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I played the Shepherd's Song was my AOTW. Now my teacher would like for me to play it at our Music Academy's Recital in May! I'm excited! My first recital! Now I need to master the song. Any suggestions? How often should I practice the song? I'm gonna use the metronome to make sure my timing is right!! Excited!!

WiseBuff and I met and practiced together.
And we also went out to eat with our husbands:). Have a great time.

Hello achievers, you've all made fantastic progress since I was last here. I need to read back over it all and catch up properly. I have had some big upheavals and havent really been able to practice for a couple of weeks. I am looking forward to getting back to it all and have missed checking in here and writing in my practice diary.

My piano and I are now in our new house and I am avoiding men for a while while I focus on practising. So my achievement is coming through this in one piece and being able to practice again. Piano is really quite life changing I have found. I never would have managed it all without piano lessons - firstly for giving me the confidence to set out on my own, and secondly for having something to get me through the stress of it all.

My U3 and I will be just fine.

This a busy week for me, but I'm on holiday from Friday to Tuesday and I hope to practice more. I was given another duet to study for the June recital, from my younger son's teacher. After his lesson, she told me: I have homework for you too, enjoy! It's a sort of cha-cha-cha, not difficult but a bit challenging rhythmically when we practice together. This not an achievement, may it will be.
My AOTW is that, after one month, I started again with my Schumann piece, and it's better than expected. I don't know how far I can go, because I have troubles with the easiest Schumann pieces, but for the moment I'm quite satisfied.

Oh, how right you are on that one C. Case in point. I've had this little Beethoven Minuet and Trio on my plate seemingly forever. Last week I was whining to my teacher that I didn't think I had a really good feel for it yet. I figured it was because I have been practicing it so slowly that it has none of its energy and charm. So, of course I spent the week speeding it up.....except, how right you are, I didn't have any plan for how I was going to do that. I just started playing it faster. Well, by the end of the week it was faster...and it was full of errors that I'd baked in all week. It completely fell apart at the lesson. Teacher sent me back to the slow and loud drawing board. Oh well, live and learn.

On the good news front, I'm really enjoying putting in "extra" time working on Moonlight, even though my teacher passed it and we no longer work on it in lessons. Somehow the lack of pressure to produce anything specific in terms of weekly improvement just feels like such a luxury. And it has come with rewards, as I work on bits and then, lo and behold, a week or two later, it doesn't matter any more how long it takes... it just sounds better than I've ever played it. I've never done this with any piece before and it turns out to be one of the great rewards I was missing.

Sometimes I think we want so badly to improve and advance that we get on this little treadmill. I know I'm guilty of this all the time. I wish I could approach all my pieces, even the ones that I'm preparing for a future lesson, with this relaxed "let the chips fall where they may" kind of attitude. I am certain it would benefit my learning and enjoyment.

My AOTW, hope I don't jinx myself by saying it, is my sight reading has made a sudden improvement. It darn well should after all the effort I have put in. I have been struggling with seeing the music and playing the notes accurately. As always the answers are there before me so I went back to practicing Bartok's Mikrokomos and practicing to recognise and play intervals. I also turned up the speed of my Prestokeys program and just practiced on single hands for a while. The last few days I feel like it has all come together and I am so pleased. Currently using Paul Harris Grade 2 Sight reading exercise book (books 3 & 4 are sitting there waiting for me telling me to hurry up).

Ragdoll - It sounds like your Canon in D is coming along. I just recently found a nice version of this I want to learn as well. It is a beautiful piece.

fifi M - You should be "chuffed" getting Mozart Fantasia in C Minor in pretty good shape after not playing it for 15 years. Way to go!

Osmosis - Congrats for completing your grade 1 exam. That is scary stuff!

Casinitaly - You are so right about "training to prepare" as you learn a piece. I have learned the hard way that if the preparation is not build in, everything falls apart when you speed it up. Your staccato and legato in the same hand sounds challenging!

Warlock214 - Yeah! A recital! I think that is awesome.

Wisebuff and FarmGirl - You both look like you are having fun!

Toastie - I am glad your life is settling down, and that your piano has helped you through a tough time. It will always be a good friend.

