Jingle Bells Rag Challenges

Whew. This piece has been harder than anticipated. (Aren't they always!)

True, it is easier than "Bare Necessities." I didn't expect to breeze through it, but I also didn't expect to still be struggling after six or eight weeks.

It doesn't sound bad. I can play through it pretty well. But it doesn't sound great. It doesn't sound polished. It doesn't sound professional. I don't feel confident about it, and confidence is key.

Some Changes

Granted, I've made some changes that have taken some time to learn.

I've replaced a few of the jumps with octave walkups/walkdowns--partly because I like the sound, but mostly because it allows me to focus more on some tricky jumps in the right hand.

I've also made a few fingering changes that I'm having to re-learn, and that takes time.

The High-Octave "Jingle-Bell" Section

I'm still trying to figure out what to do with the high-octave section toward the end. I go back and forth between playing all of it high, all of it an octave lower, or half low and half high. And I can't decide whether to play the one little dissonant part in the higher octave or the lower octave. As written, it's all in the higher octave, but I can't hear it due to my high-frequency hearing loss, and I'd rather play it low. Jingle-bell sound effects be darned.

At the same time, the jingle-bell sound effects are cool and fitting, so I go back and forth.

The Easy Part!

Here is the one truly easy part of the piece: the crossed-hands section. I won't say how many times I had to video this before I got through with no pauses and no missed notes. So frustrating that I freeze up every time I turn the camera on. Enjoy!

(To hear Jonny May playing this same piece, click here.)

Comments

Eureka! Secondary Dominant!

I am such a nerd, and I love being a nerd! Today I was working on Section 5 of You Are My Sunshine, specifically on getting this section up to performance level. In other words, I was practicing being a performer , not an arranger . But then, of course, I came up with another idea. I had just played the delicate sixths and descending rag rolls of "when skies are gray" (I chord) and then moved to the parallel octaves of "you never know, dear" (leading to IV). The shift sounded abrupt to me. Harsh. It needed something. It needed musical WD-40. Something to ease the hinge between textures. And then I stumbled upon it! Right before moving to IV, I can slip in a V7/IV — a secondary dominant! So I tried it, and it sounded so good that I actually yelled "Secondary dominant!" out loud in my house like I was Archimedes discovering water displacement in the bathtub. It's such a small thing. One little chord. But it smooths that transition, leaning the harmony ...

The Rusty Lock and Key

I'm in a room. There's a door in front of me. On the other side of that door is a whole world of adventure and imagination and joy and delight, but for the moment, I'm locked in this gray little room. The door itself has a lock that is all rusted. I've tried to open it in the past, but I've never gotten very far. Sometimes I try to scrape the rust off the lock. I also have a rusty old key that I occasionally try to polish. Each time, after I've made a little progress, I'll put it into the keyhole in hopes of opening the door. It turns a half a millimeter or so, but the brief excitement at my progress dies quickly when I realize, once again, the lock isn't opening. I set the old key aside, and from there I can forget about the door, the lock, and the world outside, for months—years, even. But then something happens—I hear birdsong, or I catch a glimpse of color—and I pick up the key and start picking away at the stubborn rust. That dark little room is my ...

Well.

It looks like "A Sort of Notebook" is an ex-blog. I'm not going to post a link to it because it's been taken over by spammers. It's Saturday night and I love merlot. No, I'm not drunkly. I went to a 50th birthday party tonight and had two lovely glasses of merlot. Then we went to a toy store. (I should never go to a toy store after two glasses of merlot, and after running eight miles. I bought some yellow teeth, a remote-control fart machine, two crazy pencils, and a present for my future niece who has yet to be conceived.) We went to an art gallery earlier that happens to have a grand piano and I played the Bach Prelude. Oh my, but it's sounding nice! Deborah (my piano teacher) has a grand (I can't remember the manufacturer. Forgive me.) that she wants to sell me for $8,800, or $100 a key. Hubster thinks that's too much. I told him it's a steal--we get the pedals, and the wood, and the wheels, and the bench for free! Lightning struck last nigh...

Picking Up the Pieces: A Piano Practice Journal

Search This Blog