Week 4: Final Submissions!
WELCOME TO THE LATEST COMMUNITY CHALLENGE!
For this challenge "A Fresh Start" the goal is to pick a BRAND-NEW piece to work on this month.
This is the time to finally open that score that you have been thinking about and get to work!
WHAT ARE WE DOING IN WEEK 4?
1. Let's share our final progress this week - post a video of a selection, part, or entire piece to showcase your progress this month!
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Here is where I am. Overall, I think this was a good exercise. I've never pushed myself to work in this kind of timeframe. So, I am pleased to get to this point in this amount of time (screenshot: 30 hours over 22 days). I will keep working as it. I feel close to being comfortable with the notes, but need more work to now start to make it flow nicely.
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Gail Starr Sorry for delay getting back. https://playnpractice.com It don't use all the features, just the time on each work. It's a little old school in the interface but once you get a little used to it it does the job. Good luck.
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Jack vreeland that's such a gorgeous sounding etude! You play it with a lovely and calm tone. Thanks so much for sharing!
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Here's my "final" submission of Scriabin Op. 8 No. 12! I wish I could try for a cleaner runthru, but I don't think I'll have time to record again this week... It's definitely not polished or performance-ready, but I'm very happy with how much progress happened over the course of this challenge. And I'm not only planning to keep working on this one, but also look into more Scriabin pieces.
Jack vreeland inspired me to count up my practice time...very similar stats - 28 hours over 23 days... or the equivalent of Horowitz/Lugansky/Trifanov playing it 750 times thru at their performance speed
https://youtu.be/XDZ7TtQsRJA (more observations in the description)
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Judy Kuan Bravo! That was so amazing! I loved your clarity, the deep feeling you played with, and just the overall effect. Great choice to play this piece! I agree with your comments too- somehow doing it together and recording early helps move the learning process forward quicker.
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Vidhya Bashyam Thank you! This piece is like one big leap of faith, and it makes such a difference to have a supportive community and be able to feel safe sharing such a high-risk piece!
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Judy Kuan Brava, Judy! This is wonderful, beautiful playing. I really enjoyed your choices in phrasing and voicing which allowed the emotion of the piece to be felt more fully.
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Judy Kuan It’s starting to have that exciting drama quality to it. What a bear of a piece to tackle in a month…nice work.
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Judy Kuan Bravo! this is nice.
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Judy Kuan I love the dramatic melodic line you accentuated so well. And thx for filming it so we can see the pedalling. I am new to it and try to follow when and how pianists use it. And I agree completely that participating in a group , although rather frightening is also so moticating.
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Judy Kuan Wow - what a different character compare to your previous week - so much energy and fire!
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Judy Kuan unbelievable! So good. Very impressive that you did all this in four weeks. Great drama and energy.
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Michelle R Marc M Heng-Pin Chen Sedef CANKOCAK Priya Viseskul Alexander Weymann Thank you for listening and your encouraging comments! I think it'll take another month before I can perform it consistently at tempo...and build up some more endurance to keep up the power thru the end. At this tempo, it's quite tiring to do multiple run-thrus, I think this was at least the 10th try (including false starts)
It's more tiring than climbing! -
Judy Kuan Nice work! It sounds majestic and you weave the voices together beautifully.
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Judy Kuan Bravo, Judy!! It sounds dramatic and beautiful, as it should. Great building of the energy threw out the piece. That middle section is such a lovely intersection between the drama of the a-section and recap (I just love that part). I also very much enjoyed your notes, so interesting to read about your process!
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Judy Kuan I love the drama in your performance! Amazing for one months work! Thank you.
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Judy Kuan Bravo, Judy! Your playing has captured the dramatic essence of the piece and this kind of great musical lines. Really, you got it!
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Judy Kuan That is really sounding incredible. And in just 28 hours! I have to learn this one, but no way under time pressure.
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Judy Kuan you have done so much with this huge piece in just a month! Great job conveying the drama of the piece and you didn't shy away from memorising either! Respect!
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Here’s where I am. Still an occasional slip, but I’m getting closer. The hardest part of the piece is the spread of the notes…left hand is all over the keyboard, and the right hand has adds some jumps to the mix at the end also. The result is that I can’t just muscle memory the piece.
https://youtu.be/7kjgKMbt7ic (edit: this is not final version...see below.)If I can eke out something better later this week I’ll post again. Will there be a watch party for this challenge? If not might play this for the May concert.
EDIT: FINAL VERSION HERE (with added commentary for fun lol): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPGFox7s7Cw
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Marc M This is so tranquilly played. I always thought Scriabin was a mad dash. Thanks for sharing.
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Marc M This sounds great, Marc! The LH reminds me of the Rach Elegie that Juan Carlos Olite is playing - takes a lot of work to track it much less memorize it.
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Sedef CANKOCAK Thank you! Yeah, Scriabin is famous for his later edgy works like Vers la flamme, but he also wrote a lot of slow, beautiful music in his earlier years. Here are 4 other nice ones: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m804aa5steE&t=2s (I'm working on making a bigger video with 10 of his lovely slower preludes, but that will take some time.)
Judy Kuan Thanks! I need to put some more work practicing my eye movement, haha.
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Marc M I thought it was pretty fantastic. Nice work over just these few weeks!
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Marc M Bravo! Beautiful playing! Really enjoyed this and all the other Scriabin in this challenge. Certainly not an easy composer to tackle in such a short time.
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Marc M beautiful! Apart from its overt romanticism, the piece has a mysterious, almost hypnotic quality - fascinating. Very good work for not even a month; this one would seem a hard one to memorize, so it’s doubly impressive.
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