ConcART III

It's the most wonderful time of the year... ConcART time!

Our first art-show-slash-recital was in October, 2008. We followed that up with ConcART II in November, 2009. Both were more successful than we dared hope. Now we're just two weeks away from ConcART III, which will be held Sunday, November 14, 2010.

Johanne has been busy with pastels and oils (including some great explorations with the palette knife). I've been busy 'shedding for the recital part. There are some challenging bits, but I really, really like this program.

1. Hungarian Dance No.2 -- Johannes Brahms
2. Air and Variations (The Harmonious Blacksmith) -- George Frideric Handel
3. Pastorale/Renaissance No.8 -- Arcangelo Corelli/Leopold Godowsky
4. Tonadas No.24 - Muiñeira (Galicia) -- Joaquin Nin-Culmell
5. Myrthen Op.25 No.1/Widmung -- Robert Schumann/Franz Liszt
6. Danza Ritual del Fuego -- Manuel de Falla

Come to Austin, see the show!

Video: Rachmaninoff--Prelude Op.23 No.5

After the first ConcART recital (in October, 2008), someone asked me if I had ever played any of the great Russian composers. I decided then and there that I'd answered "no" to that question for the last time. So I started hunting and in December, 2008 decided on this Prelude by Sergei Rachmaninoff. I figured "I've got ten months to learn it for the next ConcART... no problem".

Well, I may have underestimated the piece, or overestimated my skill, because I don't think ten months was quite enough, given my short, after-work practice schedule. I did play it at ConcART-II in November, 2009, and it went well enough. But I promised myself I'd work it a little harder for the video. So I gave it a half-year's rest and started over.

Overall, I'm happy I learned the piece, because it fills what was an obvious gap in my repertoire. It's a beautiful piece and it's fun to play, even if it serves up the occasional trainwreck. And I learned something else from this piece, too. Rachmaninoff had really big hands.

Rachmaninoff: Prelude Op.23 No.5 from Ken Barker on Vimeo.

Video: Albéniz--El Puerto (HD)

El Puerto was the first piece I recorded when I got my piano back in the summer of 2008. Two years later I finally got around to redoing it in HD with a good audio recording.

Isaac Albéniz wrote twelve pieces (four books of three) in his masterpiece, the Iberia suite. El Puerto is the second piece in book one. It's a very special piece for me, not just because I love it so much and I played it so much in my youth. Iberia was also a favorite of my teacher, Douglas Voice, who performed all twelve pieces in concert. Douglas passed away in 1998. I still think about him just about every time I play this piece.

I'm quite happy with the video. There's a lot that can go wrong in this piece. But this performance is pretty clean.

Albéniz: El Puerto from Ken Barker on Vimeo.

Video: Liszt--Sonetto 104 del Petrarca (HD)

Here is the latest installment in my series of HD remakes of SD videos. The old video of this piece is nearly two years old, and was only the second piano video I made. Definitely time for a makeover. Sonetto 104 will always be special for me, since it's one of the pieces I performed most towards the end of "the performing days of my youth". It's also one of the first I recovered when I started practicing again in 2007.

Liszt: Sonetto 104 del Petrarca from Ken Barker on Vimeo.

Coming Home Again

Various uninteresting events kept me from traveling home to Ottawa in 2009. But I made sure to hard-schedule a visit in 2010. As in 2008, I made sure to take advantage of Paulette's invitation to play her young Steinway B. My small audience was mom, dad, Johanne, Paulette, mom's friend Louise and my first piano teacher, Edith Orton. It was a very casual gathering and I made sure to play the pieces I'm working up for this year's ConcArt recital. I also played a couple of "oldies", a couple of "requests" and one piece on Paulette's Baldwin L1. Here's the list:

Friday, July 16, 2010:

• Quejas, ó La Maja y el Ruiseñor (Enrique Granados)
• Danza de la Pastora (Ernesto Halffter)
• Air and Variations: The Harmonious Blacksmith (George Handel)
• Widmung (Robert Schumann/Franz Liszt arr.)
• Muiñeira (Joaquin Nin-Culmell)
• Hungarian Dance #2 (Johannes Brahms)
• Ritual Fire Dance (Manuel de Falla)
• Danza del Gaucho Matrero (Alberto Ginastera)
• Impromptu Op.90 No.4 (Franz Schubert)
• Sonetto 104 del Petrarca (Franz Liszt)

I think everybody had a good time. I had two very nice comments and one good piece of constructive criticism. Paulette asked when I bought my piano because it sounded like my playing had matured and become much more expressive since 2008. She attributed it to having my own piano to play every day. Edith asked if I practiced technique (scales, etc.) regularly. I explained that with my limited practice time, I practice technique in service of the pieces I'm learning/playing only. But I do practice the runs, arpeggios, trills, etc. from the pieces as though they were technical exercises in order to get them as clean as possible. Her impression was that my technique and articulation were strong.

