VIDEO : Chopin 10/12

[ajspiano]

this is a recent revisit to something I haven't played in a while (learnt a couple of years ago now).. all the ongoing chatter on here on it has lead me to decide to brush it back up the last little while..

Aside from the glaring errors at the end, I guess I need to tidy up spots in the middle section.. 

I think I lost sight of the melody a few times here, most notably in bars 65-68 (clunk clunk).  and there's a good few dynamic curves going on in my head that arent coming out here.

so here it is, yet another revolutionary. 

[rachmaninoff_forever]

Hey what the heck it says the video is private!  I copied the URL and the thing was not going...

[ajspiano]

Hey what the heck it says the video is private!  I copied the URL and the thing was not going...

gah. sorry - fixed.

[rachmaninoff_forever]

gah. sorry - fixed.

Ah, so that's what you and J Menz look like!

No but yeah, but no...  But yeah, but no, but yeaaah, but no...  But yeah, I thought it was pretty sick.

Would you say it's harder for you to play it on an upright rather than a grand? 

I'm waiting for your Rach 3 now.

[pianoman53]

Hellu,

Well, well done!

A few suggestions, and some questions.

Why to you play the opening run so unbelievably dry? And you have to practice it so that it becomes more even when both hands play it together. Now, it's a bit... too uneven. Especially in the end.

For me, the accents shouldn't be seen simply as accents, but more like "correction" of the phrase. If he wouldn't have put the accents there, one would phrase if from the top note, and not from the beat. With the accent, he simply tells us to phrase if from the beat, and not from the top note.

The theme could be more contrasting. I think he writes f and p, right? Now it sounds like mf and mp, which isn't enough.

You should also try to get a smoother attack. Your tone is a bit too harsh, and it kind of kills the poetry. Especially before the recap.

And maybe you can change the color in the coda? Generally, I'd look into that a bit more. It's all a bit too much the same.

And the last chords needs pedal, especially on your instrument. Think of an orchestra. If they would play a staccato note in forte, it would be slightly longer than a staccato note in piano.
Though, it might not be meant as staccato, but as a very light accent. He wrote many staccato dots, that simply can't be meant as staccato, but has to be meant as accents.


Just my suggestions, but good job in general!

[gyzzzmo]

As pianoman already stated, there should be more contrast.
Also whats very important in this piece is the dynamics in your left hand. Currently you're emphasizing the base note (the C) while it should be crescendo towards the Es and dim back to the C, like a wave.

Good luck,

Gyzzzmo

[dima_76557]

@ ajspiano

It's clear that you have everything it takes to play this well. Under the circumstances: well done! It would be nice to hear/see you play this on a concert grand.
P.S.: I think you are not to blame for the "lack of contrast" the others are complaining about. It's a mix of your recording equipment, the room and the instrument; however hard you try, it will always sound a bit "flat". Kudos to you for making this piece sound worthwhile listening to anyway!

[ajspiano]

well thank god for some criticism,  I posted on on facebook - nothing but compliments.

I wont pass the buck entirely but dima is right,  there is a lot more contrast there than the recording lets on. Its a mobile phone, it literally amplifies the soft sounds and limits the loud ones by default.

...

r4eva.
far easier to produce a better performance on a grand in a bigger room, but not in any way difficult to play on an upright.

pianoman53
I definitely agree about the clarity/evenness in the HT descending runs. it sounds like a 'crap, fast bit' spurge of sound and the accents and beat are totally lost. Mostly in that spot I've really just worked on how I wanted to time the RH chords, which i'm not altogether happy with yet either.

funny I used to play that bit a lot more dramatically,  but I think pollini's rendition has rubbed off on me a bit, he plays that part quite straight.

I think the tone gets harsh in a few places because its overly passionate,  I end up just really hitting some of the notes without a lot of control. So they aren't a controlled forte so much as a bang without thought.

