Day 23: Notturno

Today, I began working on Notturno, Op. 54, No. 4, by Edvard Grieg.  Notturno, or Nocturne, is one of the more popular pieces of Grieg's Lyric Pieces.  It is sort of the one-stop-shop for many different techniques such as hand-crossing, cross-rhythms of triplets against doublets, and multiple voices in one hand, among others.  I managed to play approximately 20% of the piece from memory.  I can play the entire piece still if I have the music in front of me.  Since my goal is to re-commit old pieces to memory, this will not do.  I am allotting myself 30 days for this piece as well, although I doubt I need half that time.  This is good, because I still have a few measures in Wedding Day at Troldhaugen that need some improvement.

Speaking of improvement, I had the opportunity to practice on a real piano this past weekend.  There is a vast difference between playing a piece on an electronic keyboard and playing it on an actual piano.  Weighted keys, for instance, make a HUGE difference!  I found myself struggling to play some parts of Wedding Day at Troldhaugen simply because I was used to the fluidity of non-weighted keys.  What I could quickly maneuver through on my electronic keyboard suddenly felt like I was wading through mud.  Well, not quite that bad, but I think you get the picture.  I have scoped out a location for me to go practice on a piano at least a couple of times a week until I can solve the problem of not having a piano here in my house.

I have also managed to set-up a great angle with the massive tripod I procured this past weekend.  I should be making both a video of Wedding Day at Troldhaugen tonight, plus a video of my starting point for Notturno.  I will tweet about the videos when they have been uploaded to Youtube as well as post links on my Facebook page.

One last thing to mention: I have a music theory workbook.  I do need the actual textbook that accompanies it, but may talk-up one of my music major friends locally to see if they have some music theory books I can borrow in the meantime.  I intend to share not only what I learn on my blog, but also what I do actually know.  Believe it or not, I do know a few things.  I couldn't have ever carried off the pieces that I once knew without at least a little knowledge of music theory.