Piano Forum

Ahh I've spent the better part of December and most of the last two months learning this as a possible choice for my juries.

Don't get bogged down by the lack of fingering, and don't rush through the more touchy parts.  It's worth it to really get a solid fingering.  The part on [page two-three of my edition] where each hand has their own triplet figures veering away from middle C will take some time.  Try to get fingers to match up here as best as you can and keep a legato without holding the pedal through this.  Also be careful with the rhythm for the same part where right hand has beats 1 and 2 of the triplet, and the left hand has beats two and three.  Try to feel the down beat on the first note of the triplet rather than tending to accent the second beat (when both hands play).  If you know what I mean there, then great!

In the slower Moderato section, again, be really economical with your fingering - don't hide jumps with a pedal, because usually you can interchange fingers on held notes (mostly the quarters in right hand).

The tempestoso part gave me difficulty with the left hand, because in the part with the thirds in left hand, to play it true to the score without releasing the half notes, you need to hold them with the thumb while outer fingers play the thirds.  That really threw me off, but now I can play thirds with my 2-3-4-5 in left hand!

The melody from the slower part comes back throughout the rest of the piece, and when it does, make sure you can hear it (during the mash fest of the right hand white note chords near the end, the left hand upper notes actually have that melody somewhere within that craziness!)

Don't speed up, especially when the faster parts have tamer sections for your fingers.  Keep a steady tempo when the notes ease up on you, or you'll hate yourself when it gets really hairy  

I'm still working at finishing it, but it took me the better part of the last two months to really get the techniques down to be able to actually play all of the parts.  This was my first Prokofiev piece that I actually studied for school, and there are many things in this piece I've never seen before in other stuff.

If you have any other questions, just ask away; if I don't know I'll ask my prof for you  


Edit: I'd also like to let you know that the stuff I've played before this is roughly around the same level (not the same pieces, but about the difficulty of those).

The key is deceiving "oh A minor, easy"... it rarely stays in that for long, and that's what makes this such a great piece.  One of the toughest parts for me are the right hand double note jumps in F minor, about 8 measures before the rit into the moderato.  That's hell hands together, but it sounds so great in context with the rest of that part!