I like your observation re pedal at the end, I guess that's going to be a piano/hall dependent thing though.

gyzzzmo
I actually like it that way at least a good portion of the time. You are right though, I think that's more or less how ive done it every single time here, there should be some differentiation. I'm not one for following any composers instructions explicitly so we'll see how it goes. There is a bit of an upward wave in the way I generally play it but I think any subtly is lost in this kind of recording.

dima
thanks for the vote of confidence.. 

[j_menz]

Looking good so far.  To purge some of the Polloni, have a listen to Richter:

For a different approach to the end, and one I find quite effective, have a listen to Berezovsky:

I'd also like to see you do the Godowsky version. With a cup of tea in the right hand. Instant YT fame awaits. 

Ah, so that's what you and J Menz look like!

Just aj. I'm less serious looking. And not as tanned.

[ajspiano]

Looking good so far.  To purge some of the Polloni, have a listen to Richter:

I can play it that fast but in places some of my piano keys begin to melt.

For a different approach to the end, and one I find quite effective, have a listen to Berezovsky:

Will do, for the time being though "this video is not available on mobile"

I'd also like to see you do the Godowsky version. With a cup of tea in the right hand. Instant YT fame awaits. 

Yeh righto, challenge accepted - it'll be a scotch though.

Just aj. I'm less serious looking. And not as tanned.

...I'm very white. Are you an albino?

[j_menz]

Yeh righto, challenge accepted - it'll be a scotch though.

That should help no end.

...I'm very white. Are you an albino?

Vampyre.

[davidjosepha]

I like the parts where the right hand joins in with the left hand and goes down the piano. They sound cool, and also your right hand looks like it's just flapping at the notes but somehow manages to hit them all. And then your left hand is so cool to watch the whole time, cause you have such perfect control of your thumb that the rest of your hand doesn't move a millimeter when you pass it under.

Pretty crazy.

[ajspiano]

I like the parts where the right hand joins in with the left hand and goes down the piano. They sound cool, and also your right hand looks like it's just flapping at the notes but somehow manages to hit them all. And then your left hand is so cool to watch the whole time, cause you have such perfect control of your thumb that the rest of your hand doesn't move a millimeter when you pass it under.

Pretty crazy.

Generous -

such perfect control of your thumb that the rest of your hand doesn't move a millimeter when you pass it under.

I would argue that firstly its not perfect, and secondly that the arm/hand it does move, just in a small and very specific way that is a bit beyond the scope of explaining in writing.

However, if you go play scales (C major should be sufficient) using a fingering of 1-2-1-2-1-2-1-2-1 etc..  and also, 1-3-1-3-1-3-1, and 1-4 (and 1-5 if you have massive balls [its a crap-ton harder])..   you'll probably find that your thumb is somewhat inactive and provides something like 5% of the support necessary to maintain a healthy structure for the whole hand.

Experiment with how the thumb can play either by moving in toward the palm, or out away from the palm - but either way so long as its active and not slumped into. You will find it very difficult to play the scale with any real tempo without making improvements in this area.

and also your right hand looks like it's just flapping at the notes but somehow manages to hit them all.

If you have access to any of alan frasers material you can check out his stuff about fortissimo octaves and the "cobra strike" action.

Essentially (and hopefully you're sporty enough for this to be a good analogy) you can imagine you're going to throw a ball, and you prepare by bringing the arm back. As you do this, your wrist kind of "cocks" itself, moves back and is loaded to be flung forward as the arm goes forward with the throw. Then shrink that concept right down, and play around with timing it so that you can hit octaves and chords..  and do so while also likening it to that statement you hear about liszt "shaking" out his octaves from the arm..

^ofcourse you still have to support it all with fingers when you get to the notes, but that should probably explain a bit of that visual effect.. I doubt I do it even close to the way it really should be done anyway... plus you have to do some good thinking about refinement and control in certain areas of that motion to not just end up with something loud and harsh, which I probably do a good bit of the time here as pianoman53 pointed out.. though I do think that is in part (certainly not entirely though) to do with a few of the unisons being a bit out of tune on the piano.

The whole motion can be done in a more controlled reduced fashion though, valentina's pretty damn good at it.

[danhuyle]

Too slow. Need to play faster.

[pianoman53]

Too slow. Need to play faster.

