Journaling here what it takes and what it gives
I Giorni – Ludovico Einaudi – learnt from music sheet
This time on my piano landed music sheet, five pages of notes to learn by heart… and it was “I Giorni” by Ludovico Einaudi. (see the video at the bottom of this page). It is much easier to play once you know those notes by heart. It took quite time because I am trying to get challenged with every new piece of music. That way you develop your skills and use them in next piece of music. What this piece brought into my skill set? Well still improving those skills but they slightly improved, here they are as I remember them:
- hands separation
- a bit of speed
- stretched my fingers (though I had to for now, cut one note because couldn’t reach it to play clear sound, but getting there slowly)
- released a bit my wrists, but on the video you can see they are still quite stiff – getting there :),
- started to move my hands more freely, though again it is a process, and you can barely see it, but I can feel it. I am on the right direction :).
- more feeling of the music… can’t actually explain it, but once you’re there, you will feel it. Somehow, you feel it in your body: isn’t that beautiful? Playing piano is such a quest with loads of things that happen which are hard to explain. YOU MUST PLAY! YOU MUST FEEL IT!
Since, I have reached level 6th of Piano Marvel , I started less often use it. On level 6th there are many really nice pieces of music to learn, and I will certainly do it, but for now, I divide my time with piano for scales practice (here I use book The Virtuoso Pianist and as well Piano Marvel app), and new piece of music practice with online teacher. So, if you like follow my steps, I truly recommend mentioned PM app . After some time you will not need it. I don’t so much anymore.
Here is the latest video with what I am still practising… but here I am, thanks to PM, online teacher and almost daily PRACTICE 🙂
Don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel.
That is all for now, PLAY, HAVE FUN, I can tell by experience it is worth it. Not easy, to me at least, but worth it!
Take care,
Jaro
Clementi : Sonatina Op. 36, No. 1 Spiritoso & Andante – practice in progress
Well, we are here again, with, this time, Muzio Clementi Sonatina Op. 36, No. 1. Two first parts mastered, well, I am not satisfied yet, but this is still work in progress. So, with no much to add, but PRACTICE! PRACTICE! PRACTICE! Until you will get it 🙂
Muzio Clementi Sonatina Op. 36, No. 1 I master dividing my time by using Piano Marvel library section, where you can find this piece of music,and time spent practising it with metronome only… after hundreds, you are right, hundreds of times you will play it you don’t need any more notes 🙂 Well, maybe just to know when to play piano, forte, staccato etc. So, don’t wait, if you want some great music in one place:
Below, it is latest recording of me performing Sonatina Op. 36 no 1. This is still work in progress. But to keep you updated below it is. Earlier versions you can find on my YouTube channel.
Muzio Clementi Sonatina Op. 36, No. 1. – Latest update
Thanks for watching and I hope you are learning too some new pieces of music you like. As always: ENJOY THE JOURNEY! It helps a lot go through difficult times which occur from time to time 🙂
Memories – piece that needs more practice :)
I am back after quite a break with posting here on blog. You know how it is, loads of other things to do – Life! Let’s actually do something here, though.
This piece of music is again from my Piano Marvel app, level 5E in Method section. FAILURE at first. Yes, you are right I will not hide anything from you. From videos below you can see that this was complete failure. First attempt after mastering the piece was robot like play and then after few suggestions from a fellow pianist I did complete FAILURE! Completely misunderstood the suggestions… but still it was worth it to fell. That is how we learn, right? The only thing after failure is ACTION, we need to keep moving, smarter and use the lesson we got. So, below it is what happened, Soon I will upload hopefully better version of that piece which I really like to play decently one day, and I hope you will too 🙂
So, enjoy watching and if you like to play and have decent program to follow I recommend you app I am using now:
Time for a bit of music NOW 🙂
“Memories” – Learnt with Piano Marvel – enjoy watching – First video
“Memories” – Learnt with Piano Marvel – enjoy watching – Second video – FAILURE
OK. That is all for now. At some point with separate post I will update you with better performance! It is a promise 🙂
Silver Lit Night with Piano Marvel
I did get lazy a bit with posting on my page but with this post I will be sort of up to date.
