Lucy's Practice Diary
What I am practicing:
- Scales, chords, arpeggios
- Bach 1st Partita
- Numa Amei by Zhang Zhao (Chinese folk music)
- two etudes: Chopin 25-2; Rachmaninoff tableau 33-8
Why I want to play:
- 1&4 for RCM level 10 technical exam (aiming to complete in March 2022)
- 2&3 because they sound pretty
What I am struggling with:
- make the technical part(scale and stuff) into practice routine!
- octave scale, 7th chord with inversions, arpeggios
- memorization
- speed (for Chopin 25-2 and the Chinese piece)
-
This week, I worked on Bach, Schubert, and Chopin.
Bach Partita1 Gigue: was practicing with right hand playing melody for a whole week, and then when I went to lesson, my teacher and I decided it is better to switch hands, and let the left hand be the flying hand. So it is now a new piece for me to learn.. (this tells me how important to think and try different approaches before spending more time in a piece), trying to play the whole Partita all together.
Chopin: etude, 10-11, it is a piece that I gave up when I first learned it, I thought it is too difficult because my hands are not big. But I eventually learned the whole thing, and benefit a lot from the practicing. I plan to bring to the community concert although it is not a finished product. But as my teacher once said, it is never a finished product.
Schubert: I listened to lots of Schubert and feel closer to him thanks to this community challenge. If I could donate some of my lifetime to Schubert, I would donate a little bit. I have been working on D664. This weekend, being in Schubert mood, my bf and I played D940, but he turned 1 extra page (we always make fun of his page flipping skill), so there's the interruption. Will try to record the whole thing next weekend.
-
Brother Will Green thank you, yes it's so pretty
-
-
Here’s a complete recording of Schubert D940
We made mistakes but this is the only one that is complete out of several recordings we did tonight that were interrupted by our laughing of the mistakes.
-
Qingzhi Beautiful!!!
-
Qingzhi wow so lucky your bf always plays. How awesome to be able to do 4 hand pieces together. And what an awesome piece to play. This is actually one of my favorite pieces of music. I could listen to my Radu Lupu/Murray Perahia recording on repeat for hours. Thank you so much for sharing this!
-
Michael Indeed lucky. Playing 4 hands is our favorite activity to do. That's how i practice my sight reading lol. Radu Lupu/Murray Perahia recording sounds so good! thank you for sharing!
-
Brother Will Green thank you:)
-
-
Beside Schubert, I start to work on the rcm technical stuff. Here is the Chopin 25-2, one of the etudes I chose to play for the exam:
1. pedal: generally I can use less pedal, but I have to make sure the pedal covers the first big leap of left hand arpeggio in each measure.
2. wrist rotation: left hand is doing big rotation, right hand should do small rotation. Just by looking at the recording, I realize how much I rely on fingers instead of wrist movement with my right hand. Fingers too high preventing me to speed up.
-
mainly working on the 2 etudes for exam this week:
Chopin 25-2:
memorized;
trying to move more naturally on wrist especially on right hand;
trying to feel right hand in triplets, instead of 4 note group, so forming a poly rhythm with left hand.
this etude is supposed to be the easiest of all Chopin's etudes, but the more i practice, the harder it gets!
Rachmaninoff etude tableau 33-8:
need to know the notes better, memorize it.
need to separate layers: play the arpeggios softer bring out melody more
rhythm at end of middle section still feels weird..
-
Qingzhi Love this piece <3 beautiful!!!
-
Brother Will Green yes, thank you. it is very beautiful! I saw this in your practice diary repertoire list, have you played or planning to learn it?
-
Qingzhi I've learned this piece but I switched to op. 33 no. 7 for the concert. I love this playing of yours and it sounds absolutely beautiful. Thank you for sharing :) xx
-
-
I haven't updated in the forum for 2 months. Just watched the community concert and reminded me how nice it is to practice with the community.
I was playing the some of the Goldberg Variations, Brahms Rhapsody Op. 79 no. 2, Robert Schumann blumenstuck Op. 19, and some of Clara Schumann. and I finally finished my RCM level 10!
So I am now working on my RCM ARCT, half of the repertoire decided, please welcome to give suggestions:
- List A: J.S. Bach BWV848 prelude and fugue in C sharp major
- List B: I am thinking one of Mozart's sonatas (might be one of D major K284, K311 or C minor K457)
- List C: Clara Schumann Romance op. 11 no. 2
- List D: no idea!
- List E: Marjan Mozetich three pieces for piano 2nd mv: Adagietto (it's pretty I hope to play it in tonebase community concert)
- 2 concert Etudes: Kapustin Op. 40 no.3 Toccatina, the other one not decided, maybe one of Chopin, or Dohnanyi Op. 28 no 5
-
-
Qingzhi Sounding good! You bring a lot of passion to your interpretation. Hope your studies are going well!
-
