Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Clementi Sonatina Op 36 1,2 & 3 - How long to learn?

Well.. I can play it, but not up to tempo.. I'm not whatcha call a speed merchant.. not yet anyway.

How long did it take those of you who have done so to get it to acceptable tempo?

I'm at 3 1/2 years right now. 5th Alfred Book.

isnt the andante sweet? (dolce...i love when a score says the word...)

i played it until the 1st repeat before (over a year ago perhaps), and felt then it was not difficult to learn. most of notes there are scale passages so that it wouldn't pose any technical difficulty for you. i guess with only 3 pages long i would take about 2 weeks to learn and memorize it. but to polish this one to the right tempo and performance stage perhaps take another week or two.

I lost my first reply so here goes again:

I learnt thes pieces in grade 3. They didn’t take too long to memorise as I recall. Tempo, dynamics and grace notes were my challenges as well as balancing many pieces (11) at the same time. To bring the 3 sonatinas up to my teachers standards took 9 months:
Movement I - 4 months
Movement II - 3 months
Movement III – 4 months

My daughter's learning that right now!

When I started lessons again this summer, one of my first pieces was Clementi 36 - No. 1. It took about a month for all three movements. My problem on the first movement was actually slowing down. My fingers just run away with me. Run, run run. Where did you go. The 2nd movement is very sweet and pretty. I play it by itself quite often. I am currently working on #3, which is more difficult in my opinion. I know the notes now, it's just getting it up to speed and polishing it.

I get kind of bored with them, though. I prefer CHOPIN and Beethoven!

I do like the second movement.. but there are parts of the third I like as well.. the first is not terribly interesting or beautiful, just fast. I do like to learn whole pieces more than parts.. a personal tic..

it took me about a month to learn the whole piece and get it to recital point when I was 9, I really think you will get it up to spec in no time!

I love Clemente's work, they are among the first songs that I really felt like I could play fast + with emotion (I'm 16 now as of tomorrow and back then I was sick of all the slow songs my teacher made me learn...)

Keep plugging away!

I hate having to learn the slow parts too, although I can make them sound very beautiful... I just don't like them. I then made the mistake once of telling my teacher that I didn't like those parts and that only the fast, loud parts were good... oops...