~**The Official Piano Thread**~

Here will will discuss different types of piano music, different muscians, and the piano in general.

Starting from today until next Tuesady (Or if this thread getas to six pages before that) we will be discussing classical piano music.

What are some of your favorite classical musicans on the piano? What are some of your favorite pieces? What key do you like to play in? Is classical the best genre of music to play on the piano? Anything about classical music can be discussed this week.


This week's bonus question: Which is better? Playing the notes correctly, or playing with feeling?

Although piano can be very difficult, there are some songs that are very easy to play. Here are nine songs that I reccomed that you check out, for all levels of players.

EASY:

Dolly's Dreaming and Awakening, by T. Oesten
Fröhlicher Landmann by R. Schmann
Ecossaise by L.v. Beethoven


INTERMEDIATE:

Für Elsie by L.v. Beethoven
La chevaleresque by J. F. Burgmüller
Turkish March by W. A. Motzart


ADVANCED

Etude op. 10-5 "Black Keys" by F. F. Chopin
Golliwog's Cakewalk, by C. A. Debussy
Perpetuum mobile by C. M.v. Werber

These are some of the songs that I play, and I strongly suggest that you find sheet msuic for them. PM me if you would a link to a sheet music site. A good general classical msuic sheet music site is http://www.sheetmusicarchive.net/


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My absolute favorite classical pianists are: Chopin, Motzart, and Bach.

Chopin has quite a varity of types of music that he plays, but his classical is breathtaking. He wrote those songs, it seems, with such feeling and heart. If you play his songs correctly, (correctly meaning with feeling) it really is inspiring. Probably my favorite song by him is: Etude op. 10-5, sometimes known as "Black Keys" for all of the flats that the key is in.

Motzart has a rather interesting way of playing his songs. They usually start out soft, then work their way to forte, with allegero speed. Then, he quiets down with a nice flowing sonata kind of music for the next section. The he goes back to allegero. (NOTE: this is not all of his songs, but just something that I have noticed!) One of my favorite songs by him is, naturally, the Turkish March.

Bach almost always has relaxing, cal music. His songs flow quite nicely, and are great for R&R! He uses his accents quite well, also. My favorite song by him is Gavotte. That is nice, easy piece to play.

Any thoughts or comments?

As the host of this thread, if you would like to give me a suggestion to this thread, or give me advise, etc., PM me, please!

- Ani

 

My favorite is Chopin--but I don't know enough about the instrument to say why.

 

Yes, he IS good!

Do you think that we should play (Even if you don't know how!) with feeling, or should we rather focus on getting the notes right?

 

I've never bought the bit that feeling is more important...it's got to be done properly *with* feeling.

 

Ahhh, see, now I feel the opposite way. Yes, it is nice when the notes are correct, BUT! I would rather listen to someone play with a lot feeling than somebody who plays perfectly with no crescendo, or anything that would symbolize feeling.

But that is just me!

 

I like a smooth sounding song. Doesn't have to be perfect. But I would rather listen to something coming from the Pianist heart. than a piece he was given 20 minutes ago, even if played to perfection. The player more than likely doesn't love the piece enough.

The more the pianist and musician loves the piece, the more I love it.

 

Don't you think playing correctly shows love?

 

Well it totality depends.

But generally no, i you set out to play correctly you do show the piece respect. But not Love. If its a cover of a piece, you have to make it your own develop it. And sometimes mistakes make it sound even better.

But if the player plays the piece full of mistakes then I would rather listen to a piece with no mistakes.

 

Precisely.

Noooo, a lot of mistakes don't really sound wonderful, I know. Then, in that case, I would take the perfectness. But I like to hear something played with heart, instead of something that is crisp perfect. That is just who I am!

 

Well, you can play correctly; just differently. It's not like, if you love the music, you'll be hitting wrong notes. It's just that I think we're all sick of people playing music like it was clockwork. It's not clockwork.

I tend to tweak the sheet music I have in front of me. Insert myself, if you will.

 

I wish I could read music.

 

Moi aussi.

 

I played the piano today!

I'm working on 8-fingered-tapping/piano tapping on the guitar, so I figured playing some chromatic exercises on the keys would help build my right hand strength.

In terms on classic pianists, Bach and Chopin top my list. A couple of my more modern favorites are Jordan Rudess, Tony Maclapine, and Derek Sherinian.

 

I think Bruce Greer is the greatest pianist who has ever lived.

 

Never heard of him...Brit? American?

 

American. Very obscure. Plays gospel songs, but a variety of styles. His "Unshakable Kingdom" is one of the greatest moments of piano artistry ever. And he does a fantastic jazz version of the Ode to Joy and a show stopping white hot jazz Standing on the Promises.

 

Name of the CD with this song on it? Please?

 

I've been playing piano since I was 7 and won piano lessons in a raffle. It's now been 18 years, I own a 1904 Model K Steinway upright and play it at every chance.

I think that there is no more important thing than expression. Some of the worst recitals I've been to were the ones where the person played the Beethoven Pathetique Sonata note-perfect and had no expression whatsoever. It just ruins it that you're feeling something about the music and they're not.

 

My favourite piano composer has to be Chopin, just because he's fun to listen to. I mean, listen to his etude "Ocean" (Op25No12) (video), it was, in my view, his best. It's just awesome.

As for players, I don't know many, but the pianists that impress me most tend to be in metal bands these days Vitalij Kuprij, Steinar Sverd Johnsen (from Arcturus) and Øyvind Mustaparta (from Dimmu Borgir) are the ones that I like the work of, both metal- and classical-orientated.

 

Garrick Ohlsson is a fantastic pianist. I heard him do the Rachmaninoff 3rd this past November and he has this passionate intensity that made my friend who hates classical music want a copy of the performance.

 

Does he do recordings?

 

I'm going to have have to check the program for that. I'll let you know.

 

The Bruce Greer album (which is hard to get) is Majesty.

 

Many thanks...

 

It seems that a lot of people here like Chopin! I do too, his songs are awesome! Jopin is my personal fav though. I like the Maple Leaf Rag.

I agree with Anaka, it is better to play with feeling than perfection. HOwever, a bad song DOES sound horrid...