Does anyone fancy a piano chat thread?

[LemonViolet]

I’m awaiting delivery of a new piano, squeee!!! I haven’t played regularly for 20 years. I got to grade 6 as a teen, failed grade 7, carried on tinkering for a bit but have not really lived anywhere with a piano since age 18 so am well out of practice.

Whilst I hope/plan to put a baby grand in our front room, once it is done up - which may be some time - at the weekend I just realised, what am I waiting for, I want a digital anyways for playing at less sociable hours, so went ahead and ordered myself a nice Kawai digital and it arrives on Friday!!!

There’s a music chat thread on the extracurricular board but that’s more parents discussing their offsprings’ exploits, I have seen on the music board it’s quite pianissimo but there clearly are other grown up women around here playing/learning/relearning piano for our own pleasure, entertainment, therapy etc! So thought I’d post to see if anyone else is interested in hanging out on a piano thread to chat about our piano journeys, successes and failures, pieces we like, what we’re practicing etc?

It could be called the piano bar or the pianist beaker, seeing as this is MN

If there is one I’ve just failed to find, please point me in that direction.

No idea how formal your teaching was before bugger I just meant that if you wanted a casual once a week lesson without the stress of exams etc you could probably find someone easily! I only have two such pupils at the moment as most of my tuition is maths and some English.

I bought a new book yesterday too, something from Alfred’s piano series?! Not seen them before but it seems like the ideal next step for one of my pupils so obviously that means I have to have my own copy too. :o

@SingToTheSky: part of me really, really wants to get back into piano teaching. I feel, though, that I should at least upgrade my teaching skills/ qualifications first. I also know that I would struggle to make a living. . I'm working full time and although I dislike my job at least it's a regular income. Oh well.

Yes I would never be brave enough to take it on as a full time career! Luckily DH is home basically full time (I mean… it’s not lucky really because it’s only due to his health issues that he can’t work FT anymore, and it means we are mainly dependent on benefits ATM) and that means I can just teach whenever, and declare income/expenses. But tutoring is an unpredictable beast even without covid! I couldn’t work for months when schools closed. So I’m still looking for employment no matter how many more pupils I get (it’s mainly the maths that’s taking off for me ATM). But anyway, you never know maybe at some point you’ll find a friend or neighbour whose child wants to learn and you can just teach them as an extra (if it’s not too much on top of FT work!) 💐

My grade 1-5 jazz scales book arrived. I think I can get the hang of some of them fairly quickly (and obviously some do overlap with what I learned for my exams) but the “blues scale” addled my brain a bit 😳🤣 need to sit and properly look at that at some point. Insanely busy few days coming up though so that’s unlikely

I’ve written a list of scales I can definitely do. All majors, and all the white note minors. Definitely muscle memory there! I need to check the black note minors so leaving those for now. Then I’ve added three dorians and three mixolydians from the jazz scale book. I want to add the pentatonics, and I get how the notes work on the major and the flat third ones, but I can’t get my head around the fingers yet!

Well done! You'll be onto the blues in no time.

Thanks! I’m actually enjoying practicing them now and itching to add some more. Need to do some broken chords and arpeggios but I always struggled with the latter, and never actually did broken chords myself in lessons.

I fucking love having a piano with headphones. My DH and DDs slept downstairs last night watching a movie, and I’ve been able to play in the same room without waking them up! 😁💖

Found Michael Aaron piano course on YouTube. Couldn't believe someone has actually posted how to play to the pieces grade 1, grade 2, etc. This course is ancient!!😱 Have used it to help with one of the pieces I was stuck on during the week. Getting back into hand independence now🙌

Does anyone look at Alan Chan? He covers the whole of the abrsm syllabus I think (although I gather that he's not to everyone's liking...)

I just stumbled across this lovely thread. I did grade 5 as a teenager, failed grade 6 then didn't play much for 25 years, other than when visiting my mum. I now have a Clavinova and started playing again a few years ago. I've had lessons with 2 teachers since then, though I'm not currently having lessons. I just play, fairly regularly, and it brings me a lot of pleasure. I love the idea mentioned here of having 3 pieces that are performance-ready - I'm a good sight-reader (the result of growing up in a home full of cheaply-bought second-hand sheet music) but rarely manage to polish things. A couple of years ago I bought the ABRSM grade 6 pieces just to see, and worked on a couple of them with my then-teacher - I was really pleased to see that they were within my reach.

@supersparrow glad you have enjoyed revisiting the piano. I can now see in retrospect the value of scale, arppegio and even Hanon exercises, I’m using them as a warm up every morning.
I’m on day 10 of my return to playing and am still amazed how it has all coming back to me. The grade 4 book Pieces I bought on recommendation on this thread are getting better every day and I’m moving on quicker than I would ever have dreamt .
I’m determined to be able to play ( not at the correct speed!) rondo alla turca as my personal challenge. I can play the first short section sort of ok but am struggling with the consecutive octaves. I may edit that section!
I have great admiration for those of you starting from scratch as an adult.
I’ve lost another 2 hours this morning in my lovely “ creative room”, playing the piano and repairing a dressing up outfit of my granddaughters.

@Buggerthebotox just listened to him on YouTube, how amazing that students preparing for exams can listen to their pieces.
I’m remembering more stuff from my 1960’s/ 70’s lessons including having to balance a pencil on my hands to achieve perfect positioning!
Not sure I’ll take an exams, grade 7 in the 1970’s required a copy of my o level music certificate as proof of theory! Think it would be very out of date now

Yes it's great that students can listen to and watch their pieces.

Rondo alla Turca is in my list too - all fine except for those right hand octaves. My hands are too small to reach the notes. Is it possible to stretch your hands?

