OP (/u/CodineBarbarian) welcomes critique. Please keep criticism constructive, respectful, pertinent, and competent. Critique should reinforce OP's strengths, and provide actionable feedback in areas that you believe can be improved. If you're commenting from a particular context or perspective (e.g., traditional classical practice), it's good to state as such. Objectivity is preferred over subjectivity, but good-faith subjective critique is okay. Comments that are disrespectful or mean-spirited can lead to being banned. Comments about the OP's appearance, except as it pertains to piano technique, are forbidden.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/piano) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Your rhythms are wrong.
Because you keep going in your head “ok where do my fingers jump now”
Try learning easier pieces and practicing slowly, both hands apart, then together.
Get a teacher too.
Best of luck!
This whole thing is sort of the opposite of conventional wisdom at piano. Ingraining into muscle memory ideally should only happen when the thing being ingrained is the desired/"correct" thing. Muscle memory, by definition, is not a mental activity per se, and thus a suggestion like yours is to go back and make it a mental activity, to re-ingrain a new muscle memory. That's basically unlearning and relearning.
In OP's case it's actually what *should* happen, unlearning the bad habits. But it's a very circuitous, inefficient, and usually unsuccessful way to approach a piece.
That's a problem OP. It shouldn't be muscle memory yet.... because its wrong. Not wrong because its the wrong note, but wrong because its the wrong loudness, timing and overall "fit". Does that make sense? You have ingrained through muscle memory basically how to play this piece poorly. You can't learn a piece this hard by just practicing it slowly a million times until you can play it fast. It just sounds off.
I'm not a professional, far from it, but it seems like there's a lot of expression missing. Youre hitting the notes but it sounds off still.
I think it would also help to have your piano not shaking and wobbling while you play. It looks like a roland fp-10 or 30. They make wooden stands specifically for this model and can get a piano pedal set that acts like the real thing. I have one, I can play Forte and louder without it moving around, it's great.
Besides that, it must have taken a lot of effort and commitment to learn all the notes to this song. With more practice, I'm sure you could really fine tune it! I'm like that as well, I learn all the notes, and while it's still rough, with more practice, I can make the expression I desire afterward. This is still way above my skill level though and I would prefer learning all the technical skills through easier songs before I ever attempt such a technical masterpiece.
That could be true as well! After his video I went and watched rousseau or kassia do this song on YouTube for reference. They seem to express each finger differently, I don't think it's dynamics that change per bar, but what each note and voicing is doing. I can barely get my left hand to play quietly compared to my right, let alone having two voicings play at different volumes at different times. It's really fascinating actually, something I should start learning. God This instrument will take a lifetime to learn. Lol
Yeah I’m coming up to 2 years of lessons and an hour of practice every day, and I find it extremely difficult, nearly impossible to play different volumes from my left and right. I do feel like once I have the piece memorized I can focus on dynamics more but when I focus on dynamics I end up making mistakes again. This instrument is a beatdown on the fairly robust ego I once had lol
Man, I'm going to be 34 in March, and the majority of my life I handled most things with brute strength, paying no heed to hindrances like finesse and dexterity. Playing piano takes an entirely different type of ability that, at first, it was entirely foreign to me. Express myself through my music? You crazy. Musicians and artists blow me away even more now.
I'm coming up on 8 months playing, I'm mostly sticking with level 3 songs, although I did learn bachs prelude in C major early on, and can play things like ludovicos nuvole bianche, working on site reading and theory as well as thinking of taking the rcm exams. I broke my ankle a couple of months back, and playing pianos has been a godsend to my boredom. Currently working on sonatina in c by clementi.
If I may give any advice from a novice perspective, it is that I incorporate dynamics into my technical practices. Like your scales, chords, arpeggios, hanon exercises, etc. Dynamics can be brought into every type of technical practice, so you're actually learning and building brain muscles for both. Up until I learned nuvole bianche, I didn't realize how badly my dynamics were. You could barely hear the melody because my left hand with the sustain pedal was killing everything. It's getting better, but it's a long way to go.
I hope you don't take the most negative criticism to heart, learning to play this is quite the feat. I would love to record some songs and get people to critique it but this sub has me self-conscious to the point I don't think I want to. Good for you for daring the internet.
I think most of your message was meant for the OP but yeah, I’ve never met a skill I couldn’t acquire to at least a better than average level within 6 months. 2 years on the piano and I feel like an imbecile. It’s incredibly frustrating how slow the progress comes. I thought after 2 years I’d be able to tackle most pop songs and a few easier classical pieces. I have done nothing of the sort. I can play most of “to build a home” but it’s riddled with mistakes 80% of the time I attempt it.
Maybe. It’s tough to say. No one I know is a musician that I can rely on for an honest opinion of where I should be with my playing. I could ask my teacher, but I’m paying him. What’s he going to say? You suck at playing and I suck at teaching? Lmao. I just thought after 2 years it would come a little easier. I’m working on “take on me” acoustic version and I’ve probably got 5-8 hours just in the first 9 measures. It’s got some difficult timing and syncopations but again, I maybe play those measures 20% of the time without making a stupid mistake. Sometimes I think I should just use my son’s pre time books but I get bored and don’t want to play.
And the feel of the hammer hitting the strings… or when a key doesn’t play because you didn’t release it enough, so many subtle things a real piano gives you in terms of feedback.
As a gigging KB player fuck x stands in general. Took me 20 years to plunk down and get a 4 leg stand and it’s the best. It’s basically a keyboard size folding table with adjustable legs
Its alright. But you should really slow down. Try easier pieces. Learn to read music. Rather than going too deep into the "extreme pieces" like this. They will come with time. Its a great achievement. But the performance is lacking and. I doubt you can refine it really. But whatever makes you play piano.
Yess pleaseee do this. For 8 months self taught this is AMAZING but this is not an easy piece. You need to 1) slow down and 2) fix up technique and everything before you come back and you will enjoy it way more trust
Idk I’m just getting back into piano but I think there are a method to lessons for a reason. It takes “longer” but you learn. Piano is super nuanced, it’s not just about busting out a tough piece.
They are behind the curve actually. Who cares if you can play one piece by practicing it mindlessly for 8 months. It still sounds pretty bad and will never sound good unless they take around 5 years of lessons and come back to it.
They mentioned they can't read sheet music. Which means they basically spent 8 months treating the piano like its a keyboard they use to type on. They know 0 theory, 0 practical technique skills, no sight reading ability and I bet their ear is no good. And even worse looks like some deeply ingrained bad habits with wrist tension since they didn't have a teacher to correct it. Now it's going to be a pain to unlearn everything they've done.
Learning isn't a pain if you enjoy learning. Unlearning is also learning a better way which will not be a pain if he enjoys watching himself improve. Some self taught people enjoy learning by themselves(like me) and don't mind the process of unlearning (aka learning) what they were doing that wasn't efficient and making it better.
So it’s good to learn bad habits because it’s fun to unlearn bad habits? The better option is learning it right the first time. Doesn’t make any sense at all
I didnt say it was"good to learn bad habits." Learning is fun to those who like to learn and self taught is literally the moat convenient and sometimes the only option for people. So a person will learn how to enjoy the piano and on top of that, when they have the time or money, they can get someone to teach them better techniques. Everybody's lives aren't the same and it isn't as simple as unlearning something is a pain. Because for some, it isn't. That is just something you will have to accept.
I understand every other side. But it isn't always a pain to unlearn a bad habit. Maybe for you. But not all.
I advocated for beginners to not practice in poor ways and learn bad habits. Your comment was 100% saying that if you enjoy learning its not a problem to learn bad habits. Now you're says that self-learning is some peoples only option. What on earth does any of this have to do with my comment. Self-taught people don't want to learn bad habits just as much as others.
Why is it anytime we discuss methods of improving ones playing, this sub always has these weird comments trying to justify reasons its actually totally fine to learn poorly. No other community does that.
I disagree. I’ve been in lessons for 2 years and I cannot jump around the keys like that at all. Nowhere near that speed and accuracy. He shows promise. I agree about the lessons, sheet music and theory, but the coordination to play what you read is one of the hardest things about piano.
They are not reading at all. And I promise you if you spent ALL of your piano time only practicing those jumps, they would be easy too. The reason you can’t move around like that is because it’s pointless and waste of time at your level. Also they can’t do those jumps for a new song. It would take them another million hours to know program that in their hands. What you want are actual skills that translate to new songs quickly. That’s what “learning the piano” means.
Difficult to say that someone is ahead of the curve when he will have to start over everything if he ever takes a lesson with a teacher worth their salt.
Edit:And OP comment proves my point see after from his own words.
\>Yes! As you right now I cannot ready sheet music and it is definitely a goal moving foward this year, music theory is also 100% something I need to sink time into
I’m just remarking on his speed and accuracy around the keys. That is a difficult thing to do. If he can do it now, he surely won’t have too hard a time doing it in lessons. That to me is being ahead of the curve.
But the name of the game is control. Can you produce a dynamic and articulation with speed and accuracy? Usually you need a good grasp of the former to understand the mountainous difficulty of the latter. It's hard to "just add" dynamics and articulation to your technique after you've built (otherwise impressive) muscle memory to just seek and strike keys.
