Week 1: Status check! (also pick your piece!)
Hello and welcome to the WEEK ONE Main Thread for this challenge! 
Alright everyone - this is the thread where we'll all be posting our daily updates.
Make sure you've read the rules before replying (<- click)
Twice a week between January 23 - 30 I hope to be reading your daily updates in this very thread right here!
Here is this week's assignment!
1. Pick your piece!
2. If a new piece, post your sight-reading of it (never hurts to practice this valuable skill!) If it is an old piece, let's try and dust it off, and play through what we can, to evaluate its current condition. Let us know what your "piece status" is!
3. Optional: Tell us WHY you picked this piece that you love so much!
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Here are some tiny videos of my Balakirev so far:
1 video after 30 minutes of sight-reading, 1 video of LH only since the LH jumps are challenging for me and 1 video after 2 more slow practice sessions. I am now working on the 2nd page, and as Juan Carlos says, it DOES get easier. I'm relying on my memory much more but still not ready to put the score away for page 1.
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Gail Starr you rock! Such a cool piece of music. Pretty sure I could make out some mini-marshmallows bouncing on the lid of the piano. And ChatGPT, too cool for school. Ima ask it to play the Beethoven for me.
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Gail Starr Wow - so much fun to listen to! Thanks for posting, Gail.
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Gail Starr Love it Gail! So energetic and fun. Interesting (and hard!) piece.
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Vidhya Bashyam I’m finding it tough to even read the score! Every other note is a double sharp with a c flat or some other weird combo. So I’m going REALLY slow.
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Michael I bet ChatGPT would love to play some Beethoven for you eventually. (Now THAT’s scary thought!) But, you could ask it to tell you all the cool trivia about your piece right now.
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Michelle R It’s going to take me more than 3 weeks to learn so listen to it on YouTube. Margaret Fingerhut has a lovely interpretation.
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Gail Starr Thanks for the recommendation, Gail. It is a lively piece, for sure!
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Gail Starr Wow, Gail!!! What a great start of this fantastic piece! It suits you soo well!
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Gail Starr it's a beautiful piece! Thanks for sharing this. What you put sounds pretty good already!
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Gail Starr What a vibrant piece, Gail! I didn't know it. It's worth learning it without haste. And you has a compelling way of playing!
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Juan Carlos Olite Thank you, Juan Carlos. I'm following YOUR excellent advice, and totally changing how I learn. Instead of rushing through because I have other things to do, I am taking my time and enjoying my delicious snack.
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Andrea Buckland Thank you so much Andrea! I have to go out of town for a few days, so I'll practice more on Monday.
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Natalie Peh Thank you, Natalie. Going REALLY slowly this time. it will take more than 3 weeks, but I hope to memorize as I learn.
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Gail I can really hear the progress from just a couple practice sessions! I haven’t heard that piece before and I love how lively and rhythmic it is.
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Alice Lin Thanks! I’m going to learn it quite slowly since it is hard for me. Check out Margaret Fingerhut’s fun recording on YouTube!
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Greetings everyone. I’m rather late starting as I was building up courage to post! But you are all such lovely people and so positive and supportive it’s been really motivating just reading the chat this last week so here I am :-) It’s a pleasure to meet you!
i am learning Etude Tableau op33 no 4 in c min by Rachmaninoff.
i love Rachmaninoff and c min is my favourite key. I stumbled across this piece after I bought a new Russian edition of the Etude Tableaux.
Like so many of his pieces it is so rich in texture and harmony. I love discovering all the inner voices, the way he uses all the keyboard and the ebb and flow of the music.
The techno side was a bit of a steep learning curve for me, I’m using a Shure mic attached to my iPhone.i welcome feedback - I am finding the middle section very challenging to manage all the inner semiquavers whilst voicing to the super slow melody in the upper register and how to manage the arpeggiated ‘ripples’ preceding melody notes without slowing everything down so the melody disintegrates. However it’s been a joy to practise and immerse myself in his sound world. A work in progress…..
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marina Your piano has such rich tones and you played this piece beautifully. The hard work you have put into it is definitely paying off!
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Darrell Jenkins thanks Darrell. I loved your Brahms op 118 - I thought you brought something really special to the music, particularly with continuity and an overarching sense of development. You really carried the line beautifully.
My piano is a 1912 Blüthner. I’ve only had it a year - very rare here in New Zealand. It has a ‘patent’ action - quite different from the usual roller action. I find it more challenging to control but I am completely seduced by the sound.
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Whoops! It’s op33 no 3!!
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The above video is from Priya. For some reasons she could posted with her account!
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Hannahong I mean she couldn’t posted it with her account!
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