I have been rehearsing with a group of musicians on a symphony piece. Piano is accompaniment and the piece is contemporary with a lot of dissonance. This is actually my first time playing with an orchestra and the hardest has been keeping time with everyone, the conductor. The piece is also challenging with numerous key signatures, chords that stretch 9 notes, fast chord changes. I can play it when practicing on my own, but it's when I need to bring it together with everyone that it's like I don't know how to play. I'm really trying to get this right and I can hear sighs of annoyance from some people in the orchestra when I make a mistake. Plus my own stress when I find out I'm behind on time. Recently we practiced with a more sped up tempo and that was interesting. Aside from continuing to work on following conductor, could any of you offer some advice?
I am just about to catch my flight out of town, but I have time to give this a shot.
You are playing a piece where piano has a secondary role to the orchestra.
This piece is full of dissonance and is not well known to the public (I am assuming the 2nd point).
You are unable to keep up with the orchestra.
Here are my 2 choices:
1) Edit the work but do not tell anyone. Generally, the most important notes for you to play are the very lowest note and the very highest note. But the middle notes may be the most important in some sections, depending on the performance directions given in the score or other musical factors. Lesser important notes may be eligible for removal but consider the points made next.
If there is a passage that contains thick chords – remove some notes of the chord but make sure the most important notes remain, often the lowest and highest notes of the chord should remain. If there is a passage that has just 2 notes played at the same time – maybe tough because they are played very rapidly with 1 hand – just play the top notes or remove the low notes that make this passage hard for you. Etc., etc.
Use your good ear and judgment and start making changes that gives the biggest bang for the buck. You want to end up with an edited version that sounds good when playing with an orchestra and is EASY for you to play in time with the orchestra. Do you have a good enough ear and judgement to properly edit this? I hope that you do. Let the conductor see if he can detect any edits. I have little doubt that he will not be able to hear your edits if you can do the edits well. If he does catch a spot, let him tell you and then see if you can play this spot unedited or with fewer edits.
The thicker and louder that the orchestra is playing, the more edits you can make. Make notes in your piano score where the orchestra is soft and you stand out. These are the sections that you need to be most careful of when making your edits. Can you make or listen to a rehearsal recording? If yes, this will greatly help to see the spots where you stand out.
Of course, if you are playing by yourself and the orchestra is not playing for a section – your edits should be kept to a minimum. But this should not be a problem since you will not need to keep up with the orchestra for this solo excerpt.
2) Tell the conductor that this project is over your head and he will need to find a replacement pianist.
Got to go now. Good luck!