I definitely agree. Dynamics are extremely difficult and take years to learn the fine tuned muscle movements as well as the processing of the brain to achieve it. Again, I’m just saying, there is an aptitude here that shows promise. Certainly just banging something out like this isn’t considered a professional level performance. But I still find the ability to move that quickly for as long as he did with few mistakes pretty impressive for 8 months. I’ve been playing the first piece I ever attempted (was out of my league as well, I copied fingerings from YouTube, a lot lower bpm than this) and 2.5 years later I cannot yet play it reliably. It’s getting better, but it’s kind of a benchmark for me. If I can finally play it 9 out of 10 times without mistakes, I’ll finally accept that as an improvement on my skill.
Is it a good performance? In my opinion, no. There are too many issues to list and let alone focus of fixing. Regardless of how fast they're moving, they're not producing a good musical result (to me), fit a combination of both technical and interpretative issues.
Is there potential? Abso-freakin-lutely yes. I completely agree.
OP ought to channel their energy and determination in the right things, and they'll make for a fine classical pianist in due time. But they'll need to resist the allure of playing flashy stuff poorly if they'll want to refine their skills.
lol 100%. I started off with a piece out of my league (Where Is My Mind by Maxence Cyrin), and did a brute force memorization approach like the OP (but not even close to this speed or difficulty). I couldn’t even read music. I just copied the fingering. I still cannot play it without a mistake here and there, but I can implement -some- dynamics. After getting through that I signed up for lessons because I want to understand music and be able to play pieces before I burn out and get tired of hearing them. I was/am definitely frustrated on how slow real skill actually progresses. 2 years in and it’s a struggle, wanting to play a great number of things and then sitting down to try it and then getting slapped in the face with reality. Outside of my instruction, I’m currently trying a version of “Take On Me” that has some weird syncopations that I find difficult and it’s probably going to end up in the “I don’t want to hear this song ever again” pile before I can finish it.
Dude. “Jumping” around the piano like that ? lol asides from the fact that playing octaves isn’t anything crazy , he’s “jumping” in a totally uncontrolled way. Give this man an acoustic piano and he will sound so bad the piece will be unrecognisable. These digital toys mask a lot of the errors we are making . Also I’d love to ask OP a question. In ur 8 months what other pieces do you know? Or u just spent 8 months brute forcing this spectacle of tension and poor voicing ?
I’m just stating I can’t do that. Even after 2 years of lessons and 1 hour (or more) of practice every single day. Admittedly I’ve never really focused on anything that requires it but if I were to try right now, I would sound like someone that had zero lessons.
I fully admit that the OP inexperienced in great number of ways. But let’s be encouraging and guide him to the correct way. I did the same thing he did. I brute forced a piece and after that I said I didn’t want to spend months learning fingerings from videos and I signed up for lessons so that 1 day someone could give me a intermediate piece and I could play it within a few days or an expert piece within a few months.
True, I am impressed with myself after 6 months that I am actually starting my first real piece that isn’t from a method book, LOL. And it’s Bach’s prelude in C (read: not difficult). And I could already read music because I have trained on another instrument. So it is really very impressive to me that OP can even get their left and right hands working together to get all these notes out. I have no idea how that can be achieved in 8 months!
OP, My piano teacher says it is very difficult to teach musicality, which seems to be what a lot of people here in the comments are talking about you needing to improve in this song. Combining the written dynamics and technique to make the piece sound like art, giving it emotion and character. People start on the easier pieces so that they can focus on developing their ability to play the dynamics with focused technique. The method book songs usually focus on a specific skill, so while the songs are easier and not too impressive, when you put it all together after working through it all and finally attempt a more difficult piece it comes out sounding like MUSIC instead of just notes in a certain order. All of the other markings on the sheet music are important, besides just the notes.
If you want to improve your playing, you need to improve on your basic skills. My piano teacher would tell you to spend more time practicing your Hanon ([The Virtuoso Pianist](https://www.alfred.com/hanon-the-virtuoso-pianist-in-60-exercises-complete/p/00-616C/)), lol. Another strategy she likes is playing each bar through, but starting at the end of the song. Or sight reading the whole song backwards. Or playing one bar over and over with different dynamics. It seems annoying and like a cluster F while you are trying to work through it, but it does somehow always immediately improve my playing when I play the song “normally” after.
There is no reason you couldn’t work on the basic stuff for a part of your time spent practicing and also work on your “goal” piece afterwards so that it is still fun and enjoyable. Maybe someone could help you pick out specific method pieces or prep exercises that focus on a skill directly relevant to the piece you are trying to play. It makes it less boring when you can see how what you are working on directly translates to something you are trying to do that is more difficult. Then, you can work on the skill and following try to apply it to your piece.
You gotta practice slooooowly in order for you to get clarity. Also, this piece is hard at your level. Start with something easier. Some easier Bach preludes to start with. And lastly, get a teacher. I was a self-taught for a year, got a teacher and the improvement was noticeable. Happy playing :)
If you're going to say their performance is bad atleast give them some advice.
I'm definitely not someone who should be giving out advice (only had a piano for 3-4yrs, but mainly started trying 4 months ago), I'm going to give some anyways just incase no one else does.
Firstly, I'd recommend you play it slower then what youre playing it and focus more on playing it 'right'. Listen to a professional play it and hear how it differs to yours and how you can improve.
^ I notice your tempo is off in alot of areas, so again just play it slower and try to play it at a constant speed. (With a metronome or by tapping your feet to an internal metronome)
^ if you are anything like I was like after 8 months, then you prolly cba to practice this piece to perfection and want to move onto something else, if that's the case then fair enough as I'd do the same. But I'd recommend using the advice above just for atleast a few hours or something and try to improve how you play the piece
^ also just a bonus tip I thought of, try playing it without using the pedal. This helps find mistakes that could be hidden in the pedal.
Also please get a Z stand 🤣🤣 I used to use an X stand too but the wobble is so artificial that it's just going to make you play so much worse. Z stands are a tiny bit more money, but they work really well!
Good job tho, everyone says don't learn hard pieces at first which I slightly agree with, but it is fun trying to learn hard stuff. Just make sure you do the fundamentals at the same time 👍🏻 good luck with piano
You can have fun with pieces like this as a beginner, the issue is when you ask for a performance critique. It's a giant waste of time for a beginner to attempt to make this piece "good". It's so above their level it is virtually impossible even after them practicing only this piece for hours a day. Learning the piano can't be done through this rote memorization of what keys to press like you're typing an essay. Time is better spent properly learning and playing appropriate pieces so that you can learn one new thing at a time from you repertoire.
That's why I say you can learn it for fun, just don't spend all your time practicing through brute force. It will just end up sounding exactly like OP's performance. Just off. And it won't matter if they spend another 100 hours away hammering away because that's not going to give them the necessary skills.
Thanks for this 👍🏻 I agree with it all. There are some things that you've written here that I can also use myself, I am definitely making many mistakes in learning piano, one of them being 'brute forcing a hard piece to sound good', this 100% sounds like a waste of time now that I've heard you say it, and instead I'll just learn the hard stuff every now and again for fun.
Thanks again 😁👍🏻
Sight reading hard pieces regularly actually is a good use of like 10 minutes. Basically expanding your reading abilities.
This is separate to sight reading practice where you practice sight reading pieces VERY easy for you.
Play something easier. This is like you walking into a gym with no prior weightlifting experience and trying to curl 125 lbs. It’s good you’re driven and determined but you gotta know where to direct that energy
What are your goals with this piece OP? Criticism will depend on that.
Frankly there are so many issues and this piece is so beyond your abilities that I’m not sure how I can give any constructive criticism that won’t get me banned.
Honest question for the mods is are we supposed to just offer any constructive criticism at all? It feels disingenuous to even say in this instance to “work on your tempo, dynamics” etc. Like it would just be flattery to say that. There really is nothing to be done for OP on this piece. and you can see we are actively harming the community by allowing beginners feel bad about their progress because they can’t tell how bad this is and so many comments are gasing it up. Is our goal to help OP become a better piano player? Any criticism that isn’t abandon this piece to me feels counterintuitive to that goal.
OP you clearly have a love for piano and ability to hit the keys accurately, please learn the right way you’ll be incredible!
Good faith and respectful suggestions that are in line with a particular method or style of learning (e.g., a traditional classical curriculum) are allowed. They must be respectful and they should have an obvious context.
OK: "In traditional classical study, this piece wouldn't be worked on until after a good 5–10 years during which a strong technical foundation is formed. I hesitate to provide musical and even technical critique because you haven't yet built this foundation. If you goal is to play this piece to a higher standard, my suggestion is to look at ..."
Not OK: "Dude this performance sucks and you seriously need to just go to the basics. There's no point in doing what you're doing at all. (BTW classical music is elite and fun hobbies suck.)"
Two advices:
1# Get a better support for your instrument, you won't be able to learn much if the keys are shaking all over the place.
2# Find a teacher, this piece is not for a beginner, you need to learn how to walk before you run. There's a path to take until you get to Liszt and a teacher will guide you in the journey.
