Chopin Revolutionary Etude project

[caioramos]

Hey everyone!

Inspired by my new pianostreet friend "Choo choo love" who has a topic and a blog about her current working piece Fantasie-impromptu, which she's doing pretty well btw, I realized that is a really good idea to keep track of our improvement, while sharing its development with the community. So all suggestions, constructive criticism, comments about it are very welcomed! Also its quite a new different experience for me.

I will be posting videos of my progress regularly, so stay tuned if you want to accompany me on this, quite hard, task of learning this amazing piece. I started reading the piece today, and I got a few bars going, of course, practicing slow. So don't expect me to play fast anytime soon  
I'm gonna try to record the 1st video by tomorrow or the day after.

A little background, I've been playing for quite a short time, I just started in February, so yeah I know, its quite a shock trying to play this. But I did some really good progress in this time, I started from scratch (almost, I played guitar before, so I knew how to at least read music, but never touched the piano), I went through some of the alfred's book, to some Bach inventions, to Mozart sonata 545, to Rach prelude op3 no2, a Mendelssohn piece and a Bach prelude from wtc1 Cm. Now, I'm finishing chopin fantasie imp, and working on a Haydn sonata as well. Also I did some minor others pieces through the year, and now I'm trying this. If you asked me when I started if I would be playing this at the end of the year I would say of course not, so even I'm quite surprised, and I hope I can do this! I'm also on vacation from my conservatory, so I won't have my teacher help me for now on this piece until February, just you guys suggestions!  :

Thanks for following!
Kyle

[caioramos]

Here is the first video link:

As I said I started yesterday, so It's still quite a mess  , I'm practicing it by sections, I hope by the next week to be playing that first page without stopping and making less mistakes, maybe I will stop learning new sections until it.

Kyle

[nickadams]

you started in february!? That's insane! I am very jealous; good job man. I will be checking in often to see your progress; what an inspiration!

[caioramos]

Hi nick!

Thanks for the support! I've been studying a lot this year, actually this is all I'm doing, so I have all the time to practice. Also, one important thing that contributed to my progress was that I chose only pieces I love, to learn, then you can put your everything into it, even if its a difficult piece, and then there is progress. I can say that this year my teacher just suggested me 1 or 2 pieces to play, the rest all of them were my own suggestions and she accepted, sometimes she said I would not be able to play it, but I surprised her and even myself going for it. Bernhard is really right about that, it so much better when you play something you really like, makes it easier! 

[candlelightpiano]

Congratulations on starting this project, Kyle!  I'm pleased that you found inspiration from my blog. I've been working on Fantasie Impromptu for 17 days now and I don't play as well as you do after one day! I only get to practice an hour a day, at the most. It's incredible that you can play so well after less than a year. In my first year, I was happy to be able to play Beethoven's Fur Elise or Brahms Waltz in A flat.

Keep it up! I'm sure you'll complete this piece way before I complete mine.

[ajspiano]

Well done.

Its difficult to tell if this is the case because of the angle of the video so I apologise if the following  isnt the case...

It looks as though you're RH wrist is 'breaking' when you play the chords, which means you're weight will fall off the piano, rather than onto the keys. Look at the following video of lisitsa

You'll see how when she plays the big chords her whole forearm lifts her hand up, and as she comes down into the chord her wrist is slightly higher up, there's also a slight forward momentum, particularly on the repeated chords. As opposed to straight up and down, the second chord will fall slightly more in toward the black keys than the first. Its very small but you'll feel and hear the difference...  Its hard to explain in words so just experiment a bit.

I'm not saying lisitsa has the best technique ever, (or that she doesnt, she's obviously better than me ) or that you should emulate her exactly..  it just provides a rough visual example of my point.

[caioramos]

Hi ajspiano!

Thanks for your comment!
You are absolutely right, my teacher would always tell me this and btw, I love lisitsa  
I'm still forming my technique and, like in my video, when I'm playing a piece I'm still not feeling very comfortable with, I can't do this loose wrist movements very well, I got kind stiff. But once the piece gets better I will try to correct my wrist movements, I feel more relaxed to play softly!

I was deciding which camera angle was going to be best for my videos, I was gonna start with something like lisitsa videos, but the problem I felt was that you can't see the horizontal movements really well and one hand would block the vision of the other, so I tried this angle. If you have any suggestions It would be nice!