It's never because of tempo. One can play it very slowly, but still very powerful. So why is it too slow? And don't say "It's not powerful enough" just because I pointed it out -.-

[costicina]

Too slow. Need to play faster.

No, the tempo is perfect. I liked very much your interpretation, very inspiring. Yes, maybe It would benefit from more dynamics' contrast (more mp and p), but you master the piece...  Thank you for sharing!

[ajspiano]

I actually broadly agree with dan (though his comment strikes me as being a piece of unthoughtful nonsense). I chose to play a bit slower since as I said at the top its a revisit, and honestly, while right now I can play the majority of it faster no trouble - it leads to a good number of slips in the middle like the ones that happened at the end here. It will become tidier at a higher tempo with a bit more time/practice.

But ofcourse there is more than enough lessons to be found in the work even at a fraction of the tempo I'm playing it here, which is why I posted it now..  I have a great disinterest in posting finished products here. For one, nothing is ever finished, and secondly the point of the board is to recieve feedback.

Also, at a rather paltry ~5 seconds behind lisitsa's performance "too" slow is a rather subjective opinion. You lose a lot of time overall by playing with a rubato here.

Dan, I would hope that anyone with a score and a metronome could tell that this is under the marked tempo. You've also been around here and been involved with my posts long enough to know that I'm a piano teacher and am obviously capable of determining a performance tempo.

Perhaps you can offer something a little more to the conversation? Discuss anything other than tempo. Or if you really feel tempo is the primary concern, at least qualify it with a musical reason. Explain what can or can't be expressed due to variants in the tempo.

Here's a performance of your own..

Not that I'm interested in it being competitive, but discuss why yours is better or not better in different places because of the tempo without also making reference to other musical elements or ideas and then consider how useful your original comment really was from a teaching perspective.

[j_menz]

Not that I'm interested in it being competitive

I was hoping for Revolutionaries at ten paces! 



In case of a draw, the Godowsky. In octaves if still unresolved.

[ajspiano]

I was hoping for Revolutionaries at ten paces! 

The problem with competitive revolutionaries is that in order to win you have to lose this time and hope to win next time.

[j_menz]

The problem with competitive revolutionaries is that in order to win you have to lose this time and hope to win next time.

Methinks you are confusing revolutions with leadership spills. 

[ajspiano]

Methinks you are confusing revolutions with leadership spills. 

 

The problem with competing revolutionaries is that they are incomparable except where individuals are attempting to overthrowing the same oppressive group. A winner could only be determined by who ever succeeds first, and that doesn't in anyway support my point that tempo is not the primary concern in a quality musical interpretation.

[j_menz]

A winner could only be determined by who ever succeeds first, and that doesn't in anyway support my point that tempo is not the primary concern in a quality musical interpretation.

Surely it would be whoever played loudest (assuming a large enough difference in volume). It would lack subtlety and any semblance of Chopin's feelings about the revolution - but for making you really feel like you were under cannon fire, perhaps it would have something going for it.

[ajspiano]

Surely it would be whoever played loudest (assuming a large enough difference in volume). It would lack subtlety and any semblance of Chopin's feelings about the revolution - but for making you really feel like you were under cannon fire, perhaps it would have something going for it.

If two revolutions where compared, and one was VERY loud (very cannon-ful), and took 4 years.. the other was relatively quiet and took 6 months with limited bloodshed..  which would be the more successful?

[j_menz]

If two revolutions where compared, and one was VERY loud (very cannon-ful), and took 4 years.. the other was relatively quiet and took 6 months with limited bloodshed..  which would be the more successful?

In the manner of these things, whichever was the later.

[ajspiano]

In the manner of these things, whichever was the later.

That would not be a fair assessment if the latter fought a different totalitarian regime.

However I will allow it because it does support the point that tempo is not what matters.

[costicina]

Ehm...
I'm  still of the opinion that a Revolutionary, as many others Chop Etudes, sounds boring and mechanical, too etudistic when played insanely fast. The listener is not able to make a musical sense out of it, to perceive the nuances, the very sound of each single note. And I'm growing to think that musicality  is essentially a question of nuances.

