Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum New here. La Campanella study group?

Im impressed. I look forward to reaching that level.

I agree with islamey, if you really like this piece I say go for it!

I have a very similar experience. I've been playing for about 16 months now. La Campanella is also one of my goal pieces although I haven't actually started it yet. Although 7 months after I first started playing last year I discovered Liszt's 'Un Sospiro' and decided that I wanted to learn that. It's not as technically challenging as La Campanella but it's quite difficult nonetheless. I knew it would take a long time but the simple matter was that I loved the piece and I wanted to learn it.

It's now been about 8 months since I first started learning it and even though it's nowhere near performance level I'm getting that much closer to it. It's listenable to some extent :p What I've found along the way is that things that looked daunting and impossible at first just took practice. So I say go for it. If you really love the piece I think you'll be pleasantly surprised at how well you'll actually do.

i look forward to the day where i can hear myself play the don juan fantasy. i'm just about as far from don juan fantasy as some are from la campanella. i guess everyone could just push forward. without goals and impetus there will be little improvement. (: cheers.

me too

Wow! This is some discussion. I came here from doing a Google search on "La Campanella fingering". In many ways i am very much like pianofairy: I am a beginner, I am in IT, I am obsessed with La Campanella, my teacher told me that it was too hard for me to attempt, and I want to play it.

So this is my plan of action. I have been playing for about 1 year now and can comfortably play pieces like Chopin "La grande valse brilliante", "The bumblebee" among others simpler ones. Deep inside I know that La Campanella is hard but I am approaching it systematically. First I am not stopping playing pieces that are for my level (or a little higher). I have downloaded the midi file of La Campenella and plays it using a software called “Midinotate Musician”. This application allows you to scrutinize the score sheet note by note and play a bar over and over again while you’re trying it on the piano yourself. You can slow things right down to what you can technically play but then increase the speed as you get better. My other strategy is to stop at any technique that I haven’t acquired yet and go off a tangent and learn that technique separately (like the 4-5 trill and the big jumps) using Hannon or other technical books. Or even ask my teacher about it. And then come back to the piece. In this way I hope to at least get the notes down within a year or a bit more. Then it’s a matter of playing it over and over again to increase confidence and ease.

So pianofairy be assured that you’re not alone in the pursuit of “the impossible”. I have no illusion that it’s going to be very very hard and frustrating along the way but playing the little bit that you know gives you the confidence to press on. There has been lots of comparison in this topic: playing La Campanella have been compared to math, computing, chemistry and so on. Allow me to make another: I look at attempting to play La Campanella like caring for a baby; it can get very hard and frustrating but then (just when you think all is lost) that baby smiles at you only once and only for a short time and that gives you that determination to press on.

Pianofairy, let us know if you decide to keep working on this piece and maybe we can compare notes.

Pedro

Is this still going? LOL I've been off line for three months and wanted to see what's new. Excuse me but, all I find are zombies (ie reanimated corpses).

But, it's one thing to play La Campanella and it is quite another thing to play it well and musically not just like an "amaze your friends at parties" stunt. And the point is, even if you do practice it for a year you will still agonise over it. Yundi Li did not exactly walk it either.
It's extremely technically challenging in the middle and then you will sweat. I would not like to come up against a wall which might be detrimental to one's confidence.

I also have that Midinotate Musician stuff but it is a midi and sounds horrible. I know this practice feature and it's good for ragtime but Liszt, you'd be better listening to recordings. Just sit down and practice the left hand and right hand separately and mark up your score, really study the elements of the score. I believe one of the many technical problems, in addition to the leaps in the right hand, the maintenance of rythym, will be the control of dynamics in the changes of voice from left to right hand. Another problem may well be fatigue both physical and mental. You will have to be careful not to strain your fingers and wrists too much. You would be advised to do a lot of appreggio and scales work at the least to supplement your
work on the score.

But although a La Campanella Study Group sounds like the ultimate challenge(And a good way to get rid of a teacher!) maybe you should solicit opinions and relocate to the Pianist Forum because at the moment there don't seem to be any takers from Adult Beginners. However, they have some extremely talented and dedicated people here who think are worth any music grad.

LOL alright!!! I only realized it was a 3-month old post after i had already clicked on "Add Reply"... Anyhoo thanks for the advise. Yes you're (of course) right; This piece is not for anybody who has the word "beginner" in their description of their piano skills. I hope to play it some day though... (dream dream!!!)

I have another question and will my sure to start another post for it.

Cheers,

Pedro

Hi.
Just found this 3 year old thread, probably most people have already left the forum... It would have been very interesting to find out how the original poster is progressing.

Probably not well...

I am sure I read in some forum that there were adult beginners who were able to pass grade 8 exams in 3 years... I know this piece is way above grade 8 but maybe there was some progress, maybe at least couple of pages of it is possible to master if the person is so passionate about it..

The original poster hasn't been seen since 2006, after making 4 posts. I think Stanza has the likely scenario. I thought this disconnect in the original post said it all:As for Adult Beginner to Grade 8 in three years - I've never seen it in real life, and I've been around for a while. Someone might be able to teach themselves to parrot a grade 8 piece ("brute-force repetition" is the phrase one poster uses ) but that does not put them at grade 8 level, and it certainly doesn't mean they'd pass a grade 8 exam.

I know patience is sometimes hard, but it's the best way. And there are masterpieces to play at every level, so enjoy the journey.

La Campanella has always been one of my dream pieces. I was just debating whether to ask to learn this at my next lesson when I saw this thread. Maybe it's time that I took the plunge! I'm scared to try and fail, but at this rate I'll never even attempt it. (I've been playing piano for 13 years, although I've not been a very consistent practicer...)