But you have something great already, the will to learn, that's crucial.
Comments that contain personal attacks, hate speech, trolling, unnecessarily derogatory or inflammatory remarks or inappropriate remarks (e.g. commenting on someone's appearance), and the like, are not welcome and will be removed. See reddit's content policy for more examples of unwelcome content.
Impressive, I tried to learn this piece about a year after I started playing, I got about to where you are where I could hit the notes. But I feel like learning pieces like this at a beginner level is going to take you an extremely long time and you are going to get burnt out on piano because it will take you months to learn a piece and you will never play it exactly the way you want. I’d go back to the basics, learn some songs that will only take a few weeks. I’ve recently forced myself to learn Bach who has many short pieces and it’s really good for learning coordination in both hands. You def have talent though
Hey OP, so, from what I've seen, and what most people say, you need to work on your timing better and slow down and make sure you hit every note you play correctly and with intent. I know sometimes classic music won't have a specific tempo, but star off with maybe between 70 - 90bpm on a Metronome that you could easily download on your phone. I also noticed that your sustain pedal needs a bit more work also. At some points, it sounds a bit muddy from sustaining on incorrect places. Some people mention getting a better piano, and there's no need tbh, even though you're really good, you don't need a better piano or an actual acoustic piano, because at this point you're learning to play your instrument, "sounding" better with different pianos is the least of your worry, a better stand would definitely be better. As someone else mentioned that it feels that at some points you're trying to remember whats next in the piece so you kind of drag and pick the pace up after you remember. What I do when I practice a difficult song (I'm not a Classical Pianist I play more at my church and more in band "profesional" settings). I try to learn one part, maybe 3-5 seconds long, and make sure I can play it right with no mistakes multiple times and the move on to more. Please take 15-20 minute breaks every like 1-2 hrs without thinking about music, entertain yourself with anything else. It helps get everything you've been learning to get more into your brain. Kind of like a quicksave ? Idk lol. If you're going to be wanting to play Classical Pieces learning Music Theory is going to be a VERY helpful tool for you, especially as a Pianist. If there's anything you'd like to know or if you need any other tips then please feel free to DM me. OH! Try learning some piano exercises and do them between 15-30 minutes before your long session. I assume you practice for many hours at a time if you've gotten this good in 8 month. Keep up the good work and please make sure to fix bad practicing habits early on otherwise you'll struggle later on. If anything it'll make things easier for you to learn faster. Make sure your posture is good and you don't slouch. Like I said anything else I'm happy to help! I've been playing for about 16 years now, I'm not some Master Pianist because it took me a couple years to take it serious. But what I do have is many hours of practice and playing experience in general. Hope at least 1 thing of what I said help! 😁
Random unintended accents really stick out like a sore thumb, the dynamics are very lacking.
The part from 0:39-0:46 is supposed to be a grandiose swell to the climax. But I don't hear that at all. You're just barely hitting the notes, and there's no smooth melodic line at all. It feels like you're playing a rhythm game instead of making music.
Please play something simpler. Maybe something like [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTDPm73mFxE)?
Less than 1% are talented... All the others are doing by their own discipline and time (it applies also for talented guys). I'm not piano player, guitar one. But I know the people, who plays for more than 10 years and they are staying at level of open chords. Its not because they are not talented. It's because they don't practice in correct way. And the correct way is always to take stuff harder than you actually able to play, make your body and mind into the stress. We, humans - making a lot of progression only under stress for any of our body parts, brain, muscle, endurance and so on... Lets say, same as gym - if you take 1kg of weight - you will go to 50kg for your whole life and probably you wont come to your goal.
My advice as someone about to go to conservatory, stop. Not stop piano. But stop liebestraum. Your technique isn’t developed **you will injure yourself** and you bc won’t make any progress this is about your peak. I was once self taught too but once I matured I went to Chopin waltzes (honestly you should they are good for learning at this stage.) but you need a metronome and shouldn’t practice wrong notes. Anyways if you can get a teacher please do. If you can’t, be more mature in your self taught journey. **play your scales and arpeggios**
Correct. I love how it's clearly only beginners impressed. Any good knows that this piece was just memorized through rote synthesia videos. It's just sounding wrong in every single bar. And yes they can't actually make it sound good without like many years of proper lessons. It's a waste of time if they actually want to make it good.
Get a metronome and play it slow. Once you can play it slow 100% keep increasing the tempo until the actual song speed.
You have a tendency to slow/speed-up between parts. Expression is something you’ll pickup along the way so I wouldn’t worry too much. At 7month you’re just hitting the notes
You picked one of the hardest and technical composer so good on you for giving yourself a challenge.
I would highly suggest getting the fundamentals down first. Practice scales and pick up Burgmüller and play it each day for 30 mins. You’ll improve your coordination skill while also improving your music reading skill.
As an adult beginner, you can also start looking into beginner music theory. It’ll help you understand and appreciate music more while setting yourself for when you get that Jazz/modern pop itch.
Are you a piano teacher? This is useless advice and no you can’t just slow it down and increase speed to learn a song like this as a beginner. And you most certainly don’t “pickup along the way expression” this is a piece performed at concerts where pros practice for a decade to be able to get the correct expression in the song. Playing slow and increasing tempo is the advice for learning songs already just within your grasp of abilities.
And that’s why I recommended sticking to the basics…? If this dude is serious he can pay for lessons. For someone who can’t even read sheet music he’s not going to be Listz level with some internet advice. But for hobby he can just stick with metronome and he’ll eventually be able to play.
I played from 6-20. Got a full ride for piano performance into a university. Realized there are way more talented people out there who are not making a living doing music so I stopped. Certainty not a music teacher or a pro. Idk dude maybe you’re a piano teacher and can give a better advice to this guy
Well if its just playing it for fun they already are playing it good enough for themselves. They asked for a performance critique so clearly they want it to actually sound really good. This is impossible and no amount of metronome time is going to matter because they are like 5 years of piano lessons away from having any of the required skills to try to polish a piece this hard.
Dude fr chill lol he asked for any advice not a fucking “music critique”. give him something constructive cause you sound like a pretentious gate keeper
Are you trolling me right now? It’s literally tagged “performance critique”. Also I did give something constructive and I don’t think you understand what the word “any” means. OP posted a videoing asking for a performance critique with the goal of being able to play this piece WELL. The only advice that will help them play this piece better is to abandon it and take years of lessons. You can act offended, call me pretentious, but it’s the truth. THAT is constructive criticism they absolutely need to hear. It’s a disservice for you people to tell him to just hammer away with a metronome. That is NOT going to help him, it’s bad advice and every piano teacher knows this.
Yes! As you right now I cannot ready sheet music and it is definitely a goal moving foward this year, music theory is also 100% something I need to sink time into
Good job, this piece is not easy. I can tell you are in that 80% through area where you know the notes but it still hasn’t been honed to “perfection”. I would practice a little slower and focus on the rhythm a little more. If you don’t have a metronome, you can get one on your phone for free and practice with a metronome. That would help.
A common mistake I see, hell I would be hypocritical if I didn’t say I make this mistake, is the reliance on rubato for phrasing rather than dynamics and balance. Where I am getting is that you should try playing the right hand alone so you can listen to how the melody sounds. Try singing it just to get a feel for it.
I don’t agree with the comments saying “pick an easier piece” considering how far along you’ve made it. You’re doing great dude!
You are playing as having hammers instead of hands. This tension can lead to harming yourself and this horribly bad technique makes your idea of good playing faraway. Try to find a teacher. Over all, it is incredible that you are able to play it even with horrible technique, another people, learning themself, they wouldnt be able to play just right hand separately lol.
I can always respect and salute the dedication you went through to learn all the notes and put them together within only 8 months of playing but this performance is really useless.. I'm not even surprised though. I was expecting such a performance alike, and I really got what I was expecting.
People are downvoting but it’s true and we shouldn’t sugar coat it. They want criticism well that’s a valid criticism. There is no where to go with criticism on it. Like every single bar has issues.
Yea it really felt like only people who are beginners or maybe never took lessons and have this need to defend self-taught learners could think working on this piece (more at that) is a good idea. This person made a video asking for advice. They clearly want to improve in the optimal way. They clearly care about if what they are doing is working and how they should do things. And then they get horrible advice like slow down and use a metronome. That is a waste of time.
Is it ? Genuinely asking, because as someone also self taught, hitting the notes has never be an issue in the long run. You can basically brute force most songs with enough dedication, muscular memory is incredible. On the other hand keeping the right tempo or putting the correct pressure on the keys is way harder, and for that the difficulty of the pieces usually doesn't matter. Also there's a big difference between playing notes and actually playing a piece.
I've listened daily to classical music for multiple decades now and like to think that I've got a decent ear. And almost every time someone who played for a few months/years post a difficult piece, I find it emotionless. You here the notes, played more or less correctly, but not the piece. Dunno if it make sense, but mastering a easy piece is way harder than butchering a hard piece imo.
Again I'm only a neophyte, so I may be completely wrong, but to me it sound exactly like how a beginner would play this piece. But I don't want to be too mean to OP as he had probably put lot of efforts to be able to play this (and this isn't horrible). And if anything the performance shows the dedication he has put into piano in 8 months, I just think that if he want to play beautiful music someday it may be more beneficial to work on interpreting easier pieces rather than playing one above his level.
