Week 2 Assignment

Sedef CANKOCAK Hi Sedef! Thank you so much for sharing this. Your pedal plan looks terrific to me. Very sensitively done! In this particular excerpt, the pedal-ing will be coming down just slightly after the 1st beat rather than right on it. The physical action of the pedal going down usually comes right after we press the note so that we can 'catch' it. We call this "legato pedaling" or "delayed pedaling" for the reason of how it is timed. However with that said, there are occasions in other piano repertoire (often in some romantic era works) when the pedal goes down before we even press the very first note, in order to 'open the strings' and start pieces with a more resonant rich sound atmosphere. I would not apply this particular pedal-ing for the Mozart, but it is a useful tool to know

Wonderful to hear you are starting with the LH only and pedal first. It is best to break it down and take it steps at a time to achieve more solidity in the practice. Bravo!

Marc M Hi Marc! Thank you so much for sharing your video and notes! This sounds beautiful, and the tone you achieve is very fitting with this Schubert. You give a sensitive attention to the details of the score too. And the dynamic differences and shaping are portrayed very naturally. Yes, to answer your question about the "pp" in the trio, I do agree that it should still maintain a singing line; therefore, we actually should not take that "pp" dynamic 'too' literally. Maintaining a deeper touch there so we still have a 'substance' the tone is very important--and you do that. As an experiment though, you could also try applying the soft pedal at the beginning of the trio section, while maintaining the same deep singing touch in the fingers physically. This might not work for every piano/every room, so it is best to also follow your instincts and listen very sensitively to the whole space. 

I just have a couple suggestions that I hope comes in helpful for your next application in your practicing:

Physical motion: The balance you maintain sounds terrific. I think we can apply a more relaxed arm motion though to help the singing melody have more lyricism and natural breathing in between the phrases. This arm motion can be applied in the longer note values (when you have dotted half notes or longer tied notes in the melody). At the very opening, the right and left arm can move outwards in contrary motion. I like to give an analogy with swimming: as if we are in pre-"butterfly" stroke mode. But just like when we push our arms underneath water: the speed should not rapid, but applied with breath control--hope this makes sense, haha. It is also important to make sure that the touch we maintain in the fingers are still deep without tension. This arm motion can also be applied the trio section when the RH hand reaches for the higher register: B-E-G# (m. 41-42) and F#-C#-E (m. 45-46) phrases: the arm can help navigate in the direction of the notes so it helps for a more singing quality. Feeling the shoulder, arm, hand as one 'bone' is a good way to think in piano playing.

Pedal: Your pedal application sounds great in this recording! I like everything you are doing. As a personal suggestion, in m. 47 and m. 56: rather than changing each quarter beat, it could also work to add pedal just at the first downbeat and letting go of the pedal in the remaining measure so the RH melody can sing out the scalar eighth notes cleanly, and the LH quarters just pulsing close to the keys. However, with that said, if you are performing this in a 'dry' space, I would just stick with the pedal that you are already doing.

Hope these suggestions help, and thank you again for all your dedicated work! All the best to this Schubert--he is certainly one of my favorite composers!

Marc M Hi Marc! My pleasure, and I am glad to be of help! Yes, you are understanding correctly. It really at the end is all about the breathing. For singers, this technique comes naturally because the body is the instrument, but as instrumentalists, sometimes we forget that breath control can actually help with our physical sound at the instrument too. To be hyper-aware of how our breath leads certain technical executions are what I find important. But for sure, it is hard to always keep track of this every time we practice. So taking it steps at a time: for example, doing the discipline work of learning the score fully first and then applying this breath awareness, will make it easier in the long run :).

And yes-I like to make an analogy with the butterfly stroke, since the arms push out in that similar contrary motion. Except we would apply more of a 'slower motion' of that stroke and a breathing lead that is relative to it. With that said, I am not a swimmer at all, haha. I took swimming lessons as a child and watch some of it during Olympics, so definitely not a professional--so the detailed techniques behind a butterfly stroke might be a bit different than our piano playing in the end. But I am mainly making an analogy to the breathing and motion behind it from what I can assess . Also imagining pushing out our arms inside the water delays the speed slightly vs when we push out our arms in air--so that was my additional thought :).