The constructive criticism came from my mother's friend Louise. She suggested (and everyone agreed) that it would be nice to have more tranquility in my repertoire, since most of the pieces I played were quick or fiery or energetic (or all three!). I do have slower, calmer material, but didn't play much of it. The comment reminded me that even in a casual gathering, you shouldn't ignore program-level considerations. It also convinced me that I really need to add one more piece to this year's planned ConcArt program. Now I just have to find a new piece that's a slow/tranquil foil for the rest of the program, something that's melodic and beautiful, something that's not too trivial, and that I can learn and get up to performance level for the Fall.

Having fun at Paulette's Steinway B

Video: Granados--Quejas ó la maja y el ruiseñor

This video is my HD remake of Enrique Granados' wonderful The Maiden and The Nightingale from Goyescas. That leaves just two more HD remakes to do: Liszt's Sonetto 104 del Petrarca and Albeniz' El Puerto. The Liszt is already filmed/recorded, but not edited. Look for it to appear around the end of July/beginning of August.

I feel like my performance of Maiden has really improved over time. But I just went back and watched the old, crappy SD video and the performance wasn't bad. There are definitely some things I prefer in the new one... and there are plenty of very subtle improvements. And of course, the video quality is a million times better. But my playing of the piece hasn't changed as much as I thought.

Granados: Quejas ó la maja y el ruiseñor from Ken Barker on Vimeo.

Happy Second Pianoversary

Today marks the second anniversary of the delivery of my piano. I can't even imagine life without it. In two years it has starred in 18 videos and audio recordings, it's shown itself in two recitals to 100 people, it's learned about 25 pieces, and it practices almost every day (I assume it doesn't play when I'm out of town).

It's been tuned 10 times, voiced twice, had its shanks fired, been tweaked, lubricated and adjusted. It's been covered on three occasions and wiped down 700 times. It has been played by two people.

It has never had a cat inside of it, although this is not thanks to any great self-restraint on the part of the cats. I've never touched its case with my bare hands, but I think today I will.

Happy Birthday, piano!

So That's What It Sounds Like

I've had my piano for two full years now. But believe it or not, I've never heard it played (I'm always the one playing it). I've invited others to play it, but have never had any takers until last weekend.

My neighbor's father is a fairly advanced pianist, and we talk about repertoire pretty regularly, but he's never taken me up on offers to play my piano. Last Saturday after dinner Johanne and I were out throwing a football in the street when he came out with his grandson to see the football. After chatting for a few minutes Johanne invited him to try the piano again and this time he took us up on it.

He played parts of Schumann's Carnavale and Mendelssohn's Songs Without Words, and even the first page of Liszt's arrangement of Schumann's Widmung, which was really fun because that's a piece I play too. I couldn't stop smiling, hearing my piano for the first time. And it's amazing how rich and full it sounds from "out front", even though its unisons are horribly out right now. I can't wait to have him back when it's tuned so I can hear it at its best.

Video: Ginastera--Danzas argentinas (HD)

The pieces I posted in the last three blog entries are often (usually?) performed together as one big work: the Danzas argentinas. I wanted to do the same with my video: have one continuous performance/video of the three dances together. (The individual videos posted last month were actually edited down from the full-length video). So this week I'm posting the complete video.

Ginastera: Danzas argentinas from Ken Barker on Vimeo.

Video: Ginastera--Danza del gaucho matrero (HD)

Here, finally, is the third piece of Alberto Ginastera's three Danzas Argentinas. This is The Dance of the Arrogant Cowboy. It's not a remake like the other two, because I never got around to recording it when I first recorded the others.

Listening to the performance, it occurs to me that I approach videos and recitals quite differently. For recitals I think energy and expression are more important than cleanliness. People take away the big picture more than the details. But in a video the details are much more noticeable. And permanent! So I think my video performances are a little more conservative. That is certainly the case here. Comparing it to the hundreds of other videos of this piece you can find on the web, my performance here is quite clean, but maybe not as fiery as some.

Ginastera: Danza del gaucho matrero from Ken Barker on Vimeo.