[ajspiano]

This is where the internet fails a bit..

I would suggest that you get the separate hands feeling comfortable and solid first and then put them together rather than trying to form the technique at the same time as learning to coordinate the hands.

I say the internet fails because i'm sure I could get you to fix the wrist issue and feel the power and speed with ease in the chords within about 2 minutes at an in person lesson. Its important that you get it right because if you play the piece with the wrist breaking you are just practicing playing with that technical flaw..  better to practice the correct technique than the wrong one.

As far as angles for videos..  if you're looking for sound technical advice you probably really need multiple angles. Watching the video I feel like you are probably getting off balance with you're left hand a lot in that your wrists are probably doing a fair bit or left/right movements away from alignment with your forearm. This will cripple your ability to speed up. BUT - its a lot of guess work and assumptions from me to say that because I can't see directly down onto the keys..  If i had a birds eye view I could see how aligned your wrists are and in turn how balanced your hands are, as well as where you are placing each finger in relation to the keyboard (as in on the white keys or closer to the black keys, or in the black keys)

Would probable get a better idea of what your wrists and arms are doing vertically if you shot it directly from the left or right, but then one arm would cloud the other, so you'd probably need left and right shots.

Aside from all that, I can't comment with too much expertise since I havent studied the rev etude at all so my advice is going to be pretty generalised.

Edit: Also, I, or preferably someone with more knowledge about teaching advanced repertoire like this would be able to provide better assessment if you describe how you feel at specific points..  something like "I feel a stretch between these fingers and difficulty to move between the notes in LH bar number x"

[candlelightpiano]

Kyle: How did you manage to place the whole YouTube screen on your post? I only know how to place a link to my YouTube videos.

[caioramos]

Choo: It's simple, below the "Bold" button on the message screen there is a youtube button, when you press it, it will create the code, then you just put the youtube link in the middle of it

[candlelightpiano]

Thank you so much! I'll try it next time. I see the button you're talking about now. 

[candlelightpiano]

I found this lesson guide on the Rev Etude. It may be of some help to you, Kyle:

https://www.talkclassical.com/152-revolutionary-etude-lesson-guide.html

I think that etude is way out of my league right now! I hope your practice is going well.

[caioramos]

Hey Choo

thanks for the video!! I'm gonna watch it.
Today I made a huge improvement, I have memorized page 2 and 3! And now I'm on last page 4.

After finishing memorizing I will be free
to concentrate on polishing my playing,
My sight reading is quite horrible, so I like
doing this way.

how's your impromptu coming along?

[candlelightpiano]

I didn't know there were only 4 pages in your etude. That's short! You have a fantastic memory to memorize almost the whole piece in - what, 3 days??

I have to go and practice my impromptu. I only get to practice late at night, for about one hour. Too busy during the day.

[caioramos]

The etude is 4 or 5 pages long, it depends on the edition, some have larger font and occupy more space, mine is more compact, although its harder to identify some notes!

Wow, you are doing great if you just have 1 hour practice a day... I'm able to go through a piece kind fast because I have free time to play. I usually practice about 3 to 5 hours a day.

[pianowolfi]

I noticed that you divide your practice sections into little sections, which is actually a good thing, but I think it would be much more helpful if you wouldn't stop and wait on fast notes, just before the real problem appears, like for instance the leap in the right hand from m. 2 to m. 3! This dotted eighth-sixteenth-half note combination should be your little section. Don't stop before the leap! If you practice sections you should always go on until the first note of the following section. Also, when you practice those little, but correctly phrased sections, strive for a very slow, but absolutely correct rhythm and flow.

[ajspiano]

I had a bit of a fiddle with the rev last night..  only 10 minutes or so..  but here's a couple things I noticed, bearing in mind that these are things relevant to me and they may not be to you. Additionally, as I touched on before.. I don't think I'm qualified to teach this level material, and unfortunately at this stage I can't find anyone that I think truly is so its unlikely I'll have a teacher for it anytime soon..

Will also say that I just played with the opening of the main theme..  bars 9-14.

2 main points.

1. in my left hand, I had a tendency to twist my wrist to the left to reach the thumb C at the top of the longer lh run. This caused me to go off balanced and really hampered my ability to speed up. The problem also became exacerbated by the increase in speed, throwing me further off balance..  To solve it I had to do isolated practiced of the arm movements required..  I played the notes that are on the beat, fast and in a relaxed comfortable hand position.. C, Eb, Eb, Eb, C. ..  these became my landmark points so to speak, then I added the other notes in to find the overall hand positions and movements required. Also noted that the rotation toward the thumb was critical and rotational back away from the thumb on the next note provided significant balance to the whole run overall.