Thank you again for all your dedication. Let me know if you have any questions along the way, and sending you continued best wishes for this Schubert!

Marc M Hi Marc, Great question! For the Bach F Major invention, that is certainly true that there is not much of a 'lyrical' style of melody as we hear in music of the classical/romantic era: especially compared to Schubert particularly. However with that said, there is still certainly room to breathe in the music so that the performance does not feel like a series of run-on sentences. For example: at the moments where there are written rests (whether in the RH or LH): that is a clear indication of a 'breath mark' for the hands or a phrase. And in this particular invention, when we have slight pauses through the rhythmic notation: such as a held eighth note moving into sixteenths or any tied notes, etc. That also could be interpreted as a comma or a period of a sentence.

In this Bach Invention, we would apply a different approach of the arm motion in comparison to the Schubert, given the nature for obvious reasons such as speed and articulation; but we still need to play with an open posture to make sure our physical body does not get stiff. Hence, I would not be tight in the arms--which I am sure you are not doing anyway :). And to achieve a more crisp articulation in the detached notes, the hands can stay physically closer to the keys: plucking the keys rather than jumping above too high from the key. T

hen finally, when you vary these articulations and add more shaping in the sequences, the phrasings will be executed more naturally too. Hope these suggestions help open some ideas--but feel free to let me know if anything needs to be clarified! Happy practicing!

Ellen Weaver Hi Ellen, thank you for sharing your video! Your pedal application sounds terrific. It adds a nice color while still maintaining that classical era sound. Bravo. I like how you are paying attention to the alignment of the arm, which is very important, and I also know takes a lot of getting used to. The balance sounds great too between the melody and accompaniment.

As a small suggestion for the RH: it will help for the hands to stay a bit more physically closer to the keys while applying the relaxed arm movement. You maintained this very well at the beginning of the excerpt. When you get into the octaves, which is very tricky for that section to connect lyrically: it might help to play with a slightly lower wrist, and lifting in between each octave just slightly less above from the key. That way, the hand is moving more laterally and maintains the open hand position. Applying more weight to the top of the octave can also naturally assist with this positioning. But of course most importantly: we should make sure there is no feeling of tension.

Your tone sounds beautiful, and I am so happy you are applying this exercise to this Beethoven movement. Great work!

Ellen Weaver Thank you for your kind words, Ellen! And so delightful to have you here. I agree! We are all guilty of sometimes over-pedaling or not having quite a plan of what to do. But once we break it down, step at a time, it makes the process a little less intimidating and also gives more clarity when it gets to the performance stage. Cheers, and happy practicing!  

Tran Le Hi Tran! Thank you so much for sharing your videos! These sound terrific. I like the how you recorded yourself both slow and close to tempo. You are paying great attention to all the details of the score, phrasings, etc. Bravo! The pedal application sounds excellent too.

As a small suggestion: in the slower version of practice, I find it useful to exaggerate the motions (especially the arm/relaxed gestures) to help get adjusted to that physical part. And then those physical gestures start to become less visually obvious as we get more closer to tempo but the muscle memory still remembers how to do it--therefore helps an easier application to our sound.

You sound wonderful, and applause to all your hard work!

Jennifer Mehta Hi Jennifer, thank you so much for sharing this! Wow this is very impressive work! I like how you shared with us both your no-pedal and then with the pedal playing . The sensitive attention to your coloring through the pedal is really beautifully done, bravo! I also like the idea of the una-corda pedal at the decays in the last two measures of this excerpt.

You are feeling the phrases beautifully. The only suggestion I have is that the right arm can also have more breathing room by applying the same finger weight you are doing while moving outwards with the arm. This will help the phrase to have a more horizontal direction and 'rounder' sound. It also helps with the sustaining of the longer note values (in this case: the tied notes). You have a lovely warm tone in your playing, which suits so well for this work! I am just giving a tiny suggestion that can help elevate it to the next level .

Thank you so much for joining this intensive! I am so happy to hear that you made some new discoveries in the process. That means a lot to me. This is certainly the beauty of music!

Jennifer Mehta Thank you so much, Jennifer! It was a joy to have you here ~ Hope all the best for your continuous music-making!