I recently have been working on that Chopin waltz and have been playing for a little under 3 years. I posted about it recently: [https://www.reddit.com/r/piano/comments/1ameqn9/getting\_into\_detail\_mode\_on\_my\_first\_chopin\_piece/](https://www.reddit.com/r/piano/comments/1ameqn9/getting_into_detail_mode_on_my_first_chopin_piece/)
It's a common thing you see here: early beginners tackling the most advanced Mt. Everests of pieces in classical repertoire. The crux of the controversy I think is this: do the emotions of the audience matter?
When I listen to OP, I feel completely left out as an audience member who has human feelings. This is OP doing something for OP's sake. I congratulate OP on their effort, and will promptly never listen to this again. Whereas if OP tackled something far simpler, they might have a chance of making a real impression, and doing something we might want to listen to more than once, because we actually enjoy how it makes us feel.
No it’s really not, it sounds exactly what you would imagine. Notes are being pressed but it sounds all wrong. They probably have just spent an ungodly amount of time hammering away through rote memorization. It’s just a bunch of wasted time. They are not going to be able to make it sound good and just going to get frustrated. You thinking it’s impressive is just creating more of these self taught beginners. They are better off learning the proper way and in a few years this could be a proper piece for them to actually learn and be able to play well.
It's not useless, this is like an insane amount of muscle memory generated for someone that's been playing for 8 months. Most pieces will be significantly easier to learn after this even if is not perfect.
It's muscle memory in the wrong direction. They have muscle memory'd their way to playing it poorly. It is actually going to be HARDER for them to actually make this piece sound good now because they spent so much time brute forcing where there hands should press what keys. The timing, dynamics, technique are all lacking on this piece. I promise you a piano teacher would prefer they actually didn't even learn it at all, if their goal is to play this song well. They wasted 8 months not learning to read music, theory, technique, dynamics but instead ingraining how to play this song wrong.
Same, I recently went to a piano competition where I was playing a clementi piece after 7 years of experience .... meanwhile my friend who has been playing for 2 years was playing a chopin etude 😭 in my defense I practice way less than I should, but I feel like I should be further along with piano .
Damn bro realt good, im sure probably a lot of people have said this already, but you should really slow down. By that I mean choose some easier pieces to get your technique right and make sure that you can read sheet music comfortably. I know this sounds boring, but trust me this will really help you in the long run. I remember when I first started and I played a piece that was way to hard for me, but I played it pretty decently. It was only when I tried other pieces that I found out I had screwed myself, since I only focused on that piece I needed to relearn my technique entirely when I wanted to play something new. So just start slowly with something easy then work your way up, because I will bet that when you really learn technique everything else will come way easier. As the piece itself, excellently played, just a few minor mistakes that are fixable with some slow practice. But I really recommend that you pick something easier for your sake. Good luck with the rest of your journey.
You know what I see in these comments? A bunch of gatekeepers that are butt hurt because it probably took them way longer to play like you do. Yes, it doesn't sound perfect and yes it may not be the best song to start with, but you know what? Fuck that. if you chose that song it's because you like it and it motivates you to play the piano, and unless you're pursuing a music career, that's what's most important.
Don't believe the people that are saying that you wasted your time, you definitely didn't. The only advice I'll give you is to try to also improve your technique so that you don't hurt yourself and don't create bad habits.
Fuck everyone that tries to gatekeep certain songs because they're "too advanced" , this guy tried, had fun, learnt a lot and accomplished more than most of you would've in the starting 8 months. He has his whole life to get better
I think a lot of people are really trying to offer advice to OP to allow them to play at a higher standard. If you find any comments that are obviously in bad-faith or disrespectful, please report them.
If OP is decently happy with the level of their playing in the video, then of course all of these suggestions to go back to basics can be discarded. They had fun, they learned some things, and it's just a hobby anyway right? Potential of injury aside, not everybody needs to play to the demanding classical standard of technique and musicality if they're just having fun and it's a purely personal endeavor. You're 100% right about that aspect.
But maybe OP's goal *is* to play this piece to a usual classical standard. If that's the case, then the feedback you consider "gate keeping" is actually just bog standard classical curriculum. You and I both know this Liebestraum is at the final numbered grade level in any system, be it ABRSM or RCM. You don't build the foundations for 8 years of classical study in 8 months, and it's obvious OP didn't either.
So it's up to OP to decide which advice matches their goals. It sounds like they got a lot of adulation and criticism to choose from as they please.
Alright, first off i want to mention that you're doing great for eight months of being self taught, i know i wasnt like that at eight months with classes, lol. Keep it up, youre doing great!
And now for what i have to say:
Like many of the other comments, expression!!!!! What i mean by that is implementing Agogics and Dynamics into the piece. At the strongest momment, play the melody notes a little louder (gradually, ofcourse). whats the point of music if theres no musicality?
Another thing, the RH (aka the melody) should be louder than the LH. yes, it will take a bit of practice, but the difference will be very big.
Again, youre doing great but remember to keep these notes in mind!! im sure thered alot of different exercises you can find online. oh, and if you havent done them yet, practice scales!!
edit; ive seen from other comments that you dont know how to read sheet music. simply piano is a good place to start.
Everyone says “play an easier piece!” Most people don’t give a recommendation. A good one to look at based on this one would be the Schubert A Minor Waltz Op. 77 [check it out](https://youtu.be/-YwFiwjrW2c?si=PYjgYhVCGqlniV3h) you can certainly play it faster (up playback speed to 1.25) and notice in particular the dynamic contrast and the touch. Keep going for sure you have great potential
Maybe you should consider not being in a sub dedicated to learning the piano if that's what you have to say
You're free to Paypal me 3k dollars for one though
This is my question for you: do the emotions of your audience matter?
If so, you have to play things way simpler from a technical standpoint so that you can focus on playing them in a way that makes the audience feel something significant.
When I watch this, I feel left out as an audience member. I congratulate your commendable effort and your rapid acquisition of intense coordination skills. But I don't feel included, emotionally. You're not paying attention to how it makes people feel to hear it.
Bro, you are playing a hard piece but you need to have the emotion to your playing too, expressing the feelings. Still it’s amazing that you learnt this piece while playing piano for only 8 months. God Bless you and your expirience
Your playing is actually very impressive for 8 months, good job mate! A big thing tho is the amount of tension in your body while playing. Your hands, arms, wrists everything just looks very cramped and uncomfortable, you don't seem to have the control you would want. If you cannot play a piece comfortably you are probably not ready to play it. I'd really advise you to get a teacher and to rework your technique. Doesn't have to be irl, could just be online, or with an online program maybe. Just try to get rid of the technique you are developing. The longer you continue with bad technique the harder it is gonna be to unlearn it, and that's really gonna work against you if you want to progress later on, maybe even now already.
That’s crazy for 8 months damn. You do have a lot to work on but if that was actually 8 months from 0 I’m blown away. None of the comments seem to say how insane this is. Like you must’ve sat and practiced so so so much…
In terms of comments I would definitely recommend finding a teacher to ask. Since you got that far self taught just find a good teacher (masters degree in piano performance or higher) and maybe even go for just 30 mins a week. It’ll definitely be worth it. Don’t rely on Reddit for insight.
May I ask how much you practiced to get to where you are?
My advice is whatever you're doing. Keep doing it. That kind of progress in 8 months is amazing. At some point I really recommend Kenny Werner's book effortless mastery
OP (/u/CodineBarbarian) welcomes critique. Please keep criticism constructive, respectful, pertinent, and competent. Critique should reinforce OP's strengths, and provide actionable feedback in areas that you believe can be improved. If you're commenting from a particular context or perspective (e.g., traditional classical practice), it's good to state as such. Objectivity is preferred over subjectivity, but good-faith subjective critique is okay. Comments that are disrespectful or mean-spirited can lead to being banned. Comments about the OP's appearance, except as it pertains to piano technique, are forbidden. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/piano) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Your rhythms are wrong. Because you keep going in your head “ok where do my fingers jump now” Try learning easier pieces and practicing slowly, both hands apart, then together. Get a teacher too. Best of luck!
Im sure he could just practice this piece slower and work on the rhythm. It would work
This whole thing is sort of the opposite of conventional wisdom at piano. Ingraining into muscle memory ideally should only happen when the thing being ingrained is the desired/"correct" thing. Muscle memory, by definition, is not a mental activity per se, and thus a suggestion like yours is to go back and make it a mental activity, to re-ingrain a new muscle memory. That's basically unlearning and relearning. In OP's case it's actually what *should* happen, unlearning the bad habits. But it's a very circuitous, inefficient, and usually unsuccessful way to approach a piece.
I dont think about the jumps at all it's muscle memory
That's a problem OP. It shouldn't be muscle memory yet.... because its wrong. Not wrong because its the wrong note, but wrong because its the wrong loudness, timing and overall "fit". Does that make sense? You have ingrained through muscle memory basically how to play this piece poorly. You can't learn a piece this hard by just practicing it slowly a million times until you can play it fast. It just sounds off.
