First public performance

[lani]

My daughter  (12 years old) just won a local music competition and is allowed one, possibly two short pieces to play and the awards recital.  Her competition piece was a Scarlatti sonata (k.201), and she is finishing up Malaguena / Lecuona.  She loves them both equally, Malaguena because it is a crowd pleaser, and is really exciting, the Scarlatti is more of an opening piece.  If she only is allowed one piece, due to time constraints, which might be the preferred choice? All the other performers are children with some teens.  She wanted some opinions from performers here on the board.  Thanks, Lani

[lostinidlewonder]

errrr.... Malaguena of course.

[lani]

Thanks!  What is your opinion about Malaguena as a competition piece contrasted with say a Chopin Prelude or Nocturne?  Regards, Lani

[BoliverAllmon]

errrr.... Malaguena of coruse.

agreed. if it is a crowd of younger children and teens then malaguena is the way to go.

boliver

[lostinidlewonder]

I have personally used Maleguena to win one talent quest when i was a kid and got $1000 for it! lol. However In my opinion a Chopin Nocture will blow it out of the water. A very good presentation of Nocturne in c sharp minor, op. 27 no. 1 would kill it for instance I believe.

Chopin preludes are not meant for impressive stuff. I don't think there is really a Prelude which would outclass the Malaguena, and I think Lecuonna is the way to go for competition in that case. But for the Chopin Nocturnes, there is just so much more pianistic things you can present, rubato, emotion, tonal control so on. Malaguena is not that technically difficult and it doesn't explore the extremties of the Fantango or other spanish themes like Albeniz might. So an Albeniz piece(Iberia Suite for eg.) would maybe start to now challenge a Chopin Nocturne, but its all a matter of preference i reckon anyway.

[lani]

Would the Chopin prelude mentioned above be a good contrast to the Malaguena? How about Rachmaninov Prelude (Op. 23 # 4) or a Liszt piece (Un Sospiro): would either of those be considered a good contrast?  Thank you, Lani

[lostinidlewonder]

Which Chopin Prelude sorry? I think the Nocturne I mentioned with the Malaguena would be a good mix.  Un Sos will outclass the Maleguena in my opinion. It will sound too out of place and comical to play the spanish piece after it. Un Sos demands a huge amount to make the impression it should give to people happen, I haven't heard a youngester do a commanding peformance of it yet. I've heard them hit all the right notes and do nice dynamics, but never really crack it.

But if you must play Malaguena and with the choices you have given, I would say couple it with the Rachmaninov. Just because Un sos will be too hard imo to play really well for a youngster, prove me wrong though. The Rachmaninov even requires a great deal of understanding of the color that Rachmaninov paints his music with and a huge amount of tonal control and voicing and tempo control which is so important, the flow of phrases should have its own personal speed throughout each one building the piece to a higher and higher point. So very tough, lots of control in that one as well. I would be so interested to hear a recording if you could ever do it.