READ ME and POST HERE!
WELCOME TO OUR LATEST TONEBASE PIANO COMMUNITY PRACTICE CHALLENGE:
Mini Challenge: Finding Colors in your Sound!
We invite you to participate in this mini challenge leading up to a livestream on
March 8th at 11am PT with Boris Giltburg
Enter a World of Color with Boris Giltburg
Get started in this challenge by:
1. Picking a piece of music!
2. Posting an excerpt of the piece, and describe the color that YOU feel in the music.
3. (optional) tell us how you are trying to achieve this color!
Example:
1. Debussy: Prelude (Bruyeres)
2. I am trying to capture a "sky blue" color in the beginning! Because I find the music to have such an open quality (plus I am imagining an open plain, without a cloud in the sky!)
3. I am trying to achieve this by focusing on a slow attack, and washy pedal (but not muddy!)
When does this take place?
Challenge start: February 27th
Challenge days: February 27th - March 8th!
Why are we doing this?
Because we want to challenge ourselves to practice every day
Because learning together is more fun than learning alone
Because we get to share our progress with others (whether video or just text)
Because new music is wonderful and these pieces were written especially for us!
Because we want to meet our fellow tonebase community members
Because we get to hear new music which we might not play ourselves
ASK ANY QUESTIONS YOU MIGHT HAVE BELOW!
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,What a great idea, Dominic Cheli . I will certainly watch the recorded Livestream as well.
The excerpt I picked is from the development of the 1st movement of LV Beethoven's Piano Sonata Opus 14., no. 1. I am trying to imagine broad velvety swirls of purple and burgundy as this section contrasts in texture with the rest of the piece. I hope to achieve this by working on making the melody sing out as much and as expressively as possible, while still working out the pedalling changes so they don't break up the melody.
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Natalie Peh Sounds great! I really like these colors you are working on projecting!
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Natalie Peh I love your musical painting, Natalie!
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Natalie Peh Great imagery and playing!
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Dominic Cheli Vidhya Bashyam Andrea Buckland Thanks for your kind comments. I love the idea of hearing (or seeing?) colour in sound!
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Natalie Peh How beautiful and evocative sounds this development with you suggestions and playing, Natalie!
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Juan Carlos Olite thanks, Juan Carlos, appreciate your kind feedback!
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Natalie Peh Sounds fantastic! I loved thinking of those colors while I listened to you play. Your playing is always very elegant, which I love about it. This definitely felt broader and nice and full. Well done!
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Natalie Peh Quite lovely, Natalie! Thinking of the colors as you played added to the experience.
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Leah Olson Michelle R thanks Leah and Michelle! Glad you liked it!
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Firstly, I had to drop out of the live session yesterday because we received a phone call about one of her friends being in hospital as an emergency. He’s surviving, but it was a tough time for him and his family.
I think the different colours in the sound come from the key that is chosen and the chords and additional notes: 7ths, 9ths, 6ths, chord substitutions, say ii instead of IV, giving a minor colour instead of the major.
This is not to say that we can’t colour the sound additionally from the key touch and the pedal.
I plan to use this challenge to explore different harmonies and the emotions that are created from the colours in the palette.
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A pensive Chopin in Paris is thinking in his beloved country. Two emotions arise gently succeeding each other: one is a pure nostalgic sentiment (a bit dark purple horizon; touching softly and deeply the keys with generous pedal) the other put a slight smile in his face, when he remembers the movements of the dancing mazurka (golden shades make their way in the purple horizon; rhythmic and bouncy touch and less pedal).
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Juan Carlos Olite love this! So evocatively played.
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Juan Carlos Olite That's very beautiful playing, I feel the emotions and colours you are trying to project, and I love how to make the melody sing ever so gently!
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Juan Carlos Olite Beautiful, Juan Carlos! The emotions are so well-played.
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Juan Carlos Olite Very colorful, Juan Carlos!
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Juan Carlos Olite What a beautiful interpretation of this Mazurka! Very emotional and colorful playing!
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Juan Carlos Olite So nostalgic! I particularly liked your rubato at 1:48--perfect!
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Tammy Natalie Peh Michelle R Andrea Buckland Vidhya Bashyam Leah Olson Thank you so much for your kind words! It is a very beautiful music to look for colors.
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Juan Carlos Olite amazing interpretation!!
I love the way you play with this of golden shades of Oberek and the purple, nostalgic. It’s lovely!
I’m currently playing that Mazurka too. And for me is so interesting to see the way it’s interpreted in a different way.
For sure, I’ll steal some things you did (with your permission) ;)
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Adriana López Thank you so much, Adriana!
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Juan Carlos Olite Ahhh, yes. I could hear and see those beautiful purple and golden colors coming out throughout your lovely rendition of this beautiful Mazurka and you made me love it! I could just see in my mind's eye, Chopin, sitting in Paris, at the keyboard, with his fingers wistfully depressing the keys, his head slightly tilted up,, and his eyes focused beyond the room to those days when he walked along the streets of Warsaw on a pleasant, sunny day, before the uprising and remembered his loved ones and good times from the past.
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Linda Clover Thank you so much, Linda! How poetically you describe the scene; thanks a lot!
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Juan Carlos Olite I always love your playing. I also love your description. Most apt!
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Here’s a practice video of Rachmaninoff’s Prelude opus 32 no. 12. I’m trying to capture the beauty of varying shades of gray with occasional splashes of brighter colors, only very momentarily. The mood is a bit like the ebb and flow of a tide, with lots of smaller ripples in between. Another image I have is a gray, misty night with a lighthouse, sometimes crashing waves, and the distant call of sirens.
The two things I want to work on — more rhythmic precision, and clearer pedaling.
