This is one of my favorite pieces, and I’m fairly particular about it. This is the second movement, Andante, of the Sonatina in A by Frederico Moreno Torroba. It was first performed in Paris in 1925 by Andres Segovia to a private audience, which included Maurice Ravel; who, it is said, was very impressed by this work. I like the second and third movements best (the Andante and Allegro), although the first movement is definitely worthwhile.
My main complaint with this piece is that most people try to play it too fast. It doesn’t work so well like that. It’s much better played a bit behind the beat, shuffle-style, as one very long cadenza passage. If you try to play it in time, it comes out too dry. It needs to be felt from the heart, expressed tentatively.
The dynamics of the piece are very important, and this is where I have a bit of trouble with it. It’s never quite perfect, and requires a great deal of work.
Here is a video of a fellow from Eastern Michigan University playing it at a recital. It’s one of the best that I’ve heard, and I have heard quite a few. He hurries the first chord a bit (the first D in the D C D), and in a few other places. The dynamics are not observed consistently throughout. But other than that, I would call this an excellent performance; one of the best around.
The performer is Jonathan Edwards, and I’ve never heard of him before. Nevertheless, he shows great promise, and I look forward to hearing more from him in the future.
My main complaint with this piece is that most people try to play it too fast. It doesn’t work so well like that. It’s much better played a bit behind the beat, shuffle-style, as one very long cadenza passage. If you try to play it in time, it comes out too dry. It needs to be felt from the heart, expressed tentatively.
The dynamics of the piece are very important, and this is where I have a bit of trouble with it. It’s never quite perfect, and requires a great deal of work.
Here is a video of a fellow from Eastern Michigan University playing it at a recital. It’s one of the best that I’ve heard, and I have heard quite a few. He hurries the first chord a bit (the first D in the D C D), and in a few other places. The dynamics are not observed consistently throughout. But other than that, I would call this an excellent performance; one of the best around.
The performer is Jonathan Edwards, and I’ve never heard of him before. Nevertheless, he shows great promise, and I look forward to hearing more from him in the future.
I hope that you enjoy this as much as I do. It would be a rare thing to see any better performance of this wonderful piece (unless, of course, you happen to come to visit).
UPDATE:
I had to put this here, because the comments section would not accept it.
Here's another piece that I find I'm getting a bit particular about, and for the same reasons. I find that noteworthy because it's so ridiculously simple, it seems like it would be difficult to mess it up. But I see a lot of people butchering it. Terrible.
This one is one of this things that's sort of obligatory to the repertoire. Just about everybody does it.
I have two recordings of this one; one by Parkening (which is incredibly fast), and another by Eduardo Fernandez (who does it much better). The fellow in the video does it better than either one of them. As far as recordings, I prefer the Richard Cobo.
I really don't know as much about Brouwer as I would like. There's only a few of his pieces that I'm familiar with.
I've gotten to where I browse through these things because of all of the commercials on Pandora anymore.
UPDATE:
I had to put this here, because the comments section would not accept it.
Here's another piece that I find I'm getting a bit particular about, and for the same reasons. I find that noteworthy because it's so ridiculously simple, it seems like it would be difficult to mess it up. But I see a lot of people butchering it. Terrible.
This one is one of this things that's sort of obligatory to the repertoire. Just about everybody does it.
I have two recordings of this one; one by Parkening (which is incredibly fast), and another by Eduardo Fernandez (who does it much better). The fellow in the video does it better than either one of them. As far as recordings, I prefer the Richard Cobo.
I really don't know as much about Brouwer as I would like. There's only a few of his pieces that I'm familiar with.
I've gotten to where I browse through these things because of all of the commercials on Pandora anymore.
