Chopsticks for the Piano

I'm David, a hobby pianist in love with classical music. I carved out this safe space in the interwebs to explore and communicate through music, instead of obsessively striving for perfection. Through this blog, I chronicle my process, share my performances, difficulties with passages, excerpts of songs, and relevant quotes about composers and performers.  

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Wow.... it’s been awhile since I posted an update. I’ve kept mysef so busy recording (finally HIGH QUALITY VIDEO AND AUDIO!!!!) and practicing the past few weeks along with completing a degree, beginning a new one, and settling in after a big move. So clearly, my mind has been away from this blog. I welcome you to view more of my recordings (so far almost an hour total of polished pieces) at the playlist in the link of that Youtube video. I also want to thank you again for all of your support, and leave you with a beautiful, short piece from Schumann’s Carnaval.

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For the past month or so, I've been practicing this Chopin Ballade pretty seriously, and finally felt ready to record a bit of my progress. This piece has driven me to develop so many of my skills and impulses at the piano, and as you can see, I'm still working on it haha! Lots of polishing left to do on the piece, but I am so happy with my progress so far! I estimate that by the end of May, I’ll be able to play the piece all the way through finally rather than in 50 tiny chunks. Very exciting thought :)

Also, I’m happy I’ve continued the practice routine I developed since last post (of playing through excerpts from tons of different pieces I had prepared for that event). I’ve been able to maintain the repertoire that I prepared because of it, so I will continue to do this before my major practice sessions. Oddly enough, it’s become a nice warm-up routine along with scales occasionally.

Signing out and until next time :) 

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Wow this has been a very inspiring week; time to look forward. My plan for the next few months is to learn how to digitally record audio so that I can produce high quality recordings of each piece I’ve prepared up until now (suuuuper excited about this). As I do this, I’ll also be chucking away at Chopin’s Ballade No. 1. In the mean time, I accumulated many of the trickier passages from multiple pieces into a running practice sheet that I’ll be adding to my practice sessions to maintain my repertoire. I’ve never needed to keep so many different pieces polished at once before, so this is really an experiment that I’ll check in on when I begin to record. Will practicing just these tricky passages enable me to play at my best for the recordings? Time will tell!

Hoping this glimpse into my practice routine isn’t mind-numbingly boring! haha

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I was a guest artist at a hotel in downtown SD last week. So much fun!

TL;DR: I played at an event, with CONFIDENCE (whaaaaaahhhh), and received genuine support and praise (DOUBLE WHAAAAT!?). Imposter syndrome is a real thing, and now I’ll stop believing that I can’t do this!

For memory’s sake, I feel compelled to write about the incredible experience I had last week playing piano for a casual event in downtown San Diego at a Marriott property. This is a sort-of stream of consciousness post, so just skip this if it isn’t up your alley!

This event I performed was the first time I had played publicly since I was probably 11. I’m typically introverted, keep to myself, and rarely even share much about my passion for piano (until recently), so most of my friends (to no fault of theirs) don’t know the extent of my passion for music- and how ABSOLUTELY VITAL it is for my mind and health. I’m not sure why, perhaps I don’t want to call attention to myself or am embarrassed for some odd reason, but there are few people who I share about my immense love for classical music, and certainly not the several loooong periods of frustration I felt which drove me to quit piano multiple times while growing up.  Despite the love-hate relationship with piano, oddly enough, I’ve grown to love the struggle and joy (as long as I stay persistent) that playing new pieces presents. For my sanity, codifying that struggle through this site by crafting rules, intentions, and goals has been a freakin’ game changer. So creating Chopsticks for Piano in early 2017 truly was the first step for me at LOOOOVING music to my core. This framework I created was kind of a sigh of relief, because now what’s important to me is sharing the music as honestly as possible, removing ego. So for the event, I prepared my repertoire with this in mind, and I have never felt so connected to the music. I felt like I just got in the groove of things immediately and the notes just flowed out. I didn’t feel any resistance or struggle, even during the cadenzas in the Liszt Liebestraum, or in parts of the Rachmaninoff Elegie. The tricky passages in mazurkas didn’t intimidate me, so they just sounded and felt so good as they were played. 