No! It’s a real struggle plus I’ve got arthritis in some fingers including 3 knobbly heberdens nodes so I’m very compromised! A lifetime of piano, violin, knitting and crochet has ruined my hands!
I’ve remembered how good/sneaky I was at simplifying tricky music so am planning to do that with rondo tricky bits. A lifetime of being the infant school pianist and being given strange requests at the last minute
“ Mrs knitting nanny can we have ( the hardest hymn in the book with most sharps) in assembly in 5 minutes time?”
Yes of course - and I would embellish the melody with a couple of correct chords along the way.
So my husband has been listening and says I’ve definitely improved since d day 1. He has decided that aged 67 he wants to learn the piano. Tonight he learned all about the scale of c major and made a good attempt at an octave in each hand separately.

I’ve just read that the Kanneh masons nearly all took and passed grade 8 aged 9-11!
They were amazing last night on the Proms.

Why is Grieg so difficult?

I’ve been on a Joplin kick this week. Would love some recommendations of other ragtime composers too.

I gave up after bar 2 of Moonlight Sonata. Hiding sheet music until I get more competent 😬

@HarrisMcCoo very inconsiderate of him to write it in that key! Why on earth couldn’t it just be one semitones flatter?!

@HarrisMcCoo Moonlight sonata is roughly grade 5 I think (first movement) moving up to grade 8 (third movement). I remember playing the easier first part when I was a teenager, but haven't revisited this time around. It's quite repetitive so practising it in lines/sections might be worth a go. I used to love it so may try it again after I've got further with the Chopin I'm currently working on.
I also love the idea if having 3 or 4 pieces perfected- but it's difficult finding the balance of pieces I love that are not too technically challenging.
Finchcocks released their 2022 program yesterday. I've booked myself into 4 of the weekends- has anyone else been? For those of you who don't know, it's a beautiful stately home in Kent that does piano weekend "retreats" for different levels and with different focuses/composers. They have enough grand pianos for each guest to have one each for the weekend and all food/wine/accommodation is included. Can't wait.....

I'm still going on the scales and making progress- but some of them are awful! B flat minor is horrible. And the arpeggios that are all black notes are not my favourite either.... but I'm finding the patterns much more natural after a few weeks. Love the idea of jazz scales but feel I should master the basics first!

[quote LilaGrace]@HarrisMcCoo Moonlight sonata is roughly grade 5 I think (first movement) moving up to grade 8 (third movement). I remember playing the easier first part when I was a teenager, but haven't revisited this time around. It's quite repetitive so practising it in lines/sections might be worth a go. I used to love it so may try it again after I've got further with the Chopin I'm currently working on.
I also love the idea if having 3 or 4 pieces perfected- but it's difficult finding the balance of pieces I love that are not too technically challenging.
Finchcocks released their 2022 program yesterday. I've booked myself into 4 of the weekends- has anyone else been? For those of you who don't know, it's a beautiful stately home in Kent that does piano weekend "retreats" for different levels and with different focuses/composers. They have enough grand pianos for each guest to have one each for the weekend and all food/wine/accommodation is included. Can't wait.....[/quote]
Enjoy your weekend trips. That's the dream playing on a grand 🎹 isn't it?! Wine too. Bonus🍷

Haha, yes I think grade 5 pieces are a bit beyond my reach just now. Maybe Für Elise might be worth a shot?🤔

[quote Knittingnanny]@HarrisMcCoo very inconsiderate of him to write it in that key! Why on earth couldn’t it just be one semitones flatter?![/quote]
I am just accepting that it will be a while until I can reach that level. Will enjoy listening to these pieces on Classic FM until then 😂

Swapped my big pile of library music books for another lot today and ordered the whole of Mozart sonata in c major as I’ve almost mastered the first movement. Started to relearn all of the minor scales today, I did automatically remember a few despite probably it was 1974 when I last had to play them.
I seem to have settled into a rehearsing schedule that my piano teachers would be ecstatic about!
All of the major scales, 4 octaves, then all of the major arpeggios, then the first few minor scales. Then a couple of Hanon, just no 1 and 2 at present. Then a few grade 3-4 pieces and finally a bit more intense work on the harder pieces.
@LemonViolet, I going to add up how much I’ve spent since reading the thread you started…..!

@Knittingnanny that's an impressive schedule. How long do you spend on it daily? I made a list of all the scales I'll need for grade 5 (which is pretty much all of them!) and now find that it's mainly the difficult minors/black key arpeggios that I have to concentrate on. What is Hanon?
@HarrisMcCoo are you having lessons?
My lessons start again this week. I set myself the task of getting through/reminding myself of grade 2,3 and 4 theory and have just about managed that so am hoping to take the grade 5 theory exam this autumn.

LilaGrace just looking to complete the Michael Aaron piano course books with the help of YouTube until next year. My piano tuner has recommended two local tutors so will look to starting lessons next year once restrictions have finished. I think lessons are still being done remotely here. I would prefer a tutor to be at my home.

You sound like you are well on your way! I think if you have got far in to the grades previously, it's probably a bit like revision now. Grade 5😱

I am not looking to play professionally, just well enough to do Christmas carols, happy birthday, and would love to play Ashokan Farewell one day...

@HarrisMcCoo I remember Michael Aaron! I think I still have one of his books in my collection somewhere!
I got to grade 5 standard as a 12 year old but stopped before I took the exam. I regret not continuing but it's never too late. So most of it is revision but grade 5 theory is something I never took- it looks hard 😬
There's probably quite a lot you can do yourself- particularly when you're covering old ground. I like the discipline of having a teacher and having to show improvement, though she had a six week break over the summer and I've carried on practising regardless.