Torquenale - Good luck with your Schuman piece. It sounds like you have a good start back at it.

earlofmar - Sounds like your sight reading is coming along. It is something that improves with daily work and time. If you can dedicate at least 20 minutes to it each day, if starts to build on itself.

JimF and Casinitaly - You both bring up points that I am struggling with right now as well. How does one bring a piece up to tempo? When is a piece "mastered"?

I have just begun to realize that it takes a LONG time for a major piece to be really learned. Like your experience with Moonlight, JimF, my Nocturne is taking its time to reach a point were it is "owned", and I can comfortably, and competently execute it. I am learning that choreography that worked at slower tempo, simply will not work at a fast temple. This clearly is not a process that can be rushed. If I try to push, mistakes creep in. I guess my AOTW is recognizing that if I cannot play something in a relaxed, assured, fashion at tempo, it is not really performance ready. It is kind of humbling to realize there are no short cuts. As the pieces get more difficult, there are more difficulties to overcome. The Nocturne gets better and better, but I still have "out of control" areas where I still have to work out the best economy of motion. My teacher seems to feel I am making good progress though, and her expectations about how long this should take seem more reasonable than mine!

Actually being able to play two handed. Big step for me!

I dont think I ever posted in this thread:) So I thought I would post something.

In January I decided to sign up for a piano class for non music majors. So far I think it's going well. I'm actually having to practice scales. So I can now play most of the scales two octaves! My professor has me working on Hungary (Rapsodie Mignonne Op. 410)by Carl Koelling. I have to play the first two pages from Memory for my midterm exam on Tomorrow! I'm not use to playing in front of people, let alone playing things from memory So I'm kind of scared...

Good luck Augustina, I'm sure you'll be fine!

My teacher often says for my ragged trills : "Not so fast - this isn't Liszt. One day I'll learn a piece by him and see if she'll say it!

Actually the trills in my Chopin nocturne are coming along quite nicely!

Congrats on the scale work and good luck on your midterm, Augustina.

No need for big news to visit this thread... you can always come over here and celebrate the little ups (and downs) that we all go through. We'll even give you a sticker for your first post here..

WiseBuff and FarmGirl - what a great picture! You look like you're having a wonderful time. How cool that you could meet! I love it that PW encourages folks to meet all over the world

Cathy

Cathy thanks. I found out WiseBuff is going to SummerKey too. I wish we coordinated it better!

Just got word from Amazon that my books are getting shipped sooner than expected! Not everything was in stock and they indicated "one to three weeks". Great, it's next week! Very much looking forward to receiving "Divenire" and "In a Time Lapse" by Ludivico Einadi, as well as "Collection" and "Solos for New Age Piano" by David Lanz. Goodbye, boredom (Not that you can ever get bored with a piano at home.)

Thank you SwissMS.

Yes it is coming along but quite slowly because the last time I was working it daily, I became obsessed with it to the point of neglecting other studies. I am mostly concentrating on the Sally Gardens piece now and giving the Canon in D about 10 minutes a day. Mostly in the 16th notes in the melody.

My AOTW is not earth shattering but is something I was unsure I could actually do. I took a piece I'm fairly familiar with and transposed it on the fly to another key...in fact two other keys.

It was sort of a self test as to my grasp of the same progressions and fingering in other keys. I'm kinda proud of that, not that it was a huge musical struggle but still, just sayin'.

Warlock, that’s very exciting. I don’t have any advice for you as I’ve only ever played in one recital and that was 2 years ago – Using the metronome can be really great, especially for gradually getting up to tempo!

FarmGirl – what a lovely picture of you and Wisebuff!!!! You both look so very very happy --- and why not?!! I love that PW manages to bring folks from all over together to share this wonderful passion !

Toastie - nice to see you back. You sound very strong and optimistic, which is great to hear after your talk about the major upheavals in your life. Wishing you all the best as you move forward and recover your balance.

Torquenale – I think it is really fun that you are playing with both your sons! Congrats on getting back to your Schumann piece. I’m about to launch into my second of his works and I am really enjoying his style.