I’m so happy I accepted this offer to play at the event, that I prepared so methodically, and that I felt no nerves (besides being excited) because of the confidence that came from my preparation.

Many more to come this year, along with higher quality recordings the next few months. After recording Liszt Liebestraum, I will prepare Chopin’s Ballade No. 1. Weeeeee! :)

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During an interview with the legendary pianist Vladamir Horowitz, in 1988 (a year before his death at 86), he said that Liszt's ingenious piano transcriptions of the nine Beethoven symphonies were the "greatest works for the piano, tremendous works," but, he added, "they are 'sound' works," meaning pieces that they draw upon the piano's full coloristic possibilities. Horowitz played them for himself all the time, but never in concert, fearing audiences would not "understand them," he said. "We are such snobs," he said.

The Indispensable Composers (2018) by Anthony Tommasini

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TIMESTAMPS: 00:08 Ringtone Waltz (Hamelin) 00:48 Mazurka Op. 63, #3 (Chopin) 03:14 Mazurka Op. 67, #4 (Chopin) 05:45 Nocturne Op. 32, #1 (Chopin) 10:10 Nocturne Op. 9, #2 (Chopin) 14:54 Nocturne C# minor [Posthum.] (Chopin) 19:45 Mazurka Op. 67, #3 (Chopin) 21:43 Mazurka Op. 59, #2 (Chopin) 25:00 Liebestraum Consolation #3 (Liszt) 30:24 Nocturne Oo. 72, #1 (Chopin) 35:00 Carnaval: Chopin [12] (Schumann) 35:46 Carnaval: Eusebius [5] (Schumann) 37:58 Carnaval: Aveu [18] (Schumann) 39:13 Elegie Op. 3,#1 (Rachmaninoff)

Here’s a cold-run of a selection of pieces I’ll be performing in the background of an event on 2/27/19 (I have compiled lots of other smaller pieces, and others that are fillers like Chopin’s Raindrop Prelude that I didn’t see the point of playing through today). Although I had a few snafu’s while playing today (multiple ENTIRELY wrong accent notes …. glaringly awful actually haha), I’m super happy with how they come across musically, and am also happy with my recovery and response to error while playing.

Poor quality and mirror image is due to recording this via Facebook Live; but you get the gist.

I appreciate your support so thank you much for your feedback as of late!

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One of my favorite pieces by Rachmaninoff is his Elegie in Eb minor, Op. 3 No. 1. This song was a particular challenge for my brain and my fingers to get used to so many dense chords that feel just-so-slightly off in the hand (as opposed to many of pieces from Chopin or Schubert), and the precise, quickly progressing left hand movement. Such a deeply motional piece that continues to be part of my repertoire today!

This excerpt was originally created in June of 2017, and in an effort to update this website, I thought it best to put everything in one place finally. 

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A tiny little clip of my progress on one of Rachmaninoff’s Variations on a Theme by Corelli. Clearly I got carried away when I edited the video.... haha. This series was part of a year-long project from when I first began Chopsticks for Piano in 2017; these variations specifically were a huge undertaking that I ultimately did not complete as some of the variations are exceedingly difficult, and my brain couldn’t seem to overcome the complexities they present. Despite that, the practice regiment I developed during that time period was PRICELESS and serves me to this day, allowing me to explore music I always felt was “off limits”.

ORIGINALLY CREATED 3/28/2017

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In place of laboring so constantly to attract auditors, and striving to please them at whatever sacrifice, let us rather aim, like Chopin, to leave a celestial and immortal echo of what we have felt, loved, and suffered! Let us learn, from his revered memory, to demand from ourselves works which will entitle us to some true rank in the sacred city of art! Let us not exact from the present with out regard to the future, those light and vain wreath which are scarcely woven before they are faded and forgotten!

The  Life of Chopin by Franz Liszt (trans. by Martha Cook)

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I was hesitant to read Liszt’s writing of Chopin for many reasons, but am now so glad that I’ve begun. The following paragraph feels incredibly significant, as it relates Chopin’s Muse, his health, and his resulting character, in contrast to an environment which left him ultimately alienated. A description like this could only come from someone who believes that artistic inspiration is from some other realm that is bestowed, and in that sense, in a way Liszt may even humble himself by characterizing Chopin as genius, yet burdened by troubled circumstance.

