The Dance Challenge Week Four
Let’s dance!
In this community-driven challenge, we will be playing dance music. So, choose a piece from any time period, location, or culture that is set to a dance rhythm. Whether it be an Italian Saltarello, an Argentinian Tango, or something in between, let’s get our toes tapping and our fingers dancing across the guitar strings.
This challenge will last four weeks, until Saturday, June 7th. A new thread will be posted each week.
Week Three brought us music from Lauro, Aguado, Rodrigo, and De Visee. Hopefully this last week will bring more people and composers out.
If there are any beginners looking for suggested pieces, please feel free to ask the community.
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Aguado - Waltzes 7 and 8 from Opus 8
Here are the last two pieces from this opus of dances.
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Eric Phillips These Aguado waltzes are very charming, Eric, especially #7. You perform them beautifully. #7 has a gentle dramatic elegance (if that makes any sense) with a stately 'B' section, while #8 is much more playful. Excellent!
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Eric Phillips Like many of the pieces in these recent challenges I hadn't heard these before. Really lovely little waltzes, beautifully played, thanks Eric!
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Lauro - Triptico (June 1)
Here is my first recording of the entire set of three pieces in one take from memory. Still lots of work to be done, but I hope to get it close to a performance level by the end of the challenge this week.
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Eric Phillips So lovely to hear all three together - beautiful, well done Eric! Do you have any tips for memorisation?
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Ron Thanks, Ron. I don't think I am particularly good at memorizing music. My method is mostly just to play the piece a lot. That said, here are a few things that I do when I decide to memorize a piece:
- I am always aware of the underlying "chord progression" of a piece as I play. I can't tell you the last time I wrote out a formal analysis of a score, but just being aware of the logic of the harmonies helps a lot. Naturally, this only applies to tonal music (which is almost everything I play).
- I make a point of playing without a score as early as possible, but I also periodically come back to the score, to ensure that I am not memorizing something wrong and to reinforce the "mental score" I have in my mind's eye when I play from memory.
- I vary my tempo a lot when practicing, playing the piece very slowly, slowly, and at tempo. I think this keeps me from over-relying on muscle memory.
I do still find some music nearly impossible to memorize for some reason (ex. most everything by Bach). Ironically, as much as I love to play Sor, most of his music I find quite difficult to memorize. Tarrega and Villa-Lobos, however, I find to be generally easier to memorize, maybe because they are more "guitaristic"?
I hope something in there is at least a little helpful!
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Eric Phillips Incredible how your progression is with new pieces!
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Eric Phillips Thank you very much Eric that's really useful.
Although I have a sense of the chord progressions I don't think I'm consciously aware of them in every piece - that's something I will certainly try.
I probably play with the score too much, although there are certainly some pieces that seem to stick with me easier than others. I had a couple of occasions lately where I've found I was playing something wrong even with score, so I'm trying to be sure I do actually read it properly and not guess!
I do a lot of very slow practice - particularly since watching Lukasz's videos, but perhaps I need to try to play a tempo more just to see which bits work and which bits really do need more slow practice.
Thank you once again, much appreciated!
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After a break in week 2 and 3, there now is this Allemande from the first Lutesuite bij JS Bach.
Not perfect yet, but for most of us recognizable as the piece it is.
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Bart Versteeg That is more than just recognizable, Bart - it is quite beautiful!
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Eric Phillips Thank you!
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Bart Versteeg Great work, Bart. You have this challenging piece well under your fingers. BWV 996 is probably my favorite of the Lute Suites. Marcin Della and Sharon isbn are two of my favorite performers of this suite ( two of many favorites!)
I am looking forward to see your progress on this.
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End of the Year Challenge: Finish Strong!
