Scarlatti Sonata in E Major, K. 380, the one Vladimir Horowitz loved to play

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WS1Z2bqbss8 The great Vladimir Horowitz made this sonata almost a household word among pianists. Back in the 1950s, Ben Grauer, host of NBC's "Recital Hall" introduced students from Juilliard who played at least 3 Scarlatti sonatas, following Volodya's example. These Baroque selections were a necessary entrée to the main course of Classical, Romantic and Contemporary…

Seymour Bernstein, pianist, imparts wisdom about the “undulating” wrist and its influence on the singing tone (Video)

This is my favorite video in a You Tube series featuring Seymour Bernstein, pianist/master teacher, and author of With Your Own Two Hands, a piano learning classic. Part #4 is an engaging demonstration of how the "undulating" wrist helps to produce an astonishingly beautiful singing tone. In the universe of molto cantabile playing, Bernstein also…

Facebook Friends, Google + Circle turnarounds, and other soap opera scenarios

Cry your heart out! If you're a music teacher getting rid of the dead wood instead of inviting an aromatic Christmas pine into your living room that will eat up the small space reserved for your cat, then you might as well check your FB Friends list to pine away even more. A colleague bemoans…

In and out of the closet: The business and practice of private piano teaching

I once posted a blog about this very subject, then deleted it, thinking it sounded like a series of whiny complaints that would pin me as bitter and unrelenting. Then, to my surprise, ten readers contacted me wondering what happened to the writing? They had apparently strongly identified with its content. Well, I had safely…

Aikido and Piano are a good match for Sakura (Video) (Note the rolling forward wrist motion in Kabalevsky’s “Galop”)

Aikido Main article: Aikido Aikido shihōnage technique. "Aikido (合氣道:あいきどう aikidō?) is a modern grappling-based Japanese martial art developed by Morihei Ueshiba (植芝 盛平 Ueshiba Morihei, 1883 – 1969). The art consists of "striking", "throwing" and "joint locking" techniques and is known for its fluidity and blending with an attacker, rather than meeting "force with force".…

Frustrated piano teacher/Frustrated student– What to do next? (Video)

A timely comment was posted at my blog site which echoed my own frustration at times about teaching piano. Here's the spark for my current writing and it comes from a music instructor in Vancouver: "I do have the odd students who don’t practice and never improve, and then get frustrated at their lack of…

Cyprien Katsaris plays Cziffra’s Flight of the Bumblebee in the pianist’s presence on Live TV

This is a snatch of history. I hadn't seen the You Tube video until now, but here it is: A jaw-dropping, bravura execution of parallel octaves! (And as the story goes, Cziffra made a change in his Bumblebee transcription, where an EF trill, was embellished with added notes, with short notice given to Katsaris) Cyprien…

Memories of J.S. Bach’s “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” (Video)

I love the carol medley sung in chorus at this time of the year, especially, "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing," which had a touch of Mendelssohn, though he was not the original composer; "Silent Night," "O' Come All Ye Faithful," "O' Holy Night," "The Little Drummer Boy," and "Angels We Have Heard on High." But…

A Skyped supplement to piano lessons (Video)

Here's an example of a Bay area student taking a Skyped piano lesson to supplement her regular weekly meetings with me. These work well, particularly if a pupil has to catch up from a vacation period absence, or needs reinforcement of technique, and/or an added revisit of a piece in progress. In this segment, the…

Performing a piece–Getting it right (all the notes) OR really getting it right (the phrasing and nuance) VIDEOS

For many pianos students, playing 100% perfect notes, with no clunkers is goal in itself. They breathe a sigh of relief looking back on a video of a recital, where they managed to "get it right," counting correct notes from beginning to end. One even managed to play note perfect while intermittently eyeing her family…