(Aj, do you remeber what Bernhard used to say? Speed is an illusion. Whern a piece is played perfectly even and clear it seem faster...)

[gyzzzmo]

Btw, it wasnt Chopin who gave this etude its 'revolutionary' name, it just happened to be written during the polish war with russia, together with a few other pieces.

Oh, and the speed is fine, especially if you exponentially start making mistakes when going faster, but wich definitelly isnt necesarry for a good expression of the melody. Just needs more dynamics in the left hand for that 'stress' factor

[ajspiano]

Ehm...
I'm  still of the opinion that a Revolutionary, as many others Chop Etudes, sounds boring and mechanical, too etudistic when played insanely fast. The listener is not able to make a musical sense out of it, to perceive the nuances, the very sound of each single note. And I'm growing to think that musicality  is essentially a question of nuances.

(Aj, do you remeber what Bernhard used to say? Speed is an illusion. Whern a piece is played perfectly even and clear it seem faster...)

My opinion on the desirable tempo has nothing to do with mechanics or reaching some kind of target BPM. The piece is obviously very dramatic, and there are parts that will develop a greater drama with a certain use of accelerando perhaps? The overall interpretation here is heavier on the slowing down or "holding" side of the rubato spectrum. There is also delays on some of the leaps in the middle that are really a physical issue right now. Overall the piece will have more forward movement, it will create a sense of more speed as you say I suppose, and lack of "drag" which I feel there is in a few places.

Obviously the piece works slower, and having run through the godowsky 3-4 times now I feel confident that it will have to be made to work slower (and he has marked it so) because there's no way I'm putting in the effort required to play that version at chopin's tempo mark

[ajspiano]

Btw, it wasnt Chopin who gave this etude its 'revolutionary' name, it just happened to be written during the polish war with russia, together with a few other pieces.

Yeh I believe the etude 'nicknames' all came after his death (maybe not, maybe just not from him), that he much preferred the use of op numbers?

[j_menz]

Yeh I believe the etude 'nicknames' all came after his death (maybe not, maybe just not from him), that he much preferred the use of op numbers?

Given that the Op 10 set is dedicated to Franz Liszt and the Op 25 set is dedicated to Liszt's mistress, I just call them His or Her number {whatever}. 

[ajspiano]

and the Op 25 set is dedicated to Liszt's mistress

I wonder whether that was awkward for franz, and I wonder what happened for 25.10 to come about.

[j_menz]

I wonder whether that was awkward for franz, and I wonder what happened for 25.10 to come about.

Nope. He and his mistress (Marie d'Agoult) lived together - a matter which was pretty widely known. They even had three children - most famously Cosima Liszt (later Cosima von Bulow, later still (but not much) Cosima Wagner).  Perhaps 25/10 was a premonition (she was actually born a couple of years after it was written and the year of its first publication).

[danhuyle]

This is another video of me playing Op10/12.

Had a YouTuber saying that the tempo you hear in the video above is "TOO SLOW".

Here's what the guy wrote

 1Thepianoplayer 2 months ago

I'm sorry to tell you.. but 1) this piece is a lot faster in speed 2) you're notes are not at all clear and 3) you have to read this piece in the beginning extremely slow in speed an then start adding some speed to it!


AJ, you and I both KNOW that learning the notes is easy and that's as easy as it gets. Obviously you can get the rhythm EXACTLY on the beat which is far MORE important than playing playing musically.

Proof right there. Let's see you talk your way out of this one.

[dima_76557]

Had a YouTuber saying that the tempo you hear in the video above is "TOO SLOW".

Dan:

In case you didn't know yet: you shouldn't take YouTube comments too seriously. You should certainly not use such comments to "prove" that the OP's recording is supposedly not up to standards.

The tempo is just fine and up to the general performance standards. The left-hand notes should be VERY distinct and tell their own story, paint a landscape of war and and aggression, carriages riding on cobblestones in the streets of Warsaw, whatever. Generally, the less pedal, the better. The right hand should be completely independent from the left hand and should have a proud patriotic declamatory character about it with a very strict no-nonsense rhythm notwithstanding the sometimes dangerous jumps. True victory requires balls, you know. That's what makes this piece convincing. Nothing else.