“The frail and sickly organization of Chopin, not permitting him the energetic expression of his passions, he gave to his friends only the gentle and affectionate phase of his nature. In the busy, eager life of large cities, where no one has time to study the destiny of another, where every one is judged by his external activity, very few think it worth while to attempt to penetrate the enigma of individual character. Those who enjoyed familiar intercourse with Chopin, could not be blind to the importance and ennui he experienced in being, upon the calm character of his manners, so promptly believed. And may not the artist revenge the man? As his health was too frail to permit him to give vent to his impatience through the vehemence of his execution, he sought to compensate himself by pouring this bitterness over those pages which he loved to hear performed with a vigor which he could not himself always command: pages which are indeed full of the impassioned feelings of a man suffering deeply from wounds which he does not choose to avow. Thus around a gaily flagged, yet sinking ship, float the fallen spars and scattered fragments, torn by waring winds and surging waves from its shattered sides.”

The Life of Chopin by Franz Liszt (trans. from French by Martha Cook)

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Often a composer seems not at all to be striving for greatness in a work, as with those lovely Grieg piano pieces. A composer might simply think: I’m just practicing my craft, working out something that’s been kicking around within me. Now, if it’s considered great, well, wonderful. Earlier areas of music history are riddled with tales of lost works, and this was not just carelessness. The notion that pieces were conceived and written for posterity did not really take hold until the time of Beethoven, the era of the composer as Colossus, writing works for the ages.

The Indispensable Composers by Anthony Tommasini

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I just had to try out this adorable, funny arrangement (ending is marked “play as if dialing a touch-tone phone”) by the great pianist Hamelin who mocks the common, disruptive Nokia ringtone during performances. Before yesterday, I had never stumbled across it despite listening to Hamelin a ton this past year. We all know this tune, and I also just recently learned that the Nokia ringtone is based on 2 measures of a beautiful piece by Spanish composer/guitarist Francisco Tarrega that he simply titled “Gran Vals”. The internet teaches me so muuuuuuuuch yaaaaaas!

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Although this book is a tad too “into the ether” for me, I find myself completely agreeing with what the author writes in regard to the power of music and our simultaneous disconnection with this power:

Music is a potent power which can alter our awareness. This relationship between music and consciousness, in the individual or group, has been known from ancient times. Today it is effectively applied in the widespread commercial exploitation of broadcast entertainment. Despite this acknowledged power of music, it would be unusual for a modern composer or player to clearly describe the root causes of these effective changes that arise within the listener.

Superficially this lack of theoretical approach to music and change in consciousness is part of the growth of simplistic materialism: music is no longer defined in religious terms, so there is less need to relate it to outmoded concepts of divinity. Frequently music as discussed in emotional or so-called subjective terms, or in a rational structural manner which often avoids the primal musical function-that of living communication.

The Spiritual Dimension of Music by R.J. Stewart (1990)

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I’m a bit ashamed to admit...

After playing piano for over 20 years, I genuinely haven’t learned (or I have continuously failed to absorb and understand) music theory. And after polishing a set of pieces just now, from Chopin, Liszt, & Rachmaninoff, I decided that this advanced beginner is gonna start introducing himself to music theory. I’m talkin from LEVEL 1, from scratch, music theory concepts, all the way to the advanced stuff. I want to be competent, enough to apply music theory concepts in the moment without thinking, like how I read notes on the page

Today: the circle of fifths and scales (I’m cringing typing this as it’s so elementary). As I identified what key some pieces I played were in, it clicked. If I know where the melody rests or wants to move back to its home, I can communicate more efficiently by emphasizing the climax through voicing of cords differently. I can point to or away from notes in a more holistic way through understanding the intent of these notes in relation to the key. As I played these pieces, it gave me a deeper understanding of how to play the piece that’s consistent with where the piece started and will eventually end up. And I gotta say, it’s exciting that such a simple freaking concept that I’ve been scared to delve into for so long (for fear of not understandinng) is finally starting to sink in. I have a feeling that I’m going to learn so god damn much this year, and that hypes me up!

