Week 4: Romantic spirits! 
Welcome to the Main Thread for the fourth week of "The Romantic Era" challenge!
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- Watch the kickoff livestream! (<- click)
↓ Happy Sharing! ↓
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Sonata 1 (MS84) - Niccolo Paganini
This is my humble contribution to the challenge and at the same time the only one! I had not enough time to explore music for this challenge but I wanted to participate with you guys. I found that Paganini has written a lot of little sonatas for guitar and I picked the first one... I was able to give it roughly 15 minutes per day for about 12 non-consecutives days.
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Blaise Laflamme Blaise , that was amazing. Your performance was wonderful. As Eric pointed out your technical control is very impressive and your interpretation excellent. This is also a very nice piece. I looked at some of Paganini's pieces but never connected with them. But now I have to re-evaluate my assessment of Paganini's guitar works. Perhaps it is your interpretation the has won me over.
It is good to see you actually have a body.
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Jack Stewart thank you Jack for your kind words, I'm happy you like my interpretation of this work! I understand you, I've never myself connected to what I've heard of Paganini guitar works... then I decided to start fresh with a work I was not aware of and tried to do something!
Well... I was able to materialize my body for this recording session!
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Blaise Laflamme Awesome, and great to see you participating in this thing. Wonderful playing as usual, and nice choice from Paganini to round out this challenge. Guitar tone and recording quality also superb. Have you change your recording setup?
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Barney thank you Barney. I've done a couple of changes, I've separated my workspace from my practice studio, acoustically treated it a bit, and got a new pair of KM 184 (this is my first time trying them). Now I have to experiment a bit with all of that
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Blaise Laflamme Sounds excellent so far. I look forward to you future submissions. Thanks!
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Barney thank you for your appreciation, considering your recordings and expectation about sound, I'm happy you like it. I roughly position them as I was used to with the CM4 and in another configuration of the room, I needed a known starting point.
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Blaise Laflamme Superbly played! I've heard that Paganini was also a good guitarist himself and sometimes performed in Violin + Guitar duet setting. Really like your guitar sound - clean, powerful, and bright, which can only be achieved when you know the piece very well.
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Wai thanks Wai, for sure he knew the instrument enough to write interesting stuff.
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Blaise Laflamme Bravíssimo!! Great performance, Blaise! You have the piece under your fingers, with total control! Like Eric I did some calcs... this result with just 3 hours working?!?!?! Bravíssimo, again!! Thank you so much for sharing this with us!
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Moyses Lopes thank you Moyses, you shouldn't do that kind of calcs...
... this kind of piece looks harder than it is in reality! -
Blaise Laflamme No doubt! I'm shure it's a difficult piece, I'm very impressed with the velocity that you can obtain a great result, like this that you shared with us!
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Moyses Lopes As I said, it's not really a difficult piece... it looks harder than it is. I would say OTOH that the result is more impressive than the amount of work it takes to play it!
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Blaise Laflamme I missed this until the watch party today - magnificent performance! I love the energy and balance you achieve which is so suitable for Paganini. Have you ever played the Grand Sonata? I have enjoyed working on the second movement, "Romanza" and hope to make a video of that someday. Thank you for this wonderful contribution to the challenge.
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Rick Lord Thank you Rick! No I have never played any Paganini before, I'll take a look at the Grand Sonata, that I remember listening to at some point, but I definitely enjoyed discovering and playing this little sonata! I'll look forward to your recording for sure... I've subscribed to your YT channel!
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Chopin Prelude op. 28.15 Last update for Romantic Challenge
I think this is considerably better. I reworked some of the fingerings and tried to be a bit more mindful of phrasing (a lot more work in that department but that is what makes this fun
). A few glitches but most of those are of the moment - I have played thru those sections before without any problems. -
Jack Stewart Bravo! What an improvement and very beautifully played. Loved your phrasing and musicality in that performance.
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Jack Stewart Bravo! Great phrasing and lovely interpertation. I agree with Blaise, you're in the right track with this piece. I'm shure you can refine it til the week's end (as you said in your last post), but take your time, this is a piece for a long mature time, like a good wine. Once more, Bravo!
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Jack Stewart Excellent, Jack! You've made giant strides. I love the phrasing and dynamics, especially in the long middle section in minor. Such emotional music!
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Jack Stewart Bravo Jack! forget about the small glitches, you did very well and you had the focus on the larger arcs
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Dale Needles Thanks Dale. I appreciate your support.
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Moyses Lopes Thanks Moyses. This will certainly take time to grow into, but I feel I at least have a solid base to start.
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Eric Phillips Thanks Eric. The initial theme is very nice but it is the middle section that really sets this piece apart. And then when the original theme returns it is at a whole new level. Thanks for your support.
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Blaise Laflamme Thanks Blaise. Unfortunately most of my glitches are because I did forget.
Thanks for your support.
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Experiment with reverb
As most of you know, I am not very good when it comes to technology and creating a good sounding video. This morning, I figured out how to add some reverb (it took me about an hour to figure it out!). Here is my video of Tarrega's Adelita, but this time with some reverb added. If you don't mind, could you let me know how you think it sounds? Is it too much?
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Eric Phillips that's definitely a huge improvement!! Compared to your original version it's more loud and compressed, I would personally try to adjust a bit those, as for the reverb itself it's a matter of taste... like for sauce!
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End of the Year Challenge: Finish Strong!