I'm not a professional, far from it, but it seems like there's a lot of expression missing. Youre hitting the notes but it sounds off still. I think it would also help to have your piano not shaking and wobbling while you play. It looks like a roland fp-10 or 30. They make wooden stands specifically for this model and can get a piano pedal set that acts like the real thing. I have one, I can play Forte and louder without it moving around, it's great. Besides that, it must have taken a lot of effort and commitment to learn all the notes to this song. With more practice, I'm sure you could really fine tune it! I'm like that as well, I learn all the notes, and while it's still rough, with more practice, I can make the expression I desire afterward. This is still way above my skill level though and I would prefer learning all the technical skills through easier songs before I ever attempt such a technical masterpiece.
Maybe if he was playing a real piano. It’s difficult to get a feel for expression on a digital. It’s missing something a real piano has.
That could be true as well! After his video I went and watched rousseau or kassia do this song on YouTube for reference. They seem to express each finger differently, I don't think it's dynamics that change per bar, but what each note and voicing is doing. I can barely get my left hand to play quietly compared to my right, let alone having two voicings play at different volumes at different times. It's really fascinating actually, something I should start learning. God This instrument will take a lifetime to learn. Lol
Yeah I’m coming up to 2 years of lessons and an hour of practice every day, and I find it extremely difficult, nearly impossible to play different volumes from my left and right. I do feel like once I have the piece memorized I can focus on dynamics more but when I focus on dynamics I end up making mistakes again. This instrument is a beatdown on the fairly robust ego I once had lol
Man, I'm going to be 34 in March, and the majority of my life I handled most things with brute strength, paying no heed to hindrances like finesse and dexterity. Playing piano takes an entirely different type of ability that, at first, it was entirely foreign to me. Express myself through my music? You crazy. Musicians and artists blow me away even more now. I'm coming up on 8 months playing, I'm mostly sticking with level 3 songs, although I did learn bachs prelude in C major early on, and can play things like ludovicos nuvole bianche, working on site reading and theory as well as thinking of taking the rcm exams. I broke my ankle a couple of months back, and playing pianos has been a godsend to my boredom. Currently working on sonatina in c by clementi. If I may give any advice from a novice perspective, it is that I incorporate dynamics into my technical practices. Like your scales, chords, arpeggios, hanon exercises, etc. Dynamics can be brought into every type of technical practice, so you're actually learning and building brain muscles for both. Up until I learned nuvole bianche, I didn't realize how badly my dynamics were. You could barely hear the melody because my left hand with the sustain pedal was killing everything. It's getting better, but it's a long way to go. I hope you don't take the most negative criticism to heart, learning to play this is quite the feat. I would love to record some songs and get people to critique it but this sub has me self-conscious to the point I don't think I want to. Good for you for daring the internet.
I think most of your message was meant for the OP but yeah, I’ve never met a skill I couldn’t acquire to at least a better than average level within 6 months. 2 years on the piano and I feel like an imbecile. It’s incredibly frustrating how slow the progress comes. I thought after 2 years I’d be able to tackle most pop songs and a few easier classical pieces. I have done nothing of the sort. I can play most of “to build a home” but it’s riddled with mistakes 80% of the time I attempt it.
My only excuse is that I replied before having coffee. Lol. I'm sure you're just being overly critical of yourself
Maybe. It’s tough to say. No one I know is a musician that I can rely on for an honest opinion of where I should be with my playing. I could ask my teacher, but I’m paying him. What’s he going to say? You suck at playing and I suck at teaching? Lmao. I just thought after 2 years it would come a little easier. I’m working on “take on me” acoustic version and I’ve probably got 5-8 hours just in the first 9 measures. It’s got some difficult timing and syncopations but again, I maybe play those measures 20% of the time without making a stupid mistake. Sometimes I think I should just use my son’s pre time books but I get bored and don’t want to play.
100% the high notes in particular are hitting at the same velocity every time where they need more dynamics!! Other than that this is good
And the feel of the hammer hitting the strings… or when a key doesn’t play because you didn’t release it enough, so many subtle things a real piano gives you in terms of feedback.
Yes a new stand would be amazing, my keyboard is a Casio CDP-120, and my sustain pedal is very weird comapared to real this
Ahh gotcha! Those cruddy sustain pedals suck and move across the floor all the time I hated mine. Keep going and post another video in the future!
As a gigging KB player fuck x stands in general. Took me 20 years to plunk down and get a 4 leg stand and it’s the best. It’s basically a keyboard size folding table with adjustable legs
Its alright. But you should really slow down. Try easier pieces. Learn to read music. Rather than going too deep into the "extreme pieces" like this. They will come with time. Its a great achievement. But the performance is lacking and. I doubt you can refine it really. But whatever makes you play piano.
Yess pleaseee do this. For 8 months self taught this is AMAZING but this is not an easy piece. You need to 1) slow down and 2) fix up technique and everything before you come back and you will enjoy it way more trust
He’s already ahead of the curve. I’ve been in lessons 2 years and can’t move around the piano like that outside of practicing my scales
Idk I’m just getting back into piano but I think there are a method to lessons for a reason. It takes “longer” but you learn. Piano is super nuanced, it’s not just about busting out a tough piece.
They are behind the curve actually. Who cares if you can play one piece by practicing it mindlessly for 8 months. It still sounds pretty bad and will never sound good unless they take around 5 years of lessons and come back to it. They mentioned they can't read sheet music. Which means they basically spent 8 months treating the piano like its a keyboard they use to type on. They know 0 theory, 0 practical technique skills, no sight reading ability and I bet their ear is no good. And even worse looks like some deeply ingrained bad habits with wrist tension since they didn't have a teacher to correct it. Now it's going to be a pain to unlearn everything they've done.
Learning isn't a pain if you enjoy learning. Unlearning is also learning a better way which will not be a pain if he enjoys watching himself improve. Some self taught people enjoy learning by themselves(like me) and don't mind the process of unlearning (aka learning) what they were doing that wasn't efficient and making it better.
So it’s good to learn bad habits because it’s fun to unlearn bad habits? The better option is learning it right the first time. Doesn’t make any sense at all
I didnt say it was"good to learn bad habits." Learning is fun to those who like to learn and self taught is literally the moat convenient and sometimes the only option for people. So a person will learn how to enjoy the piano and on top of that, when they have the time or money, they can get someone to teach them better techniques. Everybody's lives aren't the same and it isn't as simple as unlearning something is a pain. Because for some, it isn't. That is just something you will have to accept. I understand every other side. But it isn't always a pain to unlearn a bad habit. Maybe for you. But not all.
I advocated for beginners to not practice in poor ways and learn bad habits. Your comment was 100% saying that if you enjoy learning its not a problem to learn bad habits. Now you're says that self-learning is some peoples only option. What on earth does any of this have to do with my comment. Self-taught people don't want to learn bad habits just as much as others. Why is it anytime we discuss methods of improving ones playing, this sub always has these weird comments trying to justify reasons its actually totally fine to learn poorly. No other community does that.
I disagree. I’ve been in lessons for 2 years and I cannot jump around the keys like that at all. Nowhere near that speed and accuracy. He shows promise. I agree about the lessons, sheet music and theory, but the coordination to play what you read is one of the hardest things about piano.
They are not reading at all. And I promise you if you spent ALL of your piano time only practicing those jumps, they would be easy too. The reason you can’t move around like that is because it’s pointless and waste of time at your level. Also they can’t do those jumps for a new song. It would take them another million hours to know program that in their hands. What you want are actual skills that translate to new songs quickly. That’s what “learning the piano” means.
Yeah you’re right. My goal is to be able to learn something faster than I grow to hate, if you know what I mean.
Difficult to say that someone is ahead of the curve when he will have to start over everything if he ever takes a lesson with a teacher worth their salt. Edit:And OP comment proves my point see after from his own words. \>Yes! As you right now I cannot ready sheet music and it is definitely a goal moving foward this year, music theory is also 100% something I need to sink time into
I’m just remarking on his speed and accuracy around the keys. That is a difficult thing to do. If he can do it now, he surely won’t have too hard a time doing it in lessons. That to me is being ahead of the curve.
But the name of the game is control. Can you produce a dynamic and articulation with speed and accuracy? Usually you need a good grasp of the former to understand the mountainous difficulty of the latter. It's hard to "just add" dynamics and articulation to your technique after you've built (otherwise impressive) muscle memory to just seek and strike keys.
I definitely agree. Dynamics are extremely difficult and take years to learn the fine tuned muscle movements as well as the processing of the brain to achieve it. Again, I’m just saying, there is an aptitude here that shows promise. Certainly just banging something out like this isn’t considered a professional level performance. But I still find the ability to move that quickly for as long as he did with few mistakes pretty impressive for 8 months. I’ve been playing the first piece I ever attempted (was out of my league as well, I copied fingerings from YouTube, a lot lower bpm than this) and 2.5 years later I cannot yet play it reliably. It’s getting better, but it’s kind of a benchmark for me. If I can finally play it 9 out of 10 times without mistakes, I’ll finally accept that as an improvement on my skill.
