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.

Like this! She is a spoilt cat who has all sorts of beds crocheted for her but still chooses to sleep on the one area which will end up covered in hairs.
She hates various sounds, especially the hoover, but seems to like the piano!
She has already managed to jump up and knock over my pot of “ scales lolly sticks” so that has messed up my plan on day 1!

Nice piano @DaphneDeloresMoorhead. What make is it?

C'mon tell us- what's the music on the stand (can't quite make it out).

My lessons will hopefully resume next week after the Christmas break. We're learning via Zoom for the time being which means I have to find actual printed music rather than using my tablet - I need that for the Zoom connection. Fortunately I have managed to find a few popular tunes in the 'Easy To Play...' books. Time will tell if they are easy or not. Teacher might not even think they are suitable so I'll have to seek her opinion first. Eventually I would like to learn 'La Vie En Rose' and 'Put Your Hands Up' by Ryuichi Sakamoto.

That looks really cosy @Knittingnanny2! Love the patchwork blanket, lucky grandchildren!
This is my space. Bare walls as it’s recently been painted and it will probably take me years to decide what pictures fit!

@DaphneDeloresMoorhead - love the proper piano and your cheerful piano stool.
@LilaGrace - I’m working my way through Play it Again Piano by Melanie Spanswick. Im loving it, lots of notes to keep me right. Lovely mix of classical and jazz. I’m also playing some of the Faber Easy Piano Anthology for light relief / pieces I don’t have to concentrate so hard on.

And good luck with the Chopin nocturne. I hope to get there one day!

Love the nocturne, it’s in one of the books that came with my piano and I must have made a fairly decent job of it as when it came in the car radio the other day husband said “ you’ve played that”!

Thanks Daphne! My weekend is with Florian Mitrea but I guess the format will be similar

I discovered a Heller Prelude I haven’t played before in one of my anthologies (Romantic Sketchbook 4 - so around G6 level) yesterday and have been loving it. Video is not me but just so you can hear it! Most other performances of this on YouTube are much faster but I prefer how it sounds slower, to be fair I’m even slower than this but only started it yesterday. C# minor is a beautiful key. The final chords are just delicious.

Everyone's rooms look so nice! @Knittingnanny2 I love your patchwork cover- it's beautiful. @FleetingMind your room looks so calm, and @DaphneDeloresMoorhead I can see your lovely raspberry music bag!
@LemonViolet for the Chopin weekend I'm on in February the host has asked us to prepare some pieces from a list. But they vary hugely- I'm also on the intermediate weekend in November and that is more of a retreat- so pianists can just go and concentrate on playing without any expectation of performing. Bliss! I'm also on the Florian Mittrea one in June.... which room have you got? June will be a lovely time to be there as the grounds are beautiful and there will be hours of daylight.
I'm looking forward to expanding my repertoire and was talking about jazz with my teacher today. So may go down that route alongside the grade 5/6 exam, I'm not sure which to go for.

@absolutelynotfabulous

Nice piano *@DaphneDeloresMoorhead*. What make is it?

C'mon tell us- what's the music on the stand (can't quite make it out).

It's a Zimmerman, I've had it since 1987

My other piano is a Bosendorfer grand... currently in pieces awaiting a windfall to restore it 😅

@Knittingnanny2

Love the nocturne, it’s in one of the books that came with my piano and I must have made a fairly decent job of it as when it came in the car radio the other day husband said “ you’ve played that”!

I think the music on the stand is the grade 6 book or it might be solfegietto which I'm doing as the part A but isn't in the book

I’ve reserved Tchaikovsky Seasons at the library ( one copy in the whole of Hampshire!) to see if I like any of the other pieces. I’ve just about mastered June, which was in an eBay 1981 grade 7 book . Although a few tricky sections have been edited by knittingnanny the fake grade 7 pianist!
I’ve bought Rachmaninov preludes and Granada’s danse5 from an i family book shop but finding them too hard at the moment.
Just started to learn a Robdo ( Mozart) as a bit of a change.
Today though, I came to the conclusion that I’m never going to be able to master anything beyond grade 7 level and just to enjoy as wide a variety of pieces as possible just because I like them instead of being chosen for their challenges. It maybe is a bit like dancers as they age and their bodies change. They may still thoroughly enjoy dancing but not at competition levels if you see what I mean
That’s me at 65 though not you youngsters!

