Will you listen to my exam piece?

[Clare]

Hello. I have my first exam next week. It's a technical exam, and I'm already really nervous.

I was wondering whether you guys could listen to my study and give me some pointers on what I could brush up on before the exam. The piece is Czerny study op. 740 no. 2. The recording has fuzzy bits and I mess up rather horiffically near the end, but if you could pretend that's not happening that would be fine by me. Feel free to tell me what you think the good bits and the bad bits are. And, uh, try not to laugh at my inept playing too much if you can help it.

The mp3 is about 1.8 meg in size and the piece goes for about 2 minutes. I have fixed the link since the post below was written so it should actually work.

https://breakfastofchampions.live.com.au/clarestudy.mp3

I hope no-one says I'll fail.  :-/

[faulty_damper]

It's only 182kb in size.  And only a 11 seconds in length.

Not bad for 11 seconds though.

[faulty_damper]

Actually, it's pretty damn good for 11 seconds!  I've tried the same Czerny exercise after you asked how to play it in another thread about those darn arpegios.  That's pretty much ten times faster than I could play it.  Ten times more accurate, too.

[Clare]

Thanks! But 11 seconds? Grr. I'm trying to upload it again. I'm also trying to upload it somewhere else. Bear with me.  

[faulty_damper]

I can tell you have your piano tuned often.  It sounds nice, too!  What kind is it?

[Clare]

Thanks! I did get my piano tuned a few months ago, actually.

The brand is one I'd never heard of before - Stahlmann. It's from about the 1920s. I love it. It's a giant rickety upright.

OK - I've changed the link in my first post. I really hope it works now!

[Clare]

WOO-HOO! It works now. Trust me.  

[faulty_damper]

I'd like the recording to be better because everytime the bass chords are played it gets all muffly with the feedback.

I don't hear anything wrong with it although it reminds me of my older sister's playing.  She has a tendency to keep the bass softer than it should be.  Or rather, her left hand softer than it should be.  You may also have this problem.  It's more pronounced when halfway through, the arpegios change over to the left hand and the right hand plays the chords.  Although, this left hand weakness could be because your computer recording is to the right of your piano and the bass is less pronounced than the treble.

As I listen to it:
0-24 seconds - left should be slightly, just slightly louder.
22-32 - rising bass arpeggio notes should be louder here; more accentuation.
34-53 - left hand may be weaker than the right.  Should be slightly louder.

Yeah, I think your left is weaker than your right.  Still pretty good.  Will you pass, I'm sure you will.

[faulty_damper]

I made the following notes while looking at the score of Op.740-2.  But what I really should have been doing was my homework.  Anyway, consider it as critique for you to be super technical exercise performer of the 21st century.  I'm sure that can be interpreted in an unpleasant manner.  So don't interpret it that way.  Anyway, I noted the measures for easier reference.  I also didn't do the entire score but just the beginning as I think it is enough to let you know what I was thinking while looking at the score.


Measure 4: be sure to accent those first notes of the beat.

Measure 8: am I hearing this right?  Do you add notes with the left after the broken chord?  It sounds like it but it isn't in the score.  Nevermind, you're just accenting the first note of the beat like my above comment.  Perhaps too much accent...?

Measure 12,13, & 14: your 4 finger seems to fade on the B note after the 5 plays the D note in M13+14.  Same as M12 at the same place, different notes.

M15 & 16: The bass chords aren't arpeggio'd on the score but it was played that way.

M18...+ 22: at the diminuendo, the right hand should diminish more noticeably as the left hand brings out the arpeggio notes.  The right should diminish until it is at the piano/soft and the the forte/loud at M21 should come as an abrupt surprise.

M26...: the right hand is too loud.  It should still be played piano per the instruction two measures before it.  Then it can crescendo per instruction at M27 until the forte instruction at M33.

Hmmm... It occurs to me that I may be playing back the recording too loudly as it everything sounds forte to me... Hmmm...
Perhaps it is just the recording but there isn't a noticeable difference between piano and forte.  The
dynamic range is too small.

I made slight editing when I reread what I wrote to avoid any confusion.  This was written as I went through the exercise, so it should be read linearly.  I'm sure you can apply my suggestions for the rest of the exercise.

And lastly, thanks!  I've never heard that exercise performed in its entirety.  Sounds nice.  

[Clare]

Thanks for the feedback. I will try and put more dynamic range into my playing. I don't think it's the recording's fault that it all sounds forte, actually. It could be partly the piano's fault because it dsoesn't seem to have much dynamic range sometimes. But it's mostly my fault. I struggle to play p in this study without notes cutting out like they did anyway.

For some reason, my edition of the piece has the LH chords still broken in bars 15-16. Strange.

Anyway, thankyou so much for your comments! I'm definitely going to try and play those right hand broken chords softer, etc.

OK. I go practice now......

[donjuan]

I liked the performance!  But, I think you could benefit from more rubato and dynamics.  Keep in mind that Czerny was Liszt's teacher and Beethoven's student!  But, it sounds great, and you should do well!

Just out of curiousity, how did you manage to record yourself and make it into an internet link?  Maybe I could try it..
donjuan

[Clare]

Hm. I will think a little about using some rubato somewhere - good idea.

And to make an mp3 of myself into an internet link - first you have to be able to upload the mp3 into some web space somewhere. That's the hardest part. Then come to the forum, make a topic, etc., and click on the little world button (inset hyperlink) and write the exact location of where you put the mp3. As for recording myself, I have access to a minidisc player and a good microphone! The only reason the recording came out scratchy was I didn't set it up properly. I was playing my study and the phone rang in the middle so I had to start all over again all flustered. Oh, well.

[donjuan]

Oh, so that's how you do it.  Maybe I should consider buying an MP3 player, or whatever recording device...All I have is a microphone and Cassete Tape recorder.  Guess that wont work...
donjuan

[Clare]

That should be OK. All you need is to be able to record the tape onto the computer somehow. If you can plug a line from the headphone plug straight into the computer, you can use a sound program to record it onto your hard drive.

[donjuan]

sound program..headphone--plugin--computer...sounds awfully complicated.  It's ok, but thank you very much for your effort and time!
donjuan