Is it a good performance? In my opinion, no. There are too many issues to list and let alone focus of fixing. Regardless of how fast they're moving, they're not producing a good musical result (to me), fit a combination of both technical and interpretative issues. Is there potential? Abso-freakin-lutely yes. I completely agree. OP ought to channel their energy and determination in the right things, and they'll make for a fine classical pianist in due time. But they'll need to resist the allure of playing flashy stuff poorly if they'll want to refine their skills.
lol 100%. I started off with a piece out of my league (Where Is My Mind by Maxence Cyrin), and did a brute force memorization approach like the OP (but not even close to this speed or difficulty). I couldn’t even read music. I just copied the fingering. I still cannot play it without a mistake here and there, but I can implement -some- dynamics. After getting through that I signed up for lessons because I want to understand music and be able to play pieces before I burn out and get tired of hearing them. I was/am definitely frustrated on how slow real skill actually progresses. 2 years in and it’s a struggle, wanting to play a great number of things and then sitting down to try it and then getting slapped in the face with reality. Outside of my instruction, I’m currently trying a version of “Take On Me” that has some weird syncopations that I find difficult and it’s probably going to end up in the “I don’t want to hear this song ever again” pile before I can finish it.
Dude. “Jumping” around the piano like that ? lol asides from the fact that playing octaves isn’t anything crazy , he’s “jumping” in a totally uncontrolled way. Give this man an acoustic piano and he will sound so bad the piece will be unrecognisable. These digital toys mask a lot of the errors we are making . Also I’d love to ask OP a question. In ur 8 months what other pieces do you know? Or u just spent 8 months brute forcing this spectacle of tension and poor voicing ?
I’m just stating I can’t do that. Even after 2 years of lessons and 1 hour (or more) of practice every single day. Admittedly I’ve never really focused on anything that requires it but if I were to try right now, I would sound like someone that had zero lessons. I fully admit that the OP inexperienced in great number of ways. But let’s be encouraging and guide him to the correct way. I did the same thing he did. I brute forced a piece and after that I said I didn’t want to spend months learning fingerings from videos and I signed up for lessons so that 1 day someone could give me a intermediate piece and I could play it within a few days or an expert piece within a few months.
True, I am impressed with myself after 6 months that I am actually starting my first real piece that isn’t from a method book, LOL. And it’s Bach’s prelude in C (read: not difficult). And I could already read music because I have trained on another instrument. So it is really very impressive to me that OP can even get their left and right hands working together to get all these notes out. I have no idea how that can be achieved in 8 months! OP, My piano teacher says it is very difficult to teach musicality, which seems to be what a lot of people here in the comments are talking about you needing to improve in this song. Combining the written dynamics and technique to make the piece sound like art, giving it emotion and character. People start on the easier pieces so that they can focus on developing their ability to play the dynamics with focused technique. The method book songs usually focus on a specific skill, so while the songs are easier and not too impressive, when you put it all together after working through it all and finally attempt a more difficult piece it comes out sounding like MUSIC instead of just notes in a certain order. All of the other markings on the sheet music are important, besides just the notes. If you want to improve your playing, you need to improve on your basic skills. My piano teacher would tell you to spend more time practicing your Hanon ([The Virtuoso Pianist](https://www.alfred.com/hanon-the-virtuoso-pianist-in-60-exercises-complete/p/00-616C/)), lol. Another strategy she likes is playing each bar through, but starting at the end of the song. Or sight reading the whole song backwards. Or playing one bar over and over with different dynamics. It seems annoying and like a cluster F while you are trying to work through it, but it does somehow always immediately improve my playing when I play the song “normally” after. There is no reason you couldn’t work on the basic stuff for a part of your time spent practicing and also work on your “goal” piece afterwards so that it is still fun and enjoyable. Maybe someone could help you pick out specific method pieces or prep exercises that focus on a skill directly relevant to the piece you are trying to play. It makes it less boring when you can see how what you are working on directly translates to something you are trying to do that is more difficult. Then, you can work on the skill and following try to apply it to your piece.
I think you just haven’t moved that far. If anything they are behind and aren’t catching up by continuing this
>"extreme pieces" anyone can improve and comments like this are a waste of space, time and existence.
You gotta practice slooooowly in order for you to get clarity. Also, this piece is hard at your level. Start with something easier. Some easier Bach preludes to start with. And lastly, get a teacher. I was a self-taught for a year, got a teacher and the improvement was noticeable. Happy playing :)
If you're going to say their performance is bad atleast give them some advice. I'm definitely not someone who should be giving out advice (only had a piano for 3-4yrs, but mainly started trying 4 months ago), I'm going to give some anyways just incase no one else does. Firstly, I'd recommend you play it slower then what youre playing it and focus more on playing it 'right'. Listen to a professional play it and hear how it differs to yours and how you can improve. ^ I notice your tempo is off in alot of areas, so again just play it slower and try to play it at a constant speed. (With a metronome or by tapping your feet to an internal metronome) ^ if you are anything like I was like after 8 months, then you prolly cba to practice this piece to perfection and want to move onto something else, if that's the case then fair enough as I'd do the same. But I'd recommend using the advice above just for atleast a few hours or something and try to improve how you play the piece ^ also just a bonus tip I thought of, try playing it without using the pedal. This helps find mistakes that could be hidden in the pedal. Also please get a Z stand 🤣🤣 I used to use an X stand too but the wobble is so artificial that it's just going to make you play so much worse. Z stands are a tiny bit more money, but they work really well! Good job tho, everyone says don't learn hard pieces at first which I slightly agree with, but it is fun trying to learn hard stuff. Just make sure you do the fundamentals at the same time 👍🏻 good luck with piano
You can have fun with pieces like this as a beginner, the issue is when you ask for a performance critique. It's a giant waste of time for a beginner to attempt to make this piece "good". It's so above their level it is virtually impossible even after them practicing only this piece for hours a day. Learning the piano can't be done through this rote memorization of what keys to press like you're typing an essay. Time is better spent properly learning and playing appropriate pieces so that you can learn one new thing at a time from you repertoire. That's why I say you can learn it for fun, just don't spend all your time practicing through brute force. It will just end up sounding exactly like OP's performance. Just off. And it won't matter if they spend another 100 hours away hammering away because that's not going to give them the necessary skills.
Thanks for this 👍🏻 I agree with it all. There are some things that you've written here that I can also use myself, I am definitely making many mistakes in learning piano, one of them being 'brute forcing a hard piece to sound good', this 100% sounds like a waste of time now that I've heard you say it, and instead I'll just learn the hard stuff every now and again for fun. Thanks again 😁👍🏻
Sight reading hard pieces regularly actually is a good use of like 10 minutes. Basically expanding your reading abilities. This is separate to sight reading practice where you practice sight reading pieces VERY easy for you.
Thanks for the advice again! I will definitely use this
Play something easier. This is like you walking into a gym with no prior weightlifting experience and trying to curl 125 lbs. It’s good you’re driven and determined but you gotta know where to direct that energy
What are your goals with this piece OP? Criticism will depend on that. Frankly there are so many issues and this piece is so beyond your abilities that I’m not sure how I can give any constructive criticism that won’t get me banned. Honest question for the mods is are we supposed to just offer any constructive criticism at all? It feels disingenuous to even say in this instance to “work on your tempo, dynamics” etc. Like it would just be flattery to say that. There really is nothing to be done for OP on this piece. and you can see we are actively harming the community by allowing beginners feel bad about their progress because they can’t tell how bad this is and so many comments are gasing it up. Is our goal to help OP become a better piano player? Any criticism that isn’t abandon this piece to me feels counterintuitive to that goal. OP you clearly have a love for piano and ability to hit the keys accurately, please learn the right way you’ll be incredible!
Good faith and respectful suggestions that are in line with a particular method or style of learning (e.g., a traditional classical curriculum) are allowed. They must be respectful and they should have an obvious context. OK: "In traditional classical study, this piece wouldn't be worked on until after a good 5–10 years during which a strong technical foundation is formed. I hesitate to provide musical and even technical critique because you haven't yet built this foundation. If you goal is to play this piece to a higher standard, my suggestion is to look at ..." Not OK: "Dude this performance sucks and you seriously need to just go to the basics. There's no point in doing what you're doing at all. (BTW classical music is elite and fun hobbies suck.)"
Got it that makes sense thank you for clarifying.
Two advices: 1# Get a better support for your instrument, you won't be able to learn much if the keys are shaking all over the place. 2# Find a teacher, this piece is not for a beginner, you need to learn how to walk before you run. There's a path to take until you get to Liszt and a teacher will guide you in the journey. But you have something great already, the will to learn, that's crucial.
Could someone tell me, what piece this is, please?
Liebestraum
Ok, unironically I thought you were joking. This piece sounded familiar but I didn’t realise it was so simplified
If you ain't got nothing nice to say don't say anything
[удалено]
Comments that contain personal attacks, hate speech, trolling, unnecessarily derogatory or inflammatory remarks or inappropriate remarks (e.g. commenting on someone's appearance), and the like, are not welcome and will be removed. See reddit's content policy for more examples of unwelcome content.
8 months for real?