2. In order to play the right hand chords in time with the LH accurately you need to 'prepare', in that when you play the piece slowly you can raise your arm/hand when it comes to the note. Where as at speed, if you raise your arm at the time you do when practicing slower your LH will get ahead of the RH..  This appears to be very critical as far as getting the piece up to speed.. atleast it would be for me..  Lisitsa appears to be doing this, although the pace is pretty quick so its hard to really put any kind of timing to the 'preparation' part of the arm motion. I guess you have to feel whats right for you.

....

I may or may not completely rethink this when I practice it again later..  hope its still going well for you.

[danhuyle]

This one has very clearly divided sections all with different patterns. After you get through the rhtyhm and technique, that's when the real difficulty presents itself.

[candlelightpiano]

Kyle: Looks like you have LOTS of tips on playing this piece. Waiting for your video update. I'm not sure I'll do one this week as Christmas is coming, even though we don't celebrate it. But people will be away. Thinking about it.

[candlelightpiano]

How's your etude coming along, Kyle?

[caioramos]

Hey Choo, I was on a trip this weekend, so I haven't practiced, just got home today.
The etude is better, but far from good, I need to record something this week before Xmas!

If anyone plays this, bar 55 1st beat is been a real pain for me. Also all those triplets are quite difficult to handle on the 3rd page, reminds me of fantasie-impromptu 3 to 4 notes. It actually was a good preparation for this.

[ajspiano]

bar 55 1st beat

do you mean the RH rolled chord? ADAD?

[caioramos]

yeah! its a quite large chord, and need to be played fast. I'm having difficult to play HT, HS is quite easy

[ajspiano]

ok, will look at it this evening..  i'm not at the piano right now so cant test. Can you describe exactly what goes wrong in more detail..  what it feels like HS vs HT..  exactly what point does it break down?

[caioramos]

It's basically where I have to look at. If I keep my eyes on my right hand, I make a mistake on the left. If I look at my left hand, I make mistake on the right hand rolled chord.

[ajspiano]

It's basically where I have to look at. If I keep my eyes on my right hand, I make a mistake on the left. If I look at my left hand, I make mistake on the right hand rolled chord.

Ok, I'm starting to form an idea o the problem. 2 questions though..

1. For both situations, ie looking at LH and looking at RH - what individual note exactly does the problem occur on.

2. If you begin on the first beat of bar 55 can you play it without error?

[caioramos]

1- I usually miss the top note, on the rh chord ADAD, I would usually miss the last D or sometimes the second A. On the left hand I would usually miss the same 3rd and 4th notes. Because that notes I have to jump to them, they stay out of the hand stretch. I don't know if practicing HS without looking would be a solution.

2- I'm not sure what you mean, but I still cannot play it correctly, maybe I played once or twice by luck 

[ajspiano]

2- I'm not sure what you mean, but I still cannot play it correctly, maybe I played once or twice by luck 

Play HT from bar 54 (or earlier). You will no doubt have trouble with bar 55.

Now play HT beginning from bar 55, do you still have the problem?

If you can play it successfully beginning at bar 55 then the problem is in how you get your hands in position for bar 55, not in the notes of bar 55.

[candlelightpiano]

AJ, you're so helpful to all of us. Thanks. I still need to take a look at the notes you posted on my topic.

[ajspiano]

AJ, you're so helpful to all of us. Thanks. I still need to take a look at the notes you posted on my topic.

Honestly its not a selfless thing. I'm no expert and trying analyze and solve a technical problem does a lot for me as a pianist and teacher. And none of my current students are going to bring me tough questions about advanced repertoire so it's a lot of fun for me to do this.

....

I worked on bar 55 last night for a short time, I will detail my problems which seem to be in line with yours. I was able to solve them and play fluently from 54 to bar 56 at a moderate tempo, no where near final speed though. I didn't bother dealing with the rest since that was not your question. I can also deal with the triplets fine but I won't touch on that here because you'll end up with an 5000 word essay to read.

Ok, step 1. - playing the right hand chord accurately and quickly.