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I’m ecstatic that over-and-over, this book destroys the modern caricature of Chopin (and my own preconceived notions). As you’ll read below, Chopin wrote his foreward-thinking “funeral march” at the age of 27, most likely in reminiscing of the deep conflicts in his homeland which seems entirely appropriate. The fact that the piece was never used as a funeral song while Chopin lived is fascinating, but just as interesting is the lack of support in his day by colleagues or public at large, but the much-delayed recognition as a pivotal piece in musical history and global culture.

“The Funeral March was never played at any burial service during Chopin’s lifetime. There is some irony in the fact that the first occasion it was enlisted in the service of the dead was at Chopin’s own funeral, in the Madeleine Church, on October 30, 1849, in an orchestral arrangement by Henri Reber. When Chopin put the finishing touches to the Funeral March, in 1837, and set the manuscript aside for a time before finding a permanent home for it, he had no idea that he had just penned music that would be used to mark his own passing from this vale of tears. An inspection of the only remaining autograph fragment of the Trio reveals that Chopin placed the date November 28, 1837, beneath the closing bars, and then signed it. It was the eve of the anniversary of the November Uprising, the date on which the Pol ish diaspora in Paris marked this national catastrophe. We join with the Polish scholar Mieczyslaw Tomaszewski in saying that the Funeral March was originally a lament for Chopin’s homeland, a connection that was lost after the movement was incorporated into the wider context of the Sonata. The movement has meanwhile become as famous in its way as the Funeral March from Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony. It is difficult to understand why Schumann described it as “largely repulsive,” and then went on to say that an incomparably better effect would have been achieved had Chopin composed an Adagio, “perhaps in the key of D-flat major,” a remark that reveals Schumann to have been an occasional prisoner of the past. He is referring, of course, to the fact that all four movements are in a minor key, an unusual occurrence in classical sonatas, and one that Chopin never adopts elsewhere. Yet the Funeral March is the central pillar of the Sonata, one that defines the composition. All the other movements lead up to or away from it. Nor is it simply the sepulchral mood of the March that casts its shadow across the rest of the composition. There are thematic connections at work as well, which not only link this movement to the others but may even have helped to generate them. Far from being “unruly children,” we have come to understand that they were always members of a united family.”

Fryderyk Chopin: A Life and Times by Dr. Alan Walker

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Intriguing to read about Chopin (and frankly any musician we respect so deeply), especially from the formidable Liszt’s point of view.

Liszt remarked that one encountered in Chopin’s mazurkas “bars which might just as well be in another place.” But he added, as if to soften the criticism, that where Chopin puts them, “perhaps nobody else could.” Reaping a random harvest of harmony was ever Chopin’s good fortune; but the many chance discoveries that came his way had to earn their place in his finished compositions, or be jettisoned. It has been well said that “Chopin the composer was ruthless in dealing with Chopin the improviser.” Ideas that sprang spontaneously to life on the keyboard were not allowed to remain there until subjected to scrutiny, refined, modified, and when found wanting banished—the ultimate chastisement that Chopin was able to bring against himself.

Fryderyk Chopin: A Life and Times by Dr. Alan Walker

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It makes me so friggin’ happy ...

When someone, young or old, excitedly takes an interest in an instrument beyond a surface level, and humbly goes up against that mental workout it brings about. My neice wanted to play the Hunger Games whistle, so through helping her sound out the notes, I eagerly instructed her to play with full hands resting (not just pointer fingers), and we slapped a basic harmony with the tune with the left hand. To my surprise, she then described the concept of intervals and corrected the harmony which was a tad off (I didn’t want to confuse her with accidentals beforehand). I was sooooo proud of her, but more precisely, I’m so pleased that she has the patience and curiosity to even attempt, and to ENJOY THAT STRUGGLE. It was a fantastic way to bring in the new year, reminding me what it was like as a kid to begin playing piano, and how far music has taken me through the years.