[ajspiano]

Proof right there. Let's see you talk your way out of this one.

What is there to talk out of?

I agreed that the tempo is too slow for my liking in my video, but thats a subjective thing.. as dima has pointed out above the acceptable tempo as per professional standards is varied and while on the slower side it falls within the range, and I don't think its beneath what would be acceptable to convey something with the music that's at least close to chopin's intention.

I'm actually not sure what your point is. Are you saying that because you received a comment saying your performance here is too slow that mine (and yours, they are approximately the same length in time) actually is too slow? youtube comments are neither the pinnacle of classical music critiques, nor necessarily coming from a reputable source..

You may also find your comment may have been a bit less critical had your performance had some more clarity in general - which is not intended as an attack on your playing (and is something that I will be working on myself also), only the idea that tempo was the major problem. Surely you took more away from that comment than just "play faster"?

Obviously you can get the rhythm EXACTLY on the beat which is far MORE important than playing musically.

Ok, so now we're getting somewhere. However, surely playing in good time is part of musical playing, given that rhythm is a significant element of music (not separate from musical playing as you insinuate). How do you play with feeling without feeling the beat/rhythm?

That said, lets consider for a second that the position of the beat in time is dependent on the tempo - and the tempo fluctuates. As in, getting the notes on the beat it not a strictly metronomic thing, its more about ensuring that the listener feels where the beat is, and that it is accented appropriately, throughout the rises and falls in tempo.

So where in my performance did you find that the beat lagged? And I mean that as in not because I've deliberately held the beat back with rubato. So rather where it sounds as if i actually lost time, the listener can't feel the beat? Or perhaps better explained, the listener feels the beat and the sound doesnt match up..

That would be a constructive criticism and I can pick places where I feel that happens myself, but what does that have to do with the overall tempo?

....

I only posted the video of your performance because it was faster than mine, and supposedly a reflection of your musical opinon, and I was asking for your ideas on why the tempo matters for a musical reason, as per how you've worked on it and why - how does it convey emotions in a way that differs from mine, and that can't be done at the lower tempo? If the only reason you play it faster is because someone on youtube told you to you need to do a bit more thinking.

[ajspiano]

The left-hand notes should be VERY distinct and tell their own story, paint a landscape of war and and aggression, carriages riding on cobblestones in the streets of Warsaw, whatever. Generally, the less pedal, the better. The right hand should be completely independent from the left hand and should have a proud patriotic declamatory character about it with a very strict no-nonsense rhythm notwithstanding the sometimes dangerous jumps. True victory requires balls, you know. That's what makes this piece convincing. Nothing else.

Excellent description of an ideal interpretation.

[ronde_des_sylphes]

The tempo's a touch slow, but that doesn't strike me as anything to worry about. What I would think about is the lack of contrast (as dima says, perhaps a consequence of the piano+recording equipment - and the piano needs tuned). It's not just a matter of dynamics being a bit samey, there isn't a particular sense of dialogue between the individual rh phrases. I get the impression that you've put in a lot of effort into getting the lh correct (it is really quite good, btw) and you've neglected the rh. Have you practiced the rh on its own, concentrating on making it sing, and projecting question/answer aspects to the listener? I think this would improve the performance considerably. As it is there is plenty fervour, but not a lot of pathos.

[pianoman53]

AJ, you and I both KNOW that learning the notes is easy and that's as easy as it gets. Obviously you can get the rhythm EXACTLY on the beat which is far MORE important than playing playing musically.

Proof right there. Let's see you talk your way out of this one.

You clearly have no idea about what musicality is... There is never anything more important than playing in a musical way. In some pieces, musical means keeping the rhythm very strict. In some pieces it means that a very strict rhythm will completely kill the piece.