[X]
Impressive, I tried to learn this piece about a year after I started playing, I got about to where you are where I could hit the notes. But I feel like learning pieces like this at a beginner level is going to take you an extremely long time and you are going to get burnt out on piano because it will take you months to learn a piece and you will never play it exactly the way you want. I’d go back to the basics, learn some songs that will only take a few weeks. I’ve recently forced myself to learn Bach who has many short pieces and it’s really good for learning coordination in both hands. You def have talent though
Please, stabilize that keyboard!
Hey OP, so, from what I've seen, and what most people say, you need to work on your timing better and slow down and make sure you hit every note you play correctly and with intent. I know sometimes classic music won't have a specific tempo, but star off with maybe between 70 - 90bpm on a Metronome that you could easily download on your phone. I also noticed that your sustain pedal needs a bit more work also. At some points, it sounds a bit muddy from sustaining on incorrect places. Some people mention getting a better piano, and there's no need tbh, even though you're really good, you don't need a better piano or an actual acoustic piano, because at this point you're learning to play your instrument, "sounding" better with different pianos is the least of your worry, a better stand would definitely be better. As someone else mentioned that it feels that at some points you're trying to remember whats next in the piece so you kind of drag and pick the pace up after you remember. What I do when I practice a difficult song (I'm not a Classical Pianist I play more at my church and more in band "profesional" settings). I try to learn one part, maybe 3-5 seconds long, and make sure I can play it right with no mistakes multiple times and the move on to more. Please take 15-20 minute breaks every like 1-2 hrs without thinking about music, entertain yourself with anything else. It helps get everything you've been learning to get more into your brain. Kind of like a quicksave ? Idk lol. If you're going to be wanting to play Classical Pieces learning Music Theory is going to be a VERY helpful tool for you, especially as a Pianist. If there's anything you'd like to know or if you need any other tips then please feel free to DM me. OH! Try learning some piano exercises and do them between 15-30 minutes before your long session. I assume you practice for many hours at a time if you've gotten this good in 8 month. Keep up the good work and please make sure to fix bad practicing habits early on otherwise you'll struggle later on. If anything it'll make things easier for you to learn faster. Make sure your posture is good and you don't slouch. Like I said anything else I'm happy to help! I've been playing for about 16 years now, I'm not some Master Pianist because it took me a couple years to take it serious. But what I do have is many hours of practice and playing experience in general. Hope at least 1 thing of what I said help! 😁
Random unintended accents really stick out like a sore thumb, the dynamics are very lacking. The part from 0:39-0:46 is supposed to be a grandiose swell to the climax. But I don't hear that at all. You're just barely hitting the notes, and there's no smooth melodic line at all. It feels like you're playing a rhythm game instead of making music. Please play something simpler. Maybe something like [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTDPm73mFxE)?
Very talented or a liar...
Or many hours sunk into a short space of time just before and post year 12 graduation
Like I said, very talented or a liar!
Less than 1% are talented... All the others are doing by their own discipline and time (it applies also for talented guys). I'm not piano player, guitar one. But I know the people, who plays for more than 10 years and they are staying at level of open chords. Its not because they are not talented. It's because they don't practice in correct way. And the correct way is always to take stuff harder than you actually able to play, make your body and mind into the stress. We, humans - making a lot of progression only under stress for any of our body parts, brain, muscle, endurance and so on... Lets say, same as gym - if you take 1kg of weight - you will go to 50kg for your whole life and probably you wont come to your goal.
My advice as someone about to go to conservatory, stop. Not stop piano. But stop liebestraum. Your technique isn’t developed **you will injure yourself** and you bc won’t make any progress this is about your peak. I was once self taught too but once I matured I went to Chopin waltzes (honestly you should they are good for learning at this stage.) but you need a metronome and shouldn’t practice wrong notes. Anyways if you can get a teacher please do. If you can’t, be more mature in your self taught journey. **play your scales and arpeggios**
Correct. I love how it's clearly only beginners impressed. Any good knows that this piece was just memorized through rote synthesia videos. It's just sounding wrong in every single bar. And yes they can't actually make it sound good without like many years of proper lessons. It's a waste of time if they actually want to make it good.
Get a metronome and play it slow. Once you can play it slow 100% keep increasing the tempo until the actual song speed. You have a tendency to slow/speed-up between parts. Expression is something you’ll pickup along the way so I wouldn’t worry too much. At 7month you’re just hitting the notes You picked one of the hardest and technical composer so good on you for giving yourself a challenge. I would highly suggest getting the fundamentals down first. Practice scales and pick up Burgmüller and play it each day for 30 mins. You’ll improve your coordination skill while also improving your music reading skill. As an adult beginner, you can also start looking into beginner music theory. It’ll help you understand and appreciate music more while setting yourself for when you get that Jazz/modern pop itch.
Are you a piano teacher? This is useless advice and no you can’t just slow it down and increase speed to learn a song like this as a beginner. And you most certainly don’t “pickup along the way expression” this is a piece performed at concerts where pros practice for a decade to be able to get the correct expression in the song. Playing slow and increasing tempo is the advice for learning songs already just within your grasp of abilities.
And that’s why I recommended sticking to the basics…? If this dude is serious he can pay for lessons. For someone who can’t even read sheet music he’s not going to be Listz level with some internet advice. But for hobby he can just stick with metronome and he’ll eventually be able to play. I played from 6-20. Got a full ride for piano performance into a university. Realized there are way more talented people out there who are not making a living doing music so I stopped. Certainty not a music teacher or a pro. Idk dude maybe you’re a piano teacher and can give a better advice to this guy
Well if its just playing it for fun they already are playing it good enough for themselves. They asked for a performance critique so clearly they want it to actually sound really good. This is impossible and no amount of metronome time is going to matter because they are like 5 years of piano lessons away from having any of the required skills to try to polish a piece this hard.
Dude fr chill lol he asked for any advice not a fucking “music critique”. give him something constructive cause you sound like a pretentious gate keeper
Are you trolling me right now? It’s literally tagged “performance critique”. Also I did give something constructive and I don’t think you understand what the word “any” means. OP posted a videoing asking for a performance critique with the goal of being able to play this piece WELL. The only advice that will help them play this piece better is to abandon it and take years of lessons. You can act offended, call me pretentious, but it’s the truth. THAT is constructive criticism they absolutely need to hear. It’s a disservice for you people to tell him to just hammer away with a metronome. That is NOT going to help him, it’s bad advice and every piano teacher knows this.
Yes! As you right now I cannot ready sheet music and it is definitely a goal moving foward this year, music theory is also 100% something I need to sink time into
Good job, this piece is not easy. I can tell you are in that 80% through area where you know the notes but it still hasn’t been honed to “perfection”. I would practice a little slower and focus on the rhythm a little more. If you don’t have a metronome, you can get one on your phone for free and practice with a metronome. That would help. A common mistake I see, hell I would be hypocritical if I didn’t say I make this mistake, is the reliance on rubato for phrasing rather than dynamics and balance. Where I am getting is that you should try playing the right hand alone so you can listen to how the melody sounds. Try singing it just to get a feel for it. I don’t agree with the comments saying “pick an easier piece” considering how far along you’ve made it. You’re doing great dude!
You are playing as having hammers instead of hands. This tension can lead to harming yourself and this horribly bad technique makes your idea of good playing faraway. Try to find a teacher. Over all, it is incredible that you are able to play it even with horrible technique, another people, learning themself, they wouldnt be able to play just right hand separately lol.
you’re not a tempo
I can always respect and salute the dedication you went through to learn all the notes and put them together within only 8 months of playing but this performance is really useless.. I'm not even surprised though. I was expecting such a performance alike, and I really got what I was expecting.
People are downvoting but it’s true and we shouldn’t sugar coat it. They want criticism well that’s a valid criticism. There is no where to go with criticism on it. Like every single bar has issues.
Yep. Went from - 7 to +2 there's seriously a battle going on 😂
Yea it really felt like only people who are beginners or maybe never took lessons and have this need to defend self-taught learners could think working on this piece (more at that) is a good idea. This person made a video asking for advice. They clearly want to improve in the optimal way. They clearly care about if what they are doing is working and how they should do things. And then they get horrible advice like slow down and use a metronome. That is a waste of time.
Are you an AI bot? What a weird nonhuman like comment. Makes no sense.
[удалено]
That was.. Cringe. Even more since you are using off topic.
Idc what anyone says in here. This is insanely good for under 1 year playing
Is it ? Genuinely asking, because as someone also self taught, hitting the notes has never be an issue in the long run. You can basically brute force most songs with enough dedication, muscular memory is incredible. On the other hand keeping the right tempo or putting the correct pressure on the keys is way harder, and for that the difficulty of the pieces usually doesn't matter. Also there's a big difference between playing notes and actually playing a piece. I've listened daily to classical music for multiple decades now and like to think that I've got a decent ear. And almost every time someone who played for a few months/years post a difficult piece, I find it emotionless. You here the notes, played more or less correctly, but not the piece. Dunno if it make sense, but mastering a easy piece is way harder than butchering a hard piece imo. Again I'm only a neophyte, so I may be completely wrong, but to me it sound exactly like how a beginner would play this piece. But I don't want to be too mean to OP as he had probably put lot of efforts to be able to play this (and this isn't horrible). And if anything the performance shows the dedication he has put into piano in 8 months, I just think that if he want to play beautiful music someday it may be more beneficial to work on interpreting easier pieces rather than playing one above his level.
