Week 2: Pattern Recognition/Big Picture Thinking
Week 2: Pattern Recognition + Performance Practice
This week, we’re zooming out from individual passages and looking at the bigger picture of your Sonata.
First, look for connections across the piece: repeated or transposed themes, recurring accompaniment patterns, call-and-response ideas, and anything that seems unusual or unexpected. The goal is to start recognizing how the composer builds the Sonata from a smaller collection of musical ideas.
Then, begin putting the piece into performance mode. Try full run-throughs, make recordings, and, when possible, play for another person. Give each performance a score out of 10 and keep track of what improves from one attempt to the next.
Share one pattern or relationship you discovered in your Sonata this week. It could be a repeated theme, a transposition, a recurring texture, or something unusual you hadn’t noticed before.
And if you’ve started doing run-throughs or recordings, tell us one thing you learned from hearing or performing the piece straight through.
Download the Week 2 worksheet below for the full exercises and performance-practice tracker.
20 replies
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I shall address the assignment tomorrow, but today is the anniversary of 9/11. I was in a recording studio in West London twenty five years ago. This was the early days of the internet. The computers in the studio were not connected to the internet but the studio manager had internet connection on his office computer. He came into the studio and asked me to come into his office as he could not believe what was happening on screen. One of the Twin Towers was burning. My recollection is that we then saw a plane crash into the second tower. We debated whether this was 'fake news' or not. If only...
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At the start of this TWI, I began learning 2nd movement of Haydn c minor sonata Hob XVI:20 ... here's my 2 weeks of progress on it (please excuse the mess up and the mumbling that went with it at the end): https://youtu.be/4J-sxHjQEs0?si=WSbDnO9j9_z1g3cr
With the progress so far it seems to take me ~2 weeks to get to the end of each movement for a sonata of this size and complexity.
Just want to note that I just got to end of the piece on Friday (with much of the time spent on LH thirds and the syncopated passages) and had a lesson on it yesterday, and also I'm limited to an hour on a weekend morning to do any recordings with my home setting ... so I haven't really had much run through practices yet, though definitely see the value of logging them for more focused practice spots. As for this recording, my note to self is definitely a lot more work still on shaping and smoothing out the tone and lines.
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Hi Jarred and everyone!
Here is my video and second assignment. It's been a great intensive, and there is no doubt that doing all these tasks -analysis, pattern recognition, and so on...-, is absolutely helpful for understanding and learning a classical sonata, or any piece.
I started learning the piece in mid-August, little by little, and in the end, I've only managed to learn, more or less, the first movement. But, I've absolutely enjoyed this music and the course. Now it's time to practice the entire sonata more and more. I didn't know this piece before, and I find it really gorgeous.
Thank you, Jarred!
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I only spent the 2 weeks of this TWI on the entire Sonata (3 movements), so everything is NOT polished. But, here are movements 1 and 2 of Haydn Hob. XVI:23 in F major. I'll record the 3rd movement tomorrow and pop it in here.
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Hi, I've been struggling with this sonata on and off for a while. This two week intensive gave me the possibility to record it for the first time.🙂 Btw, my hands tends to get very stiff when I play it. How to get more relaxed hands? There is quite alot of psychology too, I'd think. (Like playing golf?)
Anyway, here it is:
https://youtu.be/5dE_PueQt5k?feature=shared
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The first week back to regular teaching interrupted my work on week 2 so I have no completed assignment to share. I did spend time recording the different sections of the K. 457 from memory though so my goal of memorizing the full movement was overall successful. I have included the section recordings below as one video for anyone interested =)