Welcome to the tonebase Piano Community!
Hey everyone - this is Dominic from tonebase 🙂!
As the lead of tonebase PIANO it's such a pleasure to welcome you to the tonebase community. We would love to get to know you! Please introduce yourself in a post below with the following format:
- Where are you from and what's your favorite food from there? ;)
- What are you currently working on?
- What are you hoping to get out of this community?
I'll go first:
- I was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri and you better believe that I love my barbecue! It is hard to pick my favorite food between ribs, brisket, or a beautiful grilled steak, but if I have to decide...nothing beats a juicy, fall-off-the-bone rack of baby back ribs!
- Currently working on some old favorites of mine by Carl Vine (Piano Sonata No.1), Beethoven (Piano Concerto No.4) and Scriabin (Fantasy op.28) but also adding some great repertoire by H. Leslie Adams (Etude in A-flat minor Book 2), Laura Kaminsky (Alluvion), and Clara Schumann (Romanze in A minor Op.21 no.1)!
- I am hoping to getting to know and helping all of you achieve your musical and artistic goals. Let's have some fun and get to work!
Now over to you (after some participation from our tonebase team members!)
870 replies
-
My name is Alex,
I'm from Australia. I'm a professional IT consultant and play the piano as a hobby. I took it up again mostly to teach my son and now I find I play for myself and more than I ever did in my youth,
I'm currently working on most of the 18 Mozart piano sonatas. Aside from a handful of the earlier ones that I haven't started on yet. I'm particularly focused on No 5 in G major, K. 283, No. 7 in C major, K. 309, No. 8 in A minor, K. 310, No. 9 in D major, K. 311, and pretty much all of them in book 2 (Nos 10-18).
I enjoyed your video on how to play the Rondo A la Turka. I played this piece too much as a child and haven't yet returned to it too much although I plan to do that soon!
I'm also working on the 6 Haydn sonatas dedicated to Katherina & Marianna Auenbrugger especially C major Hob:XVI 35, E flat major Hob:XVI 38 and G major Hob:XVI 39.
Also a few of the Clementi sonatas esp. B-Flat Major, Op.24 No.2.
What I hope to gain from the community is any tips since I don't have a teacher nor time to find one.
-
Welcome Alex. I am also from Australia.
I also hope to engage more with the community. With live events, the only challenge is time difference.
I am working on Bach’s Invention in G major and Bach’s Fugue no.1 in C major BWV 846.
Undoubtedly you will enjoy the online tutorials which I do. -
Pleased to meet you, I also play that Fugue!
-
Hello and Welcome, Alex!
-
Ok, Alex, you clearly have ESP because I'm going to ask my teacher about this passage in January when I have my next lesson.
I don't know if this is helpful, but I'm trying to sort of "throw" my hand to land on the chord that we need to hold. Playing them with a bit more volume (even if I can't hold them for the entire half measure) kind of makes it SEEM like they are being held.
Stay tuned to see what my teacher says in January.
Or, better yet, we can ask because he already plays this piece!
-
Yes I would welcome such a feedback a lot! I suppose it's the second half of each measure that introduces the biggest challenge, where holding the chord with 1 and 2 leaves 4 and 5 to play the most important part of the melody. Which seems almost impossible! I am tempted to let the chord go and play D# E and C (in measure 59) with 3 and 4. Then I think the rest can be played as notated.
-
For what it's worth, I spent some time on this today and I worked out this fingering. I think the E on the 3rd beat of measure 59 is the most important to bring out and unless you have technique like Glenn Gould then I can't imagine it is possible to do that note justice while holding the 1 and 2 on the F# and A! Then I play the A at the beginning of measure 60 a second time. What do you think?
-
It’s been a while since I played this, but yes, I think you are absolutely right with the “throwing hand” description. What I would say is important to remember in a passage like this, is that getting the rhythm correct should be priority number one. Best of luck!
-
I think I found a fingering that makes all of this possible:
Playing the melody with 5-5 5 and sliding with a snapping motion from the black notes to the white notes. This makes holding the chord with 1 and 2 quite easy, emphasising the high white note is not too hard as a lot of power can be had by snapping down from the black note. Even holding the middle note through to the chord in the first beat of the next measure is quite achievable with this fingering.
I wonder if this is exactly what Mozart had in mind?