This piece of music is again from my Piano Marvel app, level 5E in Method section. While I was learning this piece I also put a lot of attention to practice Hanons and Scales (2 octaves + chords + arpeggios) as 45 min warm up. I feel that warming up with Hanons and Scales works great for me and I quite sure that it will as well for you. I am more relaxed (my hands) and my fingers get a bit stronger. It takes time to strengthen them and it takes some time to learn Hanons. There are plenty of them and as I was told it is worth to chose Hanon in C and as well Hanon with one to three black keys for example in G or D. I did and simply I work on Hanon no 1 and 2 in both scales. Here we need to be careful, it is not about to practice to play those Hanons and straight move on to another one. I use them and it works great to work on some technique issues and to strengthen my hands and to speed up a bit. When you will try you will quite quickly notice some changes in the way you play.
But back to new piece of music you can watch and listen below. Again, as always in Piano Marvel it introduces use of new skills we just developed and as well to develop while learning this piece. This is great. But as well because it is new, you can’t expect to be perfect yet 🙂 New skills take time to sink into you, but playing again a bit more advance, not too more advance, piece of music gives you a bit of challenge to practice but not to hard that you can’t do it. After all we need to enjoy playing, otherwise… NO! nobody is quitting. We are moving forward!
So, enjoy watching and if you like to play and have decent program to follow I recommend you app I am using now:
Time for a bit of music NOW 🙂
“Silver Lit Night” – Learnt with Piano Marvel – enjoy watching
As always, till next time. Meantime: let’s keep playing, keep practising and keep chasing that dream of playing well 🙂
Knightly Tale with Piano Marvel
This piece of music is from Level 5E of Piano Marvel app.
This time few more things been uncovered after recording you will see. Most important is the imperfection on my left hand. It is too week and as well my 4th and 3rd finger behave a bit weird. Thanks to advice from my friend from one of the piano forums I am active on I know what to do next. If I wouldn’t record it and show to anybody I would exist thinking everything is fine and keep going without not correcting this mistake or rather imperfection. How? Well, very simple .In Piano Marvel there is plenty exercises called Hanon. You use them to strengthen your hands, to play with better accuracy, to create better sound, to play more even sound, to increase your speed, to correct some mistakes in your body position, to relax more while playing <- this is what happened when I started paying attention to Hanons and how I play them. I truly recommend to anyone who wants to improve skills to simply PLAY THEM. Plenty of them in Library section of the app I am using not to mention scales, chords and arpeggios exercises that work miracles if you play them on daily basis as warm up. Over time it builds strength and better understanding of your music. Try it here, you have all of them in one place:
Now, with no further ado, another piece I’ve learnt:
“Knightly Tale” – Learnt with Piano Marvel – enjoy watching
Keep going, keep playing… we will reach our stars… Practice is the key! PLAY and ENJOY!
Satin Gloves – back few months to enjoy a bit more
Last time I said that going back and playing pieces from the past (previously learnt) gives quite a fun.
It is true because when we are learning piece following any program we follow we learn as well new skills. Those new skills must sink into us, become our new nature. It takes time. So. I went back to piece of music I really liked and used new skills I developed over time. Don’t get me wrong. It is still a lot to work on. But it is much better then when I played it first time. So. Enjoy watching and in years to come prepare for MORE 🙂
If you want to learn piano as I do with the app I use try it below and I can promise you if you are serious about learning piano, you will not regret it. It can be start of really fascinating journey for you!
“Satin Gloves” – Learnt with Piano Marvel – enjoy watching
See you soon. Keep going. Keep practising. I will 🙂
Battle Hymn of the Republic with Piano Marvel
Battle Hymn of the Republic was quite a challenge and again developed new skills in my hands. Most difficult was with that piece was to keep tempo right and hand independence while playing. But again as always new pieces from the program rather stretch my skills and simply introduce new things that must be practised in the future. My experience shows that skills you develop with new piece help to sound better with the old ones a lot when you played less advanced notes. So, I guess with every new piece of music we develop our ability to play better, to sound better and to have more and more fun playing. Below is the piece I’ve learned as usually for now with Piano Marvel.
