled to get through Lara's Theme. When I finished, my teacher was simply blown away! She complemented me on the expressiveness of my playing. She went on to tell me that I have grown into a true musician, when I can make a piece my own by conveying such emotion!!

This week started off a little rocky. I wanted too get back the Chopin Etude Op. 25 No. 1. My hands were tight, middle notes were not sounding. I blocked it in chords, and played with different rhythms to try and relax when stopping. Each day I did a little, mostly focusing on a light gliding touch. Well tonight it is finally starting to work (I also think raising my seat helped a lot). I remember playing this almost 16 years ago, with fairly relaxed hands that my palms felt the white keys as I played, hands and fingers very very close to the keys. I'm really looking forward to working this in the coming weeks. Trying to get back music that I lost. Thanks for listening.

I suddenly can play the long trills of the A Major Invention (#12) after not having worked on this piece for a month or so. Don't know what has happened, I used to find it difficult to play trills on my digital. Go figure.

After the disastrous performance at the EPP, I became more relaxed while playing (and "practising") in front of other people. Maybe it's because I really wanted to play the piano instead of thinking about the performance. Making mistakes bothers me a lot and it's not because the others hear them. It's because I hear them. Even in practice, perfection is what I strive for.


I shouldn't have tried that Fazioli.

I want one.

Me Tooo!!

Achievement certainly is something to be excited about and that is wonderful to share. I recently had to excuse myself on MOYD from last Tuesday for a week, and although I haven’t practised, the reason is something I am excited about and wanted to share.

My Yamaha G1 has only ever been played by myself and I keep it in a humidity and temperature controlled room so it is in very good shape. It was a gift for my 55 B’day which now was 10 yrs ago! Today it is outside wrapped in blankets and tarpaulins across the courtyard under the arches hopefully protected from the weather. It is pouring with rain right now and the forecast is bad for the next few days.

It was with great apprehension that I agreed to it being used for a performance of Les Mis as our first concert in our Courtyard Concert Series that we hold out in the Fountain Courtyard of our Winery. A wonderful pianist and coloratura soprano have wanted to do this for quite a while. They have prepared a script and a piano score that avoids royalty issues, found a world class tenor, baritone, mezzo soprano, and TV celebrity narrator and put it all together. And to do all this with a keyboard?
At first, the stage was going to be just outside the front door and my piano was to be brought out each evening and back inside each night - which seemed not so bad. But then when the weather turned on us everything changed. We went into panic mode and found the last tent in the valley that was available since there are two other very big festivals going on this weekend. This meant the stage had to be moved to the other side of the courtyard and the idea of moving the piano in and out of the foyer a monumental commitment the guys didn’t want to be part of.

But it all worked out well. The pianist is phenomenal and the piano sounds fantastic. The soloists really transported us to 19C France. My admiration for truly talented people of all genres continues to grow and I was mesmerized by how the piano can sound so poignant at one moment and yet still belt out such a piece as the march of the revolutionaries at the barricade the next.

I shook hands with over 100 people in the audience as they left and now the word is out we expect up to 300 at capacity for the rest of the shows. It has been a tremendous undertaking and an incredible experience to stand on a stage on my own front yard to introduce these stars and share it with all those people. To play like that is probably beyond my capacity but inspires me to keep working on the pieces within my grasp and fills me with admiration for those who can.

It certainly has been a week that has given me lots to be excited about even if I’ve had to sit out from practice!

I made it home from my month in Peru!!

I played piano once, one night at a bar, and that's it. Not a very piano-y trip. Probably not a very piano-y place (Cusco); more pan flutes and drums. At school, we sang a capella and clapped our hands.

Palmpirate - that is so cool! I can see why you are excited about being AWOL on MOYD

Next time I'm in BC, I'm coming to visit you. For sure!

Malkin - sounds like you had a great time in Peru, even though it was pianoless. Welcome back.

My ATOW was to have survived the EPP, and keep MOYD too.
The days after the party I did the minimum, that's for sure!

This week I've made some really nice progress on In Church. I'm also working on a lullaby by Hugo Wolf, which is surprisingly tricky for a lullaby. Both pieces are lovely to work on.

After the EPP, I decided to pick up several new pieces from the RCM Grade 7 book, and discovered I could sight read Bach Invention 1 (C major) at close to tempo! I have always struggled a bit with balancing baroque pieces, but this came pretty intuitively at first sight. I have played several other inventions, but never this one. So my AOTW is I am finally "getting it" with better hand independence.

My other achievement is I have completed Spanish A1, which means I can introduce myself, order dinner, and generally speak Spanish at a survival level. We purchased a place here, and now we are heading back to Switzerland to prepare to move to Costa del Sol this fall. I will be so happy to see my real piano again!