Granados

I’ve just about mastered June, which was in an eBay 1981 grade 7 book . Although a few tricky sections have been edited by knittingnanny the fake grade 7 pianist!
That reminds me that I studied this a few years ago but was defeated by the middle section and abandoned it. Maybe I should try again with a bit of editing! I am also a fake Grade 7 pianist but there are so many lovely pieces to explore at that level.

Yes it’s a lovely piece, just edit that middle but. I know which bit you mean! I did it right hand only with my own made up east left hand but. The tricky bit near the end is repeated an octave lower which is much easier to read! So I just play that bit an octave lower twice. No one knows.
Maybe my new mumsnet name should me fakegrade7knittingnanny

I love the other piece in the same book Calme du soir by Mowskovsky (sp?) and it is a piece I could play very quickly , almost sight reading at a good standard and yet some of the grade 6 Chopin defeats me completely. I suppose it shows our different strengths

Anyone a beginner??

@MrsTaytodarling

Anyone a beginner??

I'm not a beginner but intermediate, which means I am more than likely less skilled and experienced than many posters on here. I've been taking lessons for nearly three and a half years.

Are you just starting @MrsTaytodarling or thinking about it?

I think a lot of us on the thread played as children/teens but lost track as adults and are returners. But I think it can be a fab hobby to take up first time as an adult. A client of mine never played before he retired, he now plays Gershwin (NOT beginner level!) for relaxation every day!

I played as a child...I use the word played very loosely. But love it now. Just starting really but really enjoying. Can lose hours

I know I lose time at the piano too!

I’ve not got my “usual” music atm as I left it visiting family at the weekend, they’re posting it back to me. So last night I sat down, I was in an angry and frustrated mood, and I picked out some other books I haven’t looked at much yet and just had a tinkle. Faber “French Romantic Repertoire” level 1 (G4-6), and a Barenreiter book of Debussy “Easy Piano Pieces and Dances” (spoiler - not easy - G5-8) and just messed around, some pieces were familiar anyway, others I can half play and just tinkled through what I could manage. Still very relaxing and meant that rather than going to bed mad about the day I was much more peaceful and chilled falling asleep.

What a welcome thread! I played when at school, to Grade 6 or so, then lapsed though I have always had a piano as long as I have had a house (my father, an engineer, was a brilliant self-taught pianist who played almost as regularly as eating, from memory mostly, and I couldn't imagine a house without a piano). Have had this one since the 1970s: it was wheeled down the road from what was then a tiny piano shop round the corner. Played less over many years (except for Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring, embedded in my fingers since a concert at about age 12), but took it up again a few years ago to play duets with a viola-playing friend. Could not bring myself to play at all during lockdown, no idea why, so really appreciating the stimulus of this thread. Piano tuner came in December: still pretty good pitch. Every so often someone has given me a subscription to Pianist magazine which is brilliant, and prompted by one of those I have just embarked on Burgmuller Etudes, op. 100. Also hoping to play duets with thirty-something son who has just re-taken up saxophone - not a lot of printed music around for that so am going to try to my hand at writing some accompaniments. (Grade 5 theory was a LONG time ago though!) 'All the Things You are', anyone?

Welcome to all the new ladies.
Had a train ride and walk around Winchester today. I was reminded of the long gone music shop there Witwams, which I used to order stuff from for school in the 90’s. There was an assistant there who could name any piece you wanted by listening to you hum a couple of bars if you couldn’t remember the title. Might have to google to see what became of him when the shop closed down. A very talented man.

@mariominder if I ever have had to accompany anyone I’ve just written chords underneath their tune and faffed about with arpeggios! Plus a few cadences at the end.

Whitwams not witwams