Hello! I've lurked until I could lurk no more, and so here I am!

I work full time as an environmental consultant and practice as much as I can around it. I'm hoping to eventually transition to a job in the arts, with more time to practice.

I just competed in an Amateur Adult competition last weekend, and I've got another one coming up in August. Current repertoire: Ravel's Jeux d'eau, Bach's second Partita, Brahms Opus 118, three Etudes by Marie Bigot, and a Haydn C Major Sonata.

Glad to be here!

Hello! Welcome to the forums.

Hello, Arcadia! Nice to have you aboard. Welcome!

Welcome Arcadia. Anyone willing to put themselves in front of an audience has a lot to offer here.

Thank you, all!

Hello! Welcome to the forums.

I too was a lurker for a long while (hence the "silent" in my name), but it's impossible not to join in eventually. Welcome!

Welcome! Good luck on your competition!

This is only my third post, so I'm new too, but welcome anyway! I'm going to be working on Ravel's Jeux d'eau also. I started it, so to speak. I will be going into it full force after tomorrow when I will complete my math requirements for ever! (I've been waiting for this day for years!) Anyway, can you tell me if I put my foot in my mouth when I asked to learn Jeux d'eau along with five other pieces this summer? Any hints, etc? It looks like a challenge, but worth it.
Good luck with the competition!

Thanks, Contrapunctus! And I agree, Silent Omen-- obviously! :-)

B flat: I re-welcome your welcome! Or something... Congrats on the end of math-- I still thank the gods that I squirmed out of most of those requirements at my college. As for Jeux d'eau, I could say a lot! It's definitely worth the challenge. My personal demon, pianistically, is 2 against 3, so that climactic section has been a living hell for me. Otherwise, I'd say it is doable, but I also don't know your level.


By the way, look for obsessive posting as I try to reach the 20 post mark and get rid of that offensive "Junior Member" status!

Thanks Arcadia! 2 against 3 is an issue for me sometimes as well. I'm also doing Chopin's Nocturne, Op. 9, No. 3, and it has a lot of uneven passages. I find those a lot worse than 2 against 3.

I didn't know about the "Junior Member" status! Look for me posting like crazy as well now!

B flat, we could be really annoying and start a thread just to get our posts over with!
No, just kidding.
I just posted in the "Who are you" thread, which strikes me as somewhat arrogant of me, seeing as no one has been wondering who I am! Oh well!

Hello Arcadia,

Was that the Pramberger competition in Denver you were at?

How did the competition go? what sort of music other contestants played?

Yes, indeed it was!
It was an interesting format, for sure. They had one warmup room with about 10 Prambergers in it, so one was warming up with any number of other pianists in there as well. Those of us in the competitive amateur category had 15 minutes, and there were 17 people in that category. The other contestants seemed to have a wide range of repertoire, ranging from Bach WTC pieces to a Chopin Scherzo, to a Debussy Prelude. One participant played a Chopin Ballade, another a Prokofiev Sonata. Quite varied.
I didn't place, but I gave one of my personal best performances. I have yet to see the judges' sheets. I'm curious to see what they had to say!

That sounds very interesting.

I think when you go to a competition or do a recital, whether you win anything or not, if you can come up with your best performance, that's what counts the most. I hate it when I can play very well at home just for myself but play real crappy in front of other people.

I agree completely. It was especially meaningful to me that I played well last weekend, as I have been struggling mightily with performance recently. I tend to be subject to nerves in the worst way. After reading several old and new threads on performance anxiety here, I upped the ante and began practicing performing as much as possible. It really helped, and last weekend was proof!

Hey Arcadia!

I was the one who played the Prokofiev Sonata and Debussy Refletions in the Water. I think I was warming up when you were finishing up. Your experience sounds exactly like mine - I didn't place but also had my best performance so far.

May I ask what competition you're playing in in August?

Oh how funny! Then you saw me, red-faced and stumbling into the room-- I got lost when I left the stage! What a concrete (and unmarked, might I add) maze!
Did you really come all the way from Michigan to compete? Wow!
I'm competing in the Amateur Pianists International competition, which is a part of the Rocky Mountain Festival for Amateur Piano, or something like that. It's in Colorado Springs, and you can find it at apiano.org. I recommend it highly-- it's a really fun, nearly week long celebration. A very friendly atmosphere, and seminars, classes, and parties to boot. Let me know if you might be coming...

LOL! Nina Rockley expressly pointed out to me exactly which door to come back through after I got done performing. My piano teacher sat next to her at a piano conference 3 years ago where she found out about this piano festival. We've got some friends in Longmont, so I thought "why not give it a try?".

They API Rocky Mountain Amateur Piano Competition and Celebration really sounds great. Wow - are you 1 of the 32 competitors?

Not yet! I have another month to apply. I worry that I may not get in. The musical scene here is obnoxiously political, and there is at least one board member with whom I'm not on particularly good terms... So we'll see!

Oh, and she pointed out the door to me, too-- I got lost anyway!

welcome, Arcadia. About five years ago, before my kids were born and I had little time to practice, I played Jeux d'eau in a recital, to general acclaim. It was, and remains, the hardest piece I have ever played. The polyrhythms in the climactic section (not just 2 against 3 but 8-against-3 in a few spots) gave me a lot of trouble.

My teacher's comment as I was struggling with this piece was "the problem with this piece is there's just a whole lot of damn notes"

Yes, and yes!

B flat, we could be really annoying and start a thread just to get our posts over with![/b]
Or we could have a race to see who gets to 20 first! I'm joking!

Incidentally, I'm playing Jeux D'eau (it's sort of become my "signature" piece - I play it whenever someone asks me to play). I learned it last summer, much faster than I thought I would. I spent about 2 weeks not able to play through much of any of it, and then one day I woke up and had the first 6 pages memorized and playable - the same thing happened with the rest of the piece a week or two later.

Regarding the difficult rhythmic sections - I have a method of playing them accurately, but it's difficult to describe. I don't think of the hands at all in relation to eachother. Rather, I focus on one hand and then switch my attention to the other, quickly, while my first hand goes on autopilot with the correct rhythm. I also focus only on large subdivisions (mainly quarter note beats), because when I count on smaller scales, one hand or the other gets out of rhythm.

(I hope that made at least a little sense)

It's a beautiful piece... good luck with it!

That's good advice, thank you! I've been fooling around with large subdivisions as well, though I hadn't thought to shift my focus between hands... I'll try that tonight!