-
From having learned this piece during my studies (with a professor who said it requires the highest level of technical mastery), I will take the liberty to chime in with the fingering I learned back then. The top voice was 5.........., 4, 5.., 5 | 4-5, to be played all non legato. Also, she advised me to release the thumb right after attacking the fourth beat, to allow it to freely "jump" to the next 1st beat. To this day I can't find a better fingering to play that passage without pedal, but I'd still rather go to the dentist than tackle this treacherous sonata again.
-
Yes that's the fingering in my Henle-Verlag edition. But I really think I'm onto something with this new fingering I worked out. In addition to simply making the score playable without cheating, there's a symmetry created. E.g. Just as you slide 2-2 e.g. G#-A in measure 59 you can then create that same sound of attack by then sliding 5-5 from D#-E. Then you have 2 anchored on the A leaving 2 very strong fingers, 1 and 3, to accent the next chord. So throughout you have 2-2 then 5-5, 2-2 and 5-5 etc and strong fingers in between to sustain the held notes and bring out the polyphonic phrases.
-
-
Oops, looks like I missed answering the original questions of the thread, so here goes!
- I was born and raised in Montreal, Canada. Favorite food here? Probably the poutine from Chalet BBQ, with chili flakes on top.
- Currently working on a mini (40-45 mins) recital intended to be easy-listening enough for audiences who are new to classical music:
-Rachmaninoff Sonata no.2, Op.36. Ok I admit that's not quite easy-listening but it's my only active repertoire right now😅! The rest of the programme should be much more palatable to the target audience but is currently at a pre-embryonic stage:
-Chopin Preludes Op.28 nos 1, 6, 11, 14, 21, 22
-Liszt Sonetto 47 del Petrarca
-Liszt Sursum Corda
-Grieg Lyric pieces: "Remembrances"
-Grieg Peer Gynt : In the Hall of the Mountain King- What I am hoping to get out of this community? Just to mingle with people share a similar background with me (passionate about the piano, then life got in the way, then returning to our first passion after all those years, but without quitting our day jobs!)
-
Hello,
I'm Claudia and I've been playing piano for 50 years. I've also been on Tonebase for a while now with my second instrument, the cello. This year I'm adding the piano.
I live in Western Germany and love eating what you can find almost everywhere here: currywurst and fries.
I haven't practiced piano all that intensively in recent years as I do play a lot on my cello with wich I join a big symphony orchestra. My current goal is to work on pieces by Chopin.
I'm looking forward to meeting you all; practicing is so much easier in a group!
Best regards, Claudia
-
Hi. Im Liz. I live in Warwick in England. I'm not sure I have a fave food but a traditional Sunday Roast with meat substitute followed by apple crumble and cream might be the best. My first love is singing - I'm in 3 choirs - but I've always played the piano so I thought I would try to improve my skills. My friend recommended Tonebase and I'm loving it! I've revived some old favourites in this past 3 weeks: Bach 2 part Inventions , Mozart Sonatas and Schubert Impromptu no 4. I've started Chopin Etude in c sharp minor from scratch (I think the tutor is fab) and noticing a huge improvement today so that's exciting. I've also started the first Arabesque by Debussy and the video is really helpful.
-
Hello. I am Trisha and I live in Northumberland in the UK. I am really a sweet tooth so I love puddings of all sorts - and I really enjoy a Cream Tea - a Cornish one with strawberry jam on a scone topped with clotted cream (my parents were from the South West, Plymouth and Cornwall).
My love of the piano began at the age of 11, but then with a nursing career, followed by parenthood, time has been limited for merely playing for enjoyment. Now I am a retired nurse, I have loads of time. I recently slipped on the ice and broke my right wrist and my main aim was to get my wrist action and finger agility back for playing piano so have been spending hours working on that and finding loads of new and specific exercises.. I found Tonebase through social media and am really looking forward to experimenting with new pieces at intermediate level. I would really love to feel more comfortable playing Chopin pieces as I have not had as much experience or exposure to a lot of Chopin. I seemed to race to grade 8 at school and focussed mostly on exam pieces without the luxury of broadening my repertoire.
I am really looking forward to being part of the Tonebase community having joined it today and although I am completely overawed by the amount of material on it, I am also very excited at working through everything and joining in the live events and participating in the forums.
Hope to 'meet' you all soon at some point!