My initial tendency was to miss the top D, and sometimes the A. So, fix - just had to play it 20 or so times by it self with the relevant movement which for me was as follows. The bottom A has to e played with a rotation toward the thumb, this prepares you to roate back the other direction for the other notes. The rotation at the top of the chord was fairly extreme, as I come off the high D my palm is facing to the left rather than down toward the keys. Doing it this way helps with 2 things, firstly you will not be inclined to 'hold' the lower notes of the chord which would mean a tense stretched hand, by using the rotation your had can remain relaxed for the whole chord and your wrist can stay aligned with your arm, avoiding the left/right and up/down wrist motions here will keep you balanced. Additionally, being in this position at the end (palm facing left) means that you can perform a fast accurate rotation back toward the thumb to play the next chord. If your getting it right this is a naturally fast motion, you will likely be able to play the RH faster than final speed and with great power.

Step 2 -
Practice just the rolled chord with the bottom B in the left hand only, so that you can get to focus on the RH while playing the left hand aswell.

Step 3 -
Add the last F# from bar 54, so now your LH plays that single note followed by HT b and rolled chord

Step 4 -
 
now don't worry about the F#, but use the same concept going the the other direction. You will play the low b with the rolled chord followed by the next LH b an octave above the first. You can watch you RH as you play the chord then watch you left hand as it comes over for the next note. As it gets more solid add the other left had notes from beat 1-2 of bar 55, but not the RH second chord yet. Focus on getting a sense of 'finishing down' on the rolled chord ad low B before you continue the LH. This may disrupt your tempo but as you speed up it will sound more like an accent/rubato than a lack of continuality.

Step 5 -
Add in the next RH chord, when this is comfortable I want you to cycle it, that means play beats 1-2 of bar 55 in a continuous loop until your are getting it in time an accurate almost always.

Step 6 -
Now play from bar 54. This time you are working not on the note of bar 55 but on the getting to bar 55. As you come in to bar 55 remember to focus on getting the first low B and rolled chord played before you worry about the next notes. If you don't do this you can become so focused on the following notes that you are tryin to move to them before you play the first note. This could be a reason for missin the top D, in that we may have a tendency to play a b or c at the top of the chord because we are already trying to move in the opposite direction to get back to the second chord.

Finally you may then need to do some isolated practice of the transition between bar 55 beats 1-2 to 3-4

I don't know how long it will take you to perfect but this took me about 10-15 minutes, long enough for my gf to have a shower actually, I'm just assuming that was 10-15 mins. This is the exact process I used, you may need to focus on one aspect more than another. Be consciously aware of exactly where your problem lies by testing all these different ways of playing the notes surround this or any other problem, then you can practice the actual problem instead of all the other mess around it..

I'm sorry I can provide a video for the technique of the rolled chord, I will try and scour YouTube for something later and if not try to do something myself when I get enough spare time to do the 85 takes it will likely require for me to be satisfied with a video.

Let me know how you go.

AJ

[caioramos]

Hey AJ!

Wow thanks for the deep explanation! I will try it right now and get back to you with the results!

[ajspiano]

Ok, step 1. - playing the right hand chord accurately and quickly.

My initial tendency was to miss the top D, and sometimes the A. So, fix - just had to play it 20 or so times by it self with the relevant movement which for me was as follows. The bottom A has to e played with a rotation toward the thumb, this prepares you to roate back the other direction for the other notes. The rotation at the top of the chord was fairly extreme, as I come off the high D my palm is facing to the left rather than down toward the keys.

I would like to add that if you position your hand comfortably and then rotate from the thumb up to the 5th finger (its not exactly a single movement, but a cant really explain in words) your second and 4th fingers that play d and a will get caught up in the black keys. You arm has to move your hand out away from the keys slightly so that these fingers can play on the white keys not in amongst the black ones. it creates a kind of arc shape movement..  ie. you hand is in out out in as you play finger 1, 2, 4 and 5 respectively. Its not huge though, has to be subtle and very rounded. Thats probably as best as I can describe without using video so just look for whats comfortable to play.

EDIT:
you can see it in the lisitsa video. JUST BARELY.  Its roughly around 1:36-1:42 and the camera changes angle almost exactly on that chord (damn). Watch closely, you can see that her hand turns in that direction slightly so that her palm faces slightly to the left and all her fingers stay relaxed and in a comfortable position, together, rather than stretched out over the span of the chord.