JimF – isn’t it interesting (ok, and really frustrating) to figure this out? Going faster means training faster…. It should be obvious, but it isn’t!
I think it is great that you’re even happier with your Moonlight now – how very very satisfying!

Earlofmar: Improving your sight reading is such a worthwhile use of your time. If you can read smoothly so many musical doors will open wide for you!

SwissMS – I have discovered, to my astonished joy! That the staccato and legato in one hand is not as difficult as it seemed even just 2 days ago! I’m thrilled! This will be my piece for the May recital so you’ll be able to hear it 
As for “how to bring a piece up to tempo”….(not that I’ve really done it, but I know the theory!)… Master the fingering and get the piece flowing smoothly at a slow speed. Use your metronome to see what your “comfy” tempo is, and when you’re ready to start going faster, increase the speed of the metronome just a little bit – get comfortable, then increase a bit more and so on, until you’re where you want to be.
As for when is it mastered? Well, I think there are two things to consider : mastering the techniques, and mastering for performance. Often as beginners we only master enough to learn the technique that a given piece has to offer us.
This is especially true for the 1 page “throw aways” (as Jim calls them). The pieces we work on for a week or two, basically just to learn how to do A or B or C.
As we learn longer and more interesting pieces, there is more to be done to master them technically and then, I think we get to the point where we begin to master them musically – for performance. I think that when we WANT to perform our piece – be it in a recording in the Piano Bar, in the ABF recital or (gasp!) in front of a live audience – then we’ve mastered a piece as much as we can for the time being. There’s always room to improve, right?

Larry Shone --- It is a big accomplishment – I clearly remember the brain strain of the first few days I played --- I would be exhausted after 15 minutes of the intense focus it required! Things will only get better from here on in!

Augustina! Welcome!!! It sounds like your new music program is perhaps filling in some study gaps from before, and preparing you nicely to share your music. When you play for the audience, just imagine a little red dot sitting in the middle of the crowd – by now you’ve recorded so much the little red dot is your friend! I’m sure you’ll do well – and remember, your audience is composed of your fellow students – they WANT you to succeed – there is no better, more supportive audience!

(Jim again--- love your sticker for Augustina!!)

Andy Platt – great to hear your Noctune is coming along! Are we going to hear it in the next recital (ha ha ha ha….sorry, I couldn’t resist!! YES I remember what you said last time)

Allard – I see you have been bitten by the “I must own more sheet music” bug! Have fun with your new books!

Ragdoll – transposing is great training! Some of my books have notes at the bottom of the studies with instructions to continue with the piece going into different keys. Argh. It is tricky, but fun to try.
If you are already doing this, you will find that at a certain point – for many pieces – you won’t have to write out the new version, you’ll be able to do it on the fly!

I had a major breakthrough today! (this is basically what I wrote in the “can’t focus” thread so…some of you may have already seen it)
I took into consideration the advice I got from the “can’t focus “ thread and what my teacher suggested. Yesterday I worked at figuring out what my "comfortable speed" was for the two pieces I wanted to record, and I got the metronome settings , and wrote them on the scores.

Then I just played the metronome and hummed the piece to myself for a few minutes, and then I started the recording. It worked fabulously!!!!!!
I didn't feel at all nervous, I could feel I was breathing with the phrasing, able to think about what I was doing and prepare in time, comfortably. I did have a couple of little glitches but they were more of the "slipping off the key" type rather than a "mistake".
I was so very very pleased.

What I realized was different was that I was in control.
That’s a really satisfying AOTW!

I think you misunderstood my post. I didn't "transcribe" them first but did just play them on the fly. (and with more than a few errors at first) It was so satisfying to see that I was able to do this.

You are absolutely right, I misunderstood! Sorry.
Let me re-do my reply!

Ragdoll: Transposing on the fly! That is a very cool achievement - you must be super pleased with yourself! I know I would be!!!

This is not my achievement but WiseBuff's. When I came from home yesterday a beautiful, incredibly beautiful flower was waiting for me in a box. My husband was really impressed. He said, "you crazy piano people are very classy people". What a nice way to leave with a good note. Thank you WiseBuff.