Try it and you will not regret using that app it (I don’t 🙂 ) The key is to practice as often as possible. Ideally every day.
“Battle Hymn of the Republic” – enjoy watching
Keep going with your practice. See you soon 🙂
Episode 17 – 19 – some more practice done
This time three pieces together. Due to some PC problems I experienced I am putting them all here.
As always so far, learnt with Piano Marvel.
Try it and you will not regret it (I don’t 🙂 )
1. “Dreamer”
2. “Tarantella”
3. “The Star Spangled Banner”
Keep practising… It is fun!
Episode 16 – Russian Dance – piano practice continues
New year, new piece of music… learning continuous.
It is still not the level I am trying to achieve but I can tell with every lesson I take with my app, with every day spend playing and practising my range spreads. So, equipped with patience and motivation to do more and more I am looking forward to deliver much more advanced pieces for you to keep you going into direction of your musical dreams. It is doable and only daily practice can take us there. So, today, in this episode it is piece called “Russian Dance” learnt with my Piano Marvel app. Enjoy watching and listening and do your work to play something like that or even better. I am still on gaining skills and I hope soon will deliver even better pieces for your pleasure 🙂
Process of learning was quite the same and developed through every day practice. Which means, I study a piece for a while, I check what keys are going to be played, which scale it is, try it slowly to find perfect position for my hands and if necessary hand movement as well and then I start being supported by chopped pieces from PM app. Then with slow tempo I learn all the piece and then I speed up till the right tempo. So far that approach works the best for me. Who knows what will be in another year of practice? Can’t imagine it actually… I couldn’t imagine place where I am now one year ago. And here we are. Practice and learn and you will surprise yourself too!
As usually, if you decide to use app I am using, below you can find some money saving discounts:
Your Piano Marvel discount code is: jw (gives you ca. 20% saving on monthly basis!
Direct link to Piano Marvel registration below – just hit the “Start Learning Now” button. I must tell it is worth it! Do it and you will experience what I do on daily basis: LOADS OF FUN!
Soon I meet you with my new material I am trying to master… let’s not waste time and practice 🙂
Till next time…
Episode 15 – Sevillana, New Year 2020
Happy New Year 2020!
As usually it is right time to set some goals for next year. We almost always do it, but many times after few months, weeks even days we forget about it and life our lives like before. So, let’s be smarter this year, let’s set goals and actually with an action plan do on daily basis something to reach them or be much closer to reach them this year.
Anyway, this video is another step for me. With piece of music called “Sevillana” from my PM program. Another step taken. Take yours with your sources you use to learn piano or maybe try what I use. As you can see it works fine for me, and I am pretty sure if you practice every day will work miracles for you too. Try it: Piano Marvel.
So, how learning process for this piece of music looked like? Well, it is part of my program, and actually it wasn’t that difficult to learn it. Not this one. Great advantage is that I knew pretty well scale it was played and because of that I guess it was quite easy to learn. So, practice and it will be easy for you to learn new material as well.
Enjoy watching, and as usually short message for you inside the video while I play for you!
As usually, if you decide to use app I am using, below you can find some money saving discounts:
Your Piano Marvel discount code is: jw (gives you ca. 20% saving on monthly basis!
Direct link to Piano Marvel registration below. Start your journey and enjoy the every step of the process. It is worth it!
I will see you soon on next post! … and now I am going back to my piano and PRACTICE. You too enjoy your practice and progress.
Till next time…
What I can say about me? I am piano enthusiast. I want to play at some point quite well to simply enjoy music and spend my time relaxing while playing. Yes, playing piano relaxes me. Though, at this stage I still need to learn A LOT, what is easy to say after you see my videos.
I hope this blog will be useful for you and we will have a lot of fun learning how to play.
I hope one day, you and me will make our music beautiful.
Ps. This is not my picture, yet. Working on it 🙂