PS - i think thats the right chord, i'm in a waiting room and I have no headphones so I watched it without sound..

[candlelightpiano]

AJ: I hope you'll decide to video tape some of the techniques you talk about. It's so hard to understand by reading what you say but if we could watch you, it will be so much better, like Birba's videos. Thanks for giving us so much assistance.

[ajspiano]

AJ: I hope you'll decide to video tape some of the techniques you talk about. It's so hard to understand by reading what you say but if we could watch you, it will be so much better, like Birba's videos.

I intend to, in the case of the rev I'm reluctant to provide an example of something that I havent actually perfected yet. I'd like to be able to coordinate things at a higher tempo before I post it. So you can see something like, "this is it working" - "now this is it slowed down so you can actually see what I mean"

Thanks for giving us so much assistance.

You have a distinct advantage in motivating me because we are discussing 2 of chopins most awesome pieces, both of which I intend to completely master myself.

[caioramos]

Yeah! thanks a lot aj for your support ^^

[candlelightpiano]

How is your Etude coming along? Are you planning to put up a new video soon? With Birba's exercises, I've finally got the off beat section so I'm thrilled, ecstatic! But I won't be posting a new video this week as I'd like to get more work done on it. Also holidays are coming up.

[derschoenebahnhof]

Another post was mentioning "this is where the Internet fails"...

I think the Internet is both a wonderful resource for finding sheet music and advice, but at the same time, there is a risk taking on pieces that are way too hard just because the sheet music is out there... I tackled a few Chopin etudes but not having reached quite that level I ended up frustrated. I almost got Op 10. no 1 to a playable level, but in the end I found it too hard on my hands.

My own 2 cents would be to learn something easier after a year of playing piano (say, something like Arabesque No 1 by Debussy, Arabesque from Schumann, Brahms Intermezzo No 2). Sure you can find anything on the Internet, but either you are a genius (in this case ignore my post  ) and can play the piece like the pros, or at some point in the near future you will stumble on a wall after trying to increase speed (I did) or hurt your hands if not injure yourself. Even mastering just the notes is only part of the work. Then you need to add the melody, the nuances, and all that makes it lively and convincing.

Anyway, it's just my opinion. I took lessons for 8 years and I am probably at slightly more than intermediate level, and after trying things that were way too hard for me (they were on the internet, and for free), I am down to simpler things where I can enjoy playing more. I am trying other fun things too, like playing pieces for 2 pianos by myself, which bring other challenges.

Not trying to discourage you but just throwing my own experience (trying pieces that were too hard for me) so you don't end up frustrated. Either way, have fun playing piano and I hope my comments don't sound harsh  (if they do, I apologize).

[caioramos]

No, i'm not offended in any way  

Because I understand and agree with what you said, at the same time the internet has the power to give access to sheet music to everybody for free, it makes some tackle on pieces more difficult than they can handle. BUT this is not the internet's fault in my opinion, this is the student's (and to some extent the teacher) fault. Because one needs to know his level and what he is capable of.

But as for me, I have a really good teacher, and every piece I wanted to give a try this year, most of them quite difficult for my level, I showed her, and she gave me her ok, but at the same time I didn't tackled pieces way too hard, I chose the ones that were still inside my capabilities. I started slow, you see, the first piece I wanted to play was Mozart sonata 545, I had at the time 3 months of piano and I was practicing Bach inventions, but I was progressing so fast that I thought I could handle it. But this sonata, which is not easy as the name says, is a grade 5 piece, for one that just started it's commonly too hard, but I did it, I managed to play it to a reasonable level about 3 months later, always working on other pieces in parallel, I don't just focus in one for months. And then I just kept going, the last piece I learned, and I'm still working on is Fantasie-impromptu, which is grade 8+, at the beginning I thought it was too hard but I gave the first bars a try, and I felt if I could overcome the poly rhythm problem I could probably play it, then I found out it was manageable, I gave my best, worked really hard, and I never had any physical injuries because I had a solid foundation of technique by my teacher, I know not to tension too much, and the right movements, and now I can mostly play it, needs polish, but I can play dynamics, and make my own interpretation besides just playing the notes.

