polishing pieces

[katefarquharson]

I am trying to polish a piece for my lesson next week (janacek: in the mists no. 3) but it just doesn't feel like it's sitting right. I can't decide where I feel I should pull back, and how much I should, and certain dynamics etc. I've been working on it too long and I'm really struggling to feel inspired by it, even though it's beautiful. I'm always stopping because there are random notes that come out too harsh, or some that don't sound (and I know that's a technique thing) it's all a bit frustrating.
I'm also trying to polish the 1st movement from Haydn's F major sonata (still working on the 2nd and 3rd) and I'm finding that easier to do because it's a lot more structured and straight forwards, in terms of voicing and phrasing etc.

(I am also doing Bach's B-flat prelude + fugue (WTC 1), Schumann's Aufschwung (op. 12 no.2). I've put Bartok's piano suite, and Grieg's E minor sonata on hold for now)

When finishing a piece, is it like a painting where it is actually never finished? are you just choosing when to stop changing things and keep it how it is?

another problem is that I rarely perform, so I don't have pressure to finish stuff.
I simply don't enjoy it, but perhaps thats just circumstances and confidence etc... I love performing when I'm singing but piano is just so nerve-racking!

anyway, any thoughts or advice would be appreciated!!

[iansinclair]

On the Janacek -- or any other "romantic" or later piece -- there comes a time when the best thing to do is to let it sit for a bit.  Since your lesson is coming soon, a bit isn't going to be very long -- but I have found that simply dropping such a thing for a few days (but letting it keep going in my head; couldn't stop that if I wanted to) and then coming back to it works wonders.  Just pounding away at it at that point doesn't help.  So -- stop playing it for a couple of days and come back to it!

And no -- for any of the later music (Beethoven and later) it is never finished.  You will always be finding something new, or a slightly different way of interpreting this passage or that one.  If you try to freeze a piece of that sort in stone, it is either going to get stale -- or you will start making silly mistakes (or even forgetting part of it!) which you never did before, because your inner mind is thinking about ways to make it more like what you really want, subconsciously, and you'll be fighting it.

This is much less true for classical era and baroque -- but oddly it is also true for Renaissance.  At least in my experience...

[slobone]

This is much less true for classical era and baroque -- but oddly it is also true for Renaissance.  At least in my experience...

I was with you up until this part. If you think there's no room for differing interpretations in Baroque music, listen to various recordings of the Goldbergs. They're all over the map. Even just with Glenn Gould's versions, he uses different tempi and articulations in performances of the same variation. Sometimes he even changes articulation in the repeat! There's always room for spontaneity in great music.

[j_menz]

Nothing worth doing at all is ever "finished".  You do reach a point, however, where it is publishable.  At that point, feel free to leave it and come back later. Weeks/months/years later.

This is much less true for classical era and baroque

If you are including Bach in that, it's pistols at dawn!!! 

[iansinclair]

If you are including Bach in that, it's pistols at dawn!!! 

I'd prefer my claymore, if I may...

But come on, guys, I did't say that there was no room for interpretation in Bach.  I said there was less room.  A distinction without a difference, perhaps -- but there is definetly room.  And of course if we extend the thinking to something like a Handelian da capo aria, there's even more room than there is in a romantic piece!

[lateromantic]

Sometimes he even changes articulation in the repeat! There's always room for spontaneity in great music.

I generally try to find something appropriate to vary in a repeat anyway, and often I plan that out in advance.  So it isn't really spontaneity, even though it may convey that impression.  "Planned spontaneity," perhaps?

[kirbycide]

Are you taking your Diploma?

[katefarquharson]

so my janacek is actually coming along nicely. My problem is that I was being so bland and boring but when I sat down and actually thought about doing something interesting with it (shock horror!!!  ) things started to click.

Are you taking your Diploma?

I was planning to do my ATCL diploma, but don't think it's necessary (and costs too much!), will go for my LTCL in my final year of undergrad I reckon (starting university next year).

I think I must also learn my music better from the start..! I'm not very thorough and get quite lazy with certain sections that I find difficult. So need to sort that out...! Just need to focus more I reckon!