And why does it matter what some youtube guy says?
Tempo is still a very secondary matter. If you feel that something is too slow, it's most probably not because of the tempo. There are people playing at a super high tempo, but it's so unclear and uneven that it sounds quite slow. There are also people who play very slow, but makes it sound fast.

When I listened the tempo didn't strike me as slow. What made it feel slow was the long pauses in the beginning, which added a beat, which made the next first beat come far later than expected..

Dan, you really need to start thinking. Nothing you've written here, in this topic or in any other, makes sense. You mix up musicality with playing super ugly rubato. You think big gestures are a sign of musicality... Come on, get a grip!

[ajspiano]

The tempo's a touch slow, but that doesn't strike me as anything to worry about. What I would think about is the lack of contrast (as dima says, perhaps a consequence of the piano+recording equipment - and the piano needs tuned). It's not just a matter of dynamics being a bit samey, there isn't a particular sense of dialogue between the individual rh phrases. I get the impression that you've put in a lot of effort into getting the lh correct (it is really quite good, btw) and you've neglected the rh. Have you practiced the rh on its own, concentrating on making it sing, and projecting question/answer aspects to the listener? I think this would improve the performance considerably. As it is there is plenty fervour, but not a lot of pathos.

Thanks for the comments, - helpful.

I have actually experimented with the recording of VERY contrasted but technically easier situations since posting this. Put simply, I can definately do better, but the phone does more or less cripple any accurate sense of dynamic contrast. Its not only the compression, but also the fact that it blends it all into this compressed mono sound file - its makes a real mess.

I definately need to work on getting softer sections (getting the p's and pp's), but to put in in perspective - up the top where pianoman 53 mentions a range of something like mp to mf. In person, the range is more mp to fff.

In the recording you hear a kind of harshness in the tone which was also pointed out, but you also hear variations in the degree of that harshness. In person the brighter sounding spots are more like huge explosions of sound (its totally lost in the recording  ) I also wonder about the tone being effected by the phone being at the upper end of the piano, and being rested on the piano.

..

Anywho, recording issues aside..

I have spent a good amount of time get the LH down, or at least I did originally. So far as sheer technical facility its weaker now than it used to be. I think perhaps this revisit is going to be more about what you've mentioned, really working on the RH melodically and adapting elements of the interpretation in and around that.

Since posting I've done a bit of work on softening the tone in the RH in the louder spots while maintaining a strong dynamic. Its coming along. There's a few places where this version makes me cringe in terms of how I've timed the melody especially in the ending. I've been playing around with those and its a bit of a pain because I discovered they were heavily linked to the LH (so there's been a good bit of unlearning certain dependencies in order to regain control).

I guess another next step will be fine tuning those call response elements like you mentioned - the differences between the "C D, Eb Eb" phrase and the responding "G G, G Ab" ones etc. etc.  Perhaps also wider structural considerations such as the difference between the exposition and the recap, which at the moment are I guess a bit too similar.

..sorry for the long read. 

[ajspiano]

What made it feel slow was the long pauses in the beginning, which added a beat, which made the next first beat come far later than expected..

There. Interesting.

Fair call, and I wonder about this.. I think in my brain its a bit like there's a short fermata over the RH chords..  they linger before the LH descends.

However, if a listener feels like a whole beat is dropped thats a real problem.

So, in the middle, especially bars 33-34 there is a similar delay on those leaps though perhaps not quite so long. Do you get the same sense of a dropped beat there?

[ronde_des_sylphes]

I have actually experimented with the recording of VERY contrasted but technically easier situations since posting this. Put simply, I can definately do better, but the phone does more or less cripple any accurate sense of dynamic contrast. Its not only the compression, but also the fact that it blends it all into this compressed mono sound file - its makes a real mess.

Yes, I totally believe this; video cameras always used to automatically compress high volume and amplify very low volume which is totally counterproductive for music.

I definately need to work on getting softer sections (getting the p's and pp's), but to put in in perspective - up the top where pianoman 53 mentions a range of something like mp to mf. In person, the range is more mp to fff.