And now I just wanted to tackle an Etude, but if you ask me, the one I like the most is op10 no4, but that's really way out of my capabilities at this moment, so I have a good sense about what I can do, and I did some research and found that rev etude is one of the easiest, so I'm giving it a go, and I've been doing pretty well. It's just a week I'm learning it, but in a month or 2 I think I will be playing it reasonably. And even if I can't play it up to speed, my technique already improved through the roof, especially my left hand of course, so its a win already. You can believe me that I built a progressing repertoire up until now that allows me to play this, well you have read my first post, and that's not all the pieces I learned this year, the thing is because I have free time, and I know how to study efficiently, so I did a 2 or 3 years progress in one. But still, I have some insecurities just time will solve. So don't worry! =D

[caioramos]

Can someone help me on fingering for bar 40, left-hand?
I'm doing 1-2-3-4 but the stretch between finger 3 and 4 is quite difficult, I wonder if I use finger 5 is ok or not.

Edit: I just downloaded another edition and the recommended fingering is quite different but it works, it puts the thumb on the A flat instead of finger 4. I was doing thumb for F, 2 and 3 for D and C and finger 4 A flat. Now this edition goes like this: same as I did but now you jump the thumb for the A flat and then do 2 for F, 3 for D and 4 for C... repeat and finish with 5 on next A flat

[ajspiano]

did you make any progress with bar 55?

if not, is the problem still the same or is it something different?

[caioramos]

did you make any progress with bar 55?

if not, is the problem still the same or is it something different?

Hey AJ!

I did some progress on bar 55, I actually can play it by itself, but I still cannot play from bar 54. I'm practicing the transition!

[candlelightpiano]

Kyle: Don't you visit my blog anymore?

[caioramos]

Hey Choo!

Yeah I visit it everyday, but I decided to just post here on your topic of piano street forums because so everyone can see it. But I will make some comments there too =)

[candlelightpiano]

Thanks, Kyle. I kinda missed you there! You're lots of fun. Got to go and practice those exercises Birba suggested. Sometimes I practice them when I'm standing around, on an invisible keyboard. Funny! I must be going crazy!

[caioramos]

I just posted on your blog, go take a look =)

[ajspiano]

I played it for an hour or so last night, not bar 55 - assorted passages.

I found I was playing the LH line (C G C D Eb G C D Eb and back, and the shorter one, and the one with the F#) too close into the black keys. I had been able to play it fairly quickly but was getting a bit stalled in the transition between the Eb and G which was creating a significant pull between my 3rd and 2nd fingers on the way up. I could do it fine slowly but it fell to pieces when I played it up to speed.

I moved my hand back, so that my 3rd finger plays on the tip of the Eb rather than further in.. now I can play the line full speed comfortably. Still needs some slower work to get it more consistently even but it feels easy and stress free at a higher speed now.

Also: https://www.scribd.com/doc/14182617/Cortot-Chopin-Etudes-Op10Students-Edition - if you havent looked at his edition already.

Also am working a bit more in detail on the arpeggio lines just after that, specifically the A A C F C F C A - Ab Ab C F C F C Ab in bar 16. I don't like the 4 over 1 fingering at the moment, I end up with an uncomfortable twist of my wrist to get up to the thumb on the high C. Instead I like a 5 1 5 3 1 3 5 1 fingering, its WAY easier for me to play at the moment but it of course can not do legato (can be resolved with light pedal perhaps?), and i'm not sure if the 515 will handle the final tempo yet - it can certainly go pretty quick though..  at this point it can go faster than 514 for me, but i don't know if thats because i need more work refining the arm movement with the 514 or because the 515 actually is better for my hand.

[caioramos]

You know, I will need help with pedaling in this piece, I don't have any idea how the pedal fits, there is too much chromatic passages that makes it sound awful with it. Maybe this piece isn't intended to be played with pedal? I don't know, I can hear some on Lisitsa playing definitely, but it's not too much, and just on some passages..

[ajspiano]

I can confirm that lisitsa uses a 5 1 5 approach for the Bb Bb Db and Ab Ab C arp lines.

and that for the other section I was talking about, re playing the tip of the Eb's - is also perfectly in line with her performance.

Slow motion youtube rocks.

[caioramos]

I'm having a look at the Cortot's edition, seems awesome!

Ow and there's the pedal!

[ajspiano]

I'm having a look at the Cortot's edition

look at bar 55 - there's  "B" above it, and a notation at the bottom of the page about the timing of the roll. Says the high D hits on the first beat of bar 55 and that the other 3 notes form a 32nd note triplet at the end of bar 54..   might make it easier to hit?