SUGGESTED Selections by Difficulty for Brahms 16 Waltzes op.39
Hey everyone! What are your favorite Waltzes from Brahms op.39?
I'd love for you to go on an exploratory journey, but I thought I'd also share with you some of my own ideas!
Check out these suggested categories I created:
By difficulty:
- Easy: 2, 3, 5, 9, 12
- Medium: 1, 4, 7, 8, 15
- Advanced: 6, 10, 11, 13, 14, 16
By technique:
- Arpeggio:
- Left Hand Attention: 1, 13. 14, 16
- Rhythm: 4, 15, 16
- Ornamentation: 11, 13, 14, 15
- Voicing chords: 5, 8, 11, 12, 15, 16
- Multiple voices/Polyphony: 2, 7, 9. 12, 16
- Scale passagework:
- Hand shifting (jumps): 1, 3, 6, 8, 13, 15
- Articulation/Phrasing: 4, 6, 9, 11. 12, 14, 15, 16
- Double notes: 7, 10, 11, 13, 14, 16
Bonus:
- My personal favorites: 1, 2, 3, 4, 15
What do you think, which ones did you like best?
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The first four waltzes make such a nice grouping, as they show within a few minutes four contrasting possibilities for what a waltz can be. One of the difficulties with this fabulous set (and there are many!) is to keep each piece dancing, to picture couples waltzing on the floor as we play. It doesn't work for me to get too sentimental or too bombastic.
Op. 39 reminds me a little bit of Schumann's Carnaval because each waltz is like a character portrait. I love both so very much!
I LOVE this challenge! This is music to treasure for a lifetime. Learning it in the supportive and reflective context of the tonebase community is a bonus!
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I love this challenge! I have listened threw the collection, and I think in time I want to play them all. It will be very nice to have this as part of the repertoire for a recital.
I have a lot on my plate for november so there will be limited practice time, but I want to do the "ornamentation set" 11, 13, 14, 15 for a starter (and do the advanced version). Looking forward to start practicing tomorrow!
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I've been so distracted recently by other (boring) things that I've yet to manage a community challenge. This one sounds great, and I'm going to try, but I'll be coming in late (8 November) because of travel away from my piano! Looking forward, I'm just now discovering these waltzes and am already liking them quite a lot! :-)
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I probably will go with my usual pattern of starting with the first variation, but listening to a recording of all I recognized #10 and #11 and remembered probably 15 years ago I played those two in the duet version, which was so fun. I found the old duet book and they are much easier that way! Anyway, now I think I will plan to do #1-4 as a set and #10-14 as another set. #12 starts off sounding like op. 118, no. 2 for a brief moment. #14 makes a great finish for that set. I will not finish the two sets in three weeks