Can anyone recommend me some etudes?

[ivorycherry]

Hello,
I am an intermediate-advanced player and my teacher would like me to play another Chopin etude. I can already play the op 10 no 12 at 126 bpm per quarter note and I’m eyeing op 10 no 4 and op 25 no 12. I also like Scriabin’s etudes. Any Chopin or Scriabin etudes that you guys would recommend most and which to stay away from at my level? My current repertoire is:
Chopin op 10 no 12
Rachmaninov op 32 no 12
Scriabin op 12 no 2
Brahms op 79 no 2
Beethoven op 2 no 1 all movements
Bach prelude and fugue in a minor book 2

Any advice would be much appreciated!

Thanks,
Alex

[brogers70]

Hello,
I am an intermediate-advanced player and my teacher would like me to play another Chopin etude. I can already play the op 10 no 12 at 126 bpm per quarter note and I’m eyeing op 10 no 4 and op 25 no 12. I also like Scriabin’s etudes. Any Chopin or Scriabin etudes that you guys would recommend most and which to stay away from at my level? My current repertoire is:
Chopin op 10 no 12
Rachmaninov op 32 no 12
Scriabin op 12 no 2
Brahms op 79 no 2
Beethoven op 2 no 1 all movements
Bach prelude and fugue in a minor book 2

Any advice would be much appreciated!

Thanks,
Alex

Right now, I'm enjoying working on Chopin 25/2 and 25/12. Our repertoires overlap a fair bit, so you might enjoy them, too.

[ivorycherry]

Thanks for replying.
 I think op 25 no 12 is a bit too challenging for me but I like no 1 and 2 of the set. I think it probably be wiser to choose an “easier” Chopin etude(jk there’s no such thing) than to try and tackle the op 10 no 4 or the octave one now that I think about it. My teacher said that the op 25 no 1 is easy but looking at the score it doesn’t look so. I like no 2 of the set a lot though. I might as well play with them for the first week and then decide. I’m also thinking about the c-sharp minor one in op 25 that’s quite slow but I don’t know which number it is. I hope you know which one I’m talking about. It seems quite manageable. Any thoughts or hidden challenges?

[lelle]

If you can play the revolutionary Etude I think Op 10 no 4 is probably not out of reach. It has some places that have trickier elements than anything in the revolutionary, but it's often one of the earlier Etudes people learn. If in doubt, Op 25 no 1 and no 2 are good early choices. Op 10 no 8 is basically the revolutionary Etude for the right hand, though I'd argue it's a bit more difficult.

Have you tried Op 10 no 4? What makes you say it's one of the more difficult ones? For me, the octave Etude is significantly more difficult than 10 no 4.

The op 25 no 7 (c sharp minor) should be fine if you can manage the revolutionary. It's challenges are heavily focused on musicality, phrasing, color, voicing and so in. Which also require technical skill but the focus is of a different kind than fast fingers.

[ranjit]

While I worked on the etudes, I found op 25 no 12 considerably easier than op 10 no 12. I would say it depends on your strengths -- I am not bad at arpeggios, so I do not find those so difficult -- I picked it up without a problem. Fluent LH scalar passages are a problem for me, so op 10 no 12 and op 10 no 4 would stretch my limits. In particular, the third and fourth page of the Revolutionary with all of those weird arpeggio patterns is killer. I probably wouldn't find the octave etude too hard either. I played the first few seconds at tempo basically on my first try -- but this is again because I use fast parallel octave chromatic octaves in my improvisations quite a bit, so I'm familiar with that technique.

I hesitate to add that I don't play these etudes at a concert standard, which is why I'm not tackling them anymore. But it was comforting to realize that I could get my hands around an etude in a couple of weeks, even if it wasn't perfect. So, they no longer feel like inapproachable behemoths.

[getsiegs]

Op. 25 No. 1 was the first Chopin etude I learned and it definitely wasn't "easy", but it's certainly more manageable than Op. 10 No. 4 or 8, for example. Similarly to lelle's description of 25/7, 25/1 is more of a challenge in voicing, balance, tone, phrasing, etc. than just playing fast. If you'd like an etude that provides more of those challenges than just speed, then 25/1 would be a great etude to start. Plus, it's definitely more fast-finger-y than 25/7, if you want some of that aspect too.

Question - do you have a specific area you want to work on or improve for yourself? I think it would be much easier to narrow down which etude to start if you can identify a particular technical hurdle that you really want to get over.

[ivorycherry]

Question - do you have a specific area you want to work on or improve for yourself? I think it would be much easier to narrow down which etude to start if you can identify a particular technical hurdle that you really want to get over.

Yeah I kind of want better technique in the sense of clarity and swiftness but I would want one that trains the most beneficial areas of technique.

Have you tried Op 10 no 4? What makes you say it's one of the more difficult ones? For me, the octave Etude is significantly more difficult than 10 no 4.

I mean on the score it looks simple but those octave jumps and the speed is even faster than the revolutionary etude which I can barely get to 126-132 bpm. Also Richter playing it is intimidating. I’ve realized also I don’t want to torture my neighbors with the octave etude. Another thing is there’s this weird voicing in it which makes it pretty hard so I think the octave one is out of reach for me.

I think I’m going to play around with the op 10 no 4 and the op 25 no 1 and choose on by the end of the week. Maybe I’ll just play the other one next. I think I’m going to wait with the op 25 no 7 though.

[getsiegs]

Yeah I kind of want better technique in the sense of clarity and swiftness

Ok then 10/4 sounds like a good plan; if you play around with it and it seems like too much then maybe 10/8 would be another good choice (similar goals in speed and clarity but a little simpler and RH dominant)

[lelle]

Yeah I kind of want better technique in the sense of clarity and swiftness but I would want one that trains the most beneficial areas of technique.I mean on the score it looks simple but those octave jumps and the speed is even faster than the revolutionary etude which I can barely get to 126-132 bpm. Also Richter playing it is intimidating. I’ve realized also I don’t want to torture my neighbors with the octave etude. Another thing is there’s this weird voicing in it which makes it pretty hard so I think the octave one is out of reach for me.

I think I’m going to play around with the op 10 no 4 and the op 25 no 1 and choose on by the end of the week. Maybe I’ll just play the other one next. I think I’m going to wait with the op 25 no 7 though.

There is no harm in playing under tempo, like you are already doing with the revolutionary Etude. Some of Chopin's metronome markings are very fast, so if you want to play at those tempos you need near-perfect technique. For example Op 10 no 1 is 176 bpm and that is FAST. Most professionals perform it slower than that. So you'll have to accept that you're gonna play many of the Etudes under tempo as you grow your skills, it does not mean there is a problem. Playing op 10 no 4 at 120 bpm as a start is fine.

Clarity and swiftness depends a lot on having very supple hands and wrists (and a relaxed body as well). Watch out so that you are not holding tension in your knuckle joints or wrists as you move your fingers. Hopefully your teacher can help you more with the specifics.