Schubert Impromptu Op. 90 No. 3 in G flat

[jinfiesto]

One of my favorite pieces. I think I play it well. Thoughts?

[goldentone]

Very nice playing of a beautiful piece.

[thalberg]

Very lyrical and reflective.  You play this piece like you really love it and understand it.

[cygnusdei]

Good job on the voicing, you bring up character of the piece on a subpar instrument, too.

There are several places where you seem to have learned the notes wrong. Most jarring is the left hand in measure 5, where did that come from? Also, a couple places where the triplets on the right hand played 512 512 where it should be 521 521 etc. The fastest way to fix this is to listen to CD or something - you'll pick up the mistakes quite easily. And measure 42 is not the same as 46!

As a general comment, you'd want to make the music flow as smoothly as possible. There is a tendency to pause between the first note on the melody (5) and the first eighth note on the accompaniment (1). By doing this you lose momentum! The phrases must soar, not stutter.

Other than that, again good job and keep it up!

[jinfiesto]

Hahahaha. The "wrong notes" are from the Liszt transcription. It's considered acceptable performance practice to use the harmonic changes from the transcription. I wouldn't play it that way in a competition, but I honestly think that it's more interesting that way. Although using the harmonic changes is a schmalzy super-romantic thing to do, I think that it serves the music in this case.

You're right about the pauses. It was an idea I had concerning using agogic accents so I can change color more often. It's overdone though, and I noticed that in retrospect. Also, the color changes don't seem to come across as well as I would've liked, but maybe that's just the recording. You're right about measures 42 and 46, I re-learned this piece recently, and it seems I forgot about that in the process.

It's funny that you say I was on a sub-par instrument. Certainly not the range of color and dynamic that I would've liked, and granted, it is a practice room piano here at my school, but it's a fairly new Boston, and as such, I'm fairly grateful as I've seen some pretty awful pianos in practice rooms even at major conservatories. Maybe my standards have gone down since the start of University, but I feel that while not necessarily a stellar piano it sits above sub-par. It seems pretty average in my experience, and I used to work at a Steinway piano Gallery, so I've seen some pretty awesome pianos.

I'm curious to know why you made that assumption?

[theone7]

hey...just learning this myself. If I may say...its a pretty good interpretation, (and i know this post is over a year old, but people read through these to learn all the time), theres something to be said for sacrificing timing and accuracy for interpretation and emotion. At times, it seems uneven, because you're trying to stress certain harmonies between the hands, and it throws off the piece slightly.

That said...I quite enjoyed it, and learned a few things from it myself. Well played.