Debussy and Liszt

[pianoman53]

Hi, this is me playing the first piece from Estampes, and the Dante sonata. The debussy is terribly soft, and the dante has a bunch of wrong notes. Apart from that, comments are very welcome!

[pianoman53]

No one?

[awesom_o]

I found your control over inner voices in the Debussy to be a bit unfocused, overall, in terms of color.

The Liszt was just a bit too sloppy/splashy. Liszt needs to be played with abandon, certainly, but the musical freedom cannot come at the expense of technical control. We need to have both!

To be fair, I don't think the quality of recording here did your playing any favors.

[pianoman53]

I rather sacrifice some notes, to have more musical freedom than the opposite, if I                         had to chose. Clearly, I'd most of all wanted to hit all the right notes, and have freedom.

Apart from that, I agree with what you said.
I didn't have time to try the piano, and then it's difficult to start with Debussy.
I also somewhat changed my technique a while back, and couldn't really control it in concert.

Thanks for commenting!

[awesom_o]

Of course, musical freedom trumps 'note-accuracy' every time, especially for live performance!

But the pianists with the greatest musical freedom that I have seen manage to play in a manner that is extraordinarily accurate, but without imparting the sense that any musicality has been sacrificed in order to obtain such a high level of accuracy.

I know how difficult of a start the Debussy is, especially on an unfamiliar piano! I've played Estampes in recital many times over the years! Your performance was highly respectable given the circumstances. However, it is such a well-known, frequently studied work, that an unusual level of musical control is required to create a world-class rendering. I would be interested to hear how you play the rest of work. I slightly prefer Soiree and Jardins to Pagodes, musically. The entire suite is a masterpiece, however.

I'm very curious to hear you describe the change you mentioned in your technique! I too, changed my technique radically, albeit many years ago.

Thank you for sharing your playing. It is very spirited! The subtlety of your gradation of tone will continue to increase as you gain more experience on stage!

[pianoman53]

Thanks.
I will play there again in a month or so, hopefully I will have time to try the piano 30 minutes or so before the actual concert.

It's not a very drastic change but it still made quite a lot of difference.
I use a higher wrist to be able to relax the rest of the hand and arm more, rather than playing with very active ringers. I find that it gives me much more control. I've played like that for about a month or two. When I do it, I find that I can do whatever I hear in my head, in terms of color and dynamic. When I don't, this becomes much more difficult.
I also started to re-study some chopin etudes, and I find them much easier now.

[awesom_o]

It's not a very drastic change but it still made quite a lot of difference.
I use a higher wrist to be able to relax the rest of the hand and arm more, rather than playing with very active ringers. I find that it gives me much more control.

You may find yourself at some point having to go back to a slightly lower wrist position in order to achieve exceptional clarity of articulation in 17th and 18th century music.

I'm glad you are gaining facility with the Chopin Etudes, however. They help pianists to render both earlier and later repertoire with power and grace.

Which ones are you working on? I'd love to hear some of them once you've really gotten this new technical approach with the higher wrist down pat!