Video: operatic fantasia/composition of mine

[ronde_des_sylphes]

Video taken from a recital in summer 2006. A few wrong notes in the coda, unfortunately, fatigue had something to do with it (had been playing for an hour and a half at the time).

This composition started life as an improvisation on one of the themes Thalberg uses in his Don Pasquale fantasy, and became progressively more structured as I played around with it. I use improvisatory material based on a theme from Liszt's paraphrase on Bellini's La Somnabula for contrast. The composition is in essence an affectionate pastiche of the Liszt/Thalberg operatic paraphrase genre.

Hope you like it; any comments are welcome.

Update/Edit: mp3 of another performance of the piece now attached within the thread.

[mad_max2024]

WOW
 

[dabbler]

Similar to your Moses Fantasy, I can only say that your playing is amazing, and here this extends to your imagination in coming up with this "pastiche". Sorry, no constructive criticism possible for me. It's so nice to see how this genre is well alive or becoming revived - it deserves to! Thanks for posting... 

[ronde_des_sylphes]

Thank you. I'm glad you appreciated it; it reflects my interest in the genre, and as I've played so much music of this type, creating it was almost second nature to me. Ok, it wasn't quite that easy   - the ideas came freely but I had to try to structure them properly .

[pianistimo]

i was trying to concentrate at the first - but got caught on that bright green carpet.  then i realized the window and wall was fake and so i wasn't taken by surprise when the hurricane force wind hit the wall during the middle of your piece and blew up like a skirt - exposing lawn.  it was at that point - it all fit.  it seemed to fit the wind and waves and the tumultuous circuitous and yet always different arpeggios coming up and going back down.

by the end - i felt tossed to and fro in the most wonderful of turns of imagination.  i didn't feel that the piece lost interest at any point.  the wave again of the skirt of the 'wall' seemed to be giving a sort of applause.  much better than that applause from the audience.  if i was there - i would have run up and kissed you on the cheek.  people don't know how much work that is.  if you were in the 19th century - the whole front row of women would have swooned and fell off their chairs. 

too bad it just doesn't have the same appeal to the majority of audience today.  excepting, of course, vocalists - who now will want you for an accompanist on the spot. 

[pianowolfi]

OHHH yes that is really awesome!!! Good job!

[imbetter]

holy...that was really good. My compositions arent nearly as good. I'm working on becoming a better composer though I recently composed a few.


that was great

[ronde_des_sylphes]

Thank you all for the nice comments

i was trying to concentrate at the first - but got caught on that bright green carpet.  then i realized the window and wall was fake and so i wasn't taken by surprise when the hurricane force wind hit the wall during the middle of your piece and blew up like a skirt - exposing lawn. 

Hehe. Yes, it was certainly a novel experience to play in a glorified tent with a mind of its own. 

[ronde_des_sylphes]

I didn't have this around earlier (consequences of a hard drive failure a while back), but as yesterday someone on youtube asked me for a cd-recording of the performance, I've taken the liberty of ripping and uploading an mp3 of an earlier performance of this piece - especially as it has infinitely better sound quality, and imo definitely a better performance too.

Anyway, if you want to comment, feel free, but I've had plenty nice comments already Hope you enjoy the recording - I have something of a soft spot for it as it represents one of my happier moments on a concert platform.