In the recording you hear a kind of harshness in the tone which was also pointed out, but you also hear variations in the degree of that harshness. In person the brighter sounding spots are more like huge explosions of sound (its totally lost in the recording  ) I also wonder about the tone being effected by the phone being at the upper end of the piano, and being rested on the piano.

I'm sure you're right, but in more general terms, be aware that what you hear when seated at the piano is not always what mics hear. I'm sure resting the phone on the piano doesn't help: presumably it will also be picking up vibrations in the wood as well as the piano sound: I'd recommend a mobile phone tripod, they are pretty cheap.

[ajspiano]

I'd recommend a mobile phone tripod, they are pretty cheap.

I should just be less lazy and record it using protools and the Rode condenser mic sitting in the drawer.

[ronde_des_sylphes]

I should just be less lazy and record it using protools and the Rode condenser mic sitting in the drawer.

Absolutely. Merge it with the phone video, nice result.

[awesom_o]

Ehm...
I'm  still of the opinion that a Revolutionary, as many others Chop Etudes, sounds boring and mechanical, too etudistic when played insanely fast. The listener is not able to make a musical sense out of it, to perceive the nuances, the very sound of each single note. And I'm growing to think that musicality  is essentially a question of nuances.

(Aj, do you remeber what Bernhard used to say? Speed is an illusion. Whern a piece is played perfectly even and clear it seem faster...)

 

[ajspiano]

Ok, so as much as I agree with the general sentiment.. Surely, if you are going to teach 'musicality' and the execution of nuances that relate to that, then tempo is one of your available nuances.

I would hope that my opinion that I would like to have an increase tempo does not get perceived as if I would want to sacrifice nuance for the sake of speed.

[awesom_o]

Ok, so as much as I agree with the general sentiment.. Surely, if you are going to teach 'musicality' and the execution of nuances that relate to that, then tempo is one of your available nuances.

I would hope that my opinion that I would like to have an increase tempo does not get perceived as if I would want to sacrifice nuance for the sake of speed.

No, we understand that you would like to have greater velocity AND more nuance. They don't have to be mutually exclusive. In fact, it's usually pretty bad if they are.

I thought you displayed many wonderful nuances consistently throughout.
Personally, I thought that your tempo was a little on the speedy side, and perhaps as a result, there was actually insufficient velocity in many places.

I think it's helpful to think less about speed and more about velocity.

[ajspiano]

I think it's helpful to think less about speed and more about velocity.

Perhaps I'm using the terms interchangeably.

I do think that there are quite a few places where I lost time with perhaps excessively slowing rubato. Without this the performance probably wouldve run in 5-10 seconds faster overall and certainly given the impression of being faster in general.

[awesom_o]

I'm not using the terms interchangeably. I think of velocity as being a musical quality. Speed is just  two things-distance divided by time. Speed is two dimensional. Velocity is speed and direction. Velocity is three dimensional.

[ajspiano]

I'm not using the terms interchangeably. I think of velocity as being a musical quality. Speed is just  two things-distance divided by time. Speed is two dimensional. Velocity is speed and direction. Velocity is three dimensional.

Yeh I see what you are getting at, and that is almost certainly what I meant in saying that I wanted to increase it to a degree. Perhaps in my mind I was not able to clarify it so well in words just yet.

[awesom_o]

Yeah. I don't think worrying about timings is beneficial. After all, when you play the piece, no one will be sitting in the audience with a stopwatch

I noticed, in fact, that my recording of the 10/12 comes in at 3:05-a full 10 seconds longer than yours.
To my ears, however, my recording sounds faster. Probably a combination of things-more rhythmic, more even, more velocity. But it's actually quite a modest tempo that I took.

I feel that's very important in Chopin.  What was it that Rubinstein said? An aristocrat never rushes?

I heard the most incredibly fast rendition of 25/4 on the radio today in the car. It was Lang Lang. I must admit it was very impressive in some ways, but it didn't leave a very deep impression on me musically. The character lacked a certain poise... sounded frantic instead of charming and playful.

Still, for what it's worth, I thought you did a fine job with this piece! They really never are finished products, our visions of these etudes. They just keep getting better and better with time!