Hungarian Rhapsody no. 2

[jakeschiller]

Hi everyone, so I've picked this piece back up again and plan to play it at an upcoming recital. Overall I'm pretty satisfied with how it's sounding but I know there are still countless ways I can improve it. I'm just trying to get some more opinions from some people other than my teacher on what areas really stick out that need improvement.
Here's a link from a few months ago before the first time I performed it for the first time and it hasn't changed too much since then.

Any input will really be appreciated.
thanks

[stringoverstrung]

Hi Jake,

first of all bravo for your recording.
Here is some advice. Don't take it too seriously as I'm only an amateur myself but I'm sharing it with you anyway because maybe it can help you.

Off course everything depends on how much time you have until your upcoming recital but I suppose you don't that much time so what I would do is 2 things in the short term:
1) Think more about how it has to sound as a piece as a whole especially taking care about integrating the connecting sections between different parts (tempo's, crescendo's, accelerando's etc). One way to figure this out is to listen to some great performances of giants and compare the relative speeds of sections and how they make the accelerando / decelerando from one to the other in order to preserve unity in the performance. Mark down the relative difference in tempos (you don't need the same tempos of course but the relative speed gives a nice indication). Next think of the piece as a whole, as a road where you have to get somewhere. Don't think by yourself: this passage was hard I nailed it now regroup and then next section or something like that. This of course is especially hard with showpieces like this. What can also help is practice in other chunks like you used to for example instead of chunk 1 en then chunk 2 practice chunk 1b and chunk 2a together and so on. All this does not require great effort just awareness of what you are trying to achieve with the piece as a whole.
2) Do you practice it slowly? I mean like max half the speed and sometimes even slower? It will help you to:
- improve the quality of your touch (I'm not saying it is bad)
- it will prevent the piece and your technique from disintegrating and getting sloppy (it happens to me if I'm playing things that are hard for me)
- You have time to listen to yourself especially the PEDAL. Listen to your phrases and adjust your pedaling (half pedal  quarter pedal  etc) It can greatly improve the overall sound of the piece.
- It also helps for number 1. You have time to think where this performance should go.
- good for muscular memory.
LISTEN very attentively to what you are doing. When you practice slow you have time for that. This will help to improve your overall performance. I've heard many top performing pianists (like Evgeny Kissin for example) warming up before the concert and many of them play it slower  then performance tempo.
At the last chords don't think "ha I nailed it!"... you are still performing and you are right now bringing home on your listeners the "totality" of the piece and your interpretation.

When you have time work the different technical elements that you have trouble with in your own opinion. One way to do this is breaking it down similarly like Cortot did for problems with Chopin pieces in his éditions de travail. Check them out they are great aids for ad hoc problems (for example Chopin studies Edition de travail and ballades édition de travail) (published by éditions Salabert).
When you have even more time and if you love Liszt then read the 3 volume biography of Liszt by Alan Walker. It's great.

I hope you can use some of my tips and let me know. Good luck with it.
And don't forget: stay relaxed and supple.

KR,
Gert