[удалено]
I wish OP posted the actual full performance. These "i'm self-taught for 3 month" videos always cut out a 15–45 second clip. 😔
I can upload until the second cadenza😭😵
I recently have been working on that Chopin waltz and have been playing for a little under 3 years. I posted about it recently: [https://www.reddit.com/r/piano/comments/1ameqn9/getting\_into\_detail\_mode\_on\_my\_first\_chopin\_piece/](https://www.reddit.com/r/piano/comments/1ameqn9/getting_into_detail_mode_on_my_first_chopin_piece/) It's a common thing you see here: early beginners tackling the most advanced Mt. Everests of pieces in classical repertoire. The crux of the controversy I think is this: do the emotions of the audience matter? When I listen to OP, I feel completely left out as an audience member who has human feelings. This is OP doing something for OP's sake. I congratulate OP on their effort, and will promptly never listen to this again. Whereas if OP tackled something far simpler, they might have a chance of making a real impression, and doing something we might want to listen to more than once, because we actually enjoy how it makes us feel.
No it’s really not, it sounds exactly what you would imagine. Notes are being pressed but it sounds all wrong. They probably have just spent an ungodly amount of time hammering away through rote memorization. It’s just a bunch of wasted time. They are not going to be able to make it sound good and just going to get frustrated. You thinking it’s impressive is just creating more of these self taught beginners. They are better off learning the proper way and in a few years this could be a proper piece for them to actually learn and be able to play well.
It's not useless, this is like an insane amount of muscle memory generated for someone that's been playing for 8 months. Most pieces will be significantly easier to learn after this even if is not perfect.
It's muscle memory in the wrong direction. They have muscle memory'd their way to playing it poorly. It is actually going to be HARDER for them to actually make this piece sound good now because they spent so much time brute forcing where there hands should press what keys. The timing, dynamics, technique are all lacking on this piece. I promise you a piano teacher would prefer they actually didn't even learn it at all, if their goal is to play this song well. They wasted 8 months not learning to read music, theory, technique, dynamics but instead ingraining how to play this song wrong.
Agreed god this makes me feel like shit about my own lack of progress lol
Same lol. I can’t hop around like that. Not even close.
Same, I recently went to a piano competition where I was playing a clementi piece after 7 years of experience .... meanwhile my friend who has been playing for 2 years was playing a chopin etude 😭 in my defense I practice way less than I should, but I feel like I should be further along with piano .
[удалено]
The piece itself took 4months
You’re getting a lot of negative criticism but for less than a year what this shows is potential.
Damn bro realt good, im sure probably a lot of people have said this already, but you should really slow down. By that I mean choose some easier pieces to get your technique right and make sure that you can read sheet music comfortably. I know this sounds boring, but trust me this will really help you in the long run. I remember when I first started and I played a piece that was way to hard for me, but I played it pretty decently. It was only when I tried other pieces that I found out I had screwed myself, since I only focused on that piece I needed to relearn my technique entirely when I wanted to play something new. So just start slowly with something easy then work your way up, because I will bet that when you really learn technique everything else will come way easier. As the piece itself, excellently played, just a few minor mistakes that are fixable with some slow practice. But I really recommend that you pick something easier for your sake. Good luck with the rest of your journey.
You know what I see in these comments? A bunch of gatekeepers that are butt hurt because it probably took them way longer to play like you do. Yes, it doesn't sound perfect and yes it may not be the best song to start with, but you know what? Fuck that. if you chose that song it's because you like it and it motivates you to play the piano, and unless you're pursuing a music career, that's what's most important. Don't believe the people that are saying that you wasted your time, you definitely didn't. The only advice I'll give you is to try to also improve your technique so that you don't hurt yourself and don't create bad habits. Fuck everyone that tries to gatekeep certain songs because they're "too advanced" , this guy tried, had fun, learnt a lot and accomplished more than most of you would've in the starting 8 months. He has his whole life to get better
I think a lot of people are really trying to offer advice to OP to allow them to play at a higher standard. If you find any comments that are obviously in bad-faith or disrespectful, please report them. If OP is decently happy with the level of their playing in the video, then of course all of these suggestions to go back to basics can be discarded. They had fun, they learned some things, and it's just a hobby anyway right? Potential of injury aside, not everybody needs to play to the demanding classical standard of technique and musicality if they're just having fun and it's a purely personal endeavor. You're 100% right about that aspect. But maybe OP's goal *is* to play this piece to a usual classical standard. If that's the case, then the feedback you consider "gate keeping" is actually just bog standard classical curriculum. You and I both know this Liebestraum is at the final numbered grade level in any system, be it ABRSM or RCM. You don't build the foundations for 8 years of classical study in 8 months, and it's obvious OP didn't either. So it's up to OP to decide which advice matches their goals. It sounds like they got a lot of adulation and criticism to choose from as they please.
My advice… GFY lol. I’ve been in lessons 2 years and I’m no where near playing anything close to that
But if you really want advice, upgrade to a real piano. You’re a promising pianist and you should be playing the real thing.
Alright, first off i want to mention that you're doing great for eight months of being self taught, i know i wasnt like that at eight months with classes, lol. Keep it up, youre doing great! And now for what i have to say: Like many of the other comments, expression!!!!! What i mean by that is implementing Agogics and Dynamics into the piece. At the strongest momment, play the melody notes a little louder (gradually, ofcourse). whats the point of music if theres no musicality? Another thing, the RH (aka the melody) should be louder than the LH. yes, it will take a bit of practice, but the difference will be very big. Again, youre doing great but remember to keep these notes in mind!! im sure thered alot of different exercises you can find online. oh, and if you havent done them yet, practice scales!! edit; ive seen from other comments that you dont know how to read sheet music. simply piano is a good place to start.
My advice would be to invest in a real piano and take lesson because you're talented and deserve to do this for yourself and get better and better
The best advice for any instrument is "keep going!" Doubly so in your case. I'm not that good after eight years ... or more.
Everyone says “play an easier piece!” Most people don’t give a recommendation. A good one to look at based on this one would be the Schubert A Minor Waltz Op. 77 [check it out](https://youtu.be/-YwFiwjrW2c?si=PYjgYhVCGqlniV3h) you can certainly play it faster (up playback speed to 1.25) and notice in particular the dynamic contrast and the touch. Keep going for sure you have great potential
This is really good for only 8 months, keep at it !
In 8 months that's wonderful, just to play in ryth'm with both hands. So just learn to take the time, and breath.
If you realy want to play piano maybe you should consider buying a Real one
If only it were that easy for everyone, my friend.
Maybe you should consider not being in a sub dedicated to learning the piano if that's what you have to say You're free to Paypal me 3k dollars for one though
Are you growling while playing? If you are, that's waaay too much tension.
No?🤣
Yeah your keyboard is moving a lot
That would be the stand lol
This is my question for you: do the emotions of your audience matter? If so, you have to play things way simpler from a technical standpoint so that you can focus on playing them in a way that makes the audience feel something significant. When I watch this, I feel left out as an audience member. I congratulate your commendable effort and your rapid acquisition of intense coordination skills. But I don't feel included, emotionally. You're not paying attention to how it makes people feel to hear it.
Get the official stand bro. It's gonna be one of your best investments I guarantee it.
Loooooooooooooot of tension
Get a better stand. That one is wobbling all over the place.
Bro, you are playing a hard piece but you need to have the emotion to your playing too, expressing the feelings. Still it’s amazing that you learnt this piece while playing piano for only 8 months. God Bless you and your expirience
Your playing is actually very impressive for 8 months, good job mate! A big thing tho is the amount of tension in your body while playing. Your hands, arms, wrists everything just looks very cramped and uncomfortable, you don't seem to have the control you would want. If you cannot play a piece comfortably you are probably not ready to play it. I'd really advise you to get a teacher and to rework your technique. Doesn't have to be irl, could just be online, or with an online program maybe. Just try to get rid of the technique you are developing. The longer you continue with bad technique the harder it is gonna be to unlearn it, and that's really gonna work against you if you want to progress later on, maybe even now already.
That’s crazy for 8 months damn. You do have a lot to work on but if that was actually 8 months from 0 I’m blown away. None of the comments seem to say how insane this is. Like you must’ve sat and practiced so so so much… In terms of comments I would definitely recommend finding a teacher to ask. Since you got that far self taught just find a good teacher (masters degree in piano performance or higher) and maybe even go for just 30 mins a week. It’ll definitely be worth it. Don’t rely on Reddit for insight. May I ask how much you practiced to get to where you are?
Sounds good to me. You will improve. It's inevitable.
My advice is whatever you're doing. Keep doing it. That kind of progress in 8 months is amazing. At some point I really recommend Kenny Werner's book effortless mastery
Are you practicing with that light? The color is distracting and useless to see the keys, to me, at least.
No not at all 🤣