{"id":237,"date":"2011-02-08T13:26:39","date_gmt":"2011-02-08T18:26:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rosewhitemusic.com\/piano\/?p=237"},"modified":"2011-02-08T13:28:16","modified_gmt":"2011-02-08T18:28:16","slug":"playing-performing-videos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rosewhitemusic.com\/piano\/2011\/02\/08\/playing-performing-videos\/","title":{"rendered":"Playing, performing, videos"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I have a new video up on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/user\/jwpritchett\" target=\"_blank\">YouTube<\/a>:\u00a0 &#8220;<em>Pagodes<\/em>&#8221; from Debussy&#8217;s <em>Estampes<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" width=\"480\" height=\"390\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/DGaq0uySx4U?rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s not my best performance of <em>Pagodes<\/em>, I think,  but it&#8217;s hard to get everything right in a video.<\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s been a few  months delay in getting another video out, and there are various reasons  for that.\u00a0 One is that the piano went way out of tune after the heat  came on and it just sounded dreadful.\u00a0 But also I was trying to sort out  my thoughts and feelings about doing these kinds of performances.<\/p>\n<p>One  thing I\u2019ve noted is that I tend to play pieces quite  differently from day to day, more variation than I recall doing when I  was younger. \u00a0I  think that this is part of the difference between <em> playing <\/em>and <em> performing<\/em>.\u00a0 For me, when I prepare a <em>performance<\/em>, I&#8217;m designing  the  experience. I have a plan for each piece, how it should proceed, how   this effect will come across, how I\u2019ll amaze my audience with this   fast section, how I\u2019ll surprise them with this <em>subito <\/em>piano.\u00a0  I then have to practice to build up the skill to  actually execute  this plan. \u00a0In a live performance, I have to take my  chances that it  will actually come off.<\/p>\n<p>But <em> playing <\/em>is another matter. \u00a0There, I\u2019m just investigating the music  by  feeling my way through it. \u00a0Sure, I have ideas about parts of  pieces,  and I always play them the same way. \u00a0And sure, I\u2019m practicing  to be  able to execute the piece effectively and accurately. \u00a0But  there\u2019s not  some ideal version of it in my mind that I\u2019m trying to  realize, some  blueprint for the experience. \u00a0As a result, I\u2019ll play the  piece faster  today than yesterday, or I\u2019ll try engaging the melody a  different way,  or just feel differently about the piece in some vague,  undefined way.  This is what I&#8217;ve been doing for the past few months and loving it.<\/p>\n<p>I read an article in the newspaper not long ago about a young  pianist coming to perform in New Jersey. \u00a0He said a typical thing\u2014that every  time he performs it\u2019s different, it\u2019s all about creativity in the  moment. \u00a0In the past I&#8217;ve always dismissed that kind of talk because my experience was that you planned a performance carefully.\u00a0 But now  I\u2019m seeing that perhaps what I call \u201cplaying\u201d is really what some  pianists do in performance.  \u00a0Perhaps one becomes so fluid with it that a <em>performance <\/em>really is just  getting up there and <em>playing<\/em>. \u00a0For me it never was that way.\u00a0 That&#8217;s probably one reason I didn&#8217;t become a concert pianist!<\/p>\n<p>So much of the joy I&#8217;m finding in playing now was hidden to me in the past because I was focused on performing.\u00a0 As a piano major, of course, it was natural to make impressive performances my priority.\u00a0 And youth had a lot to do with it, too:\u00a0 the urge to impress and outdo my peers, or just plain showing off.\u00a0 But now that I&#8217;m older and free from the burden of making a living from the piano, I&#8217;m discovering new ways that it fits into my life, and playing is one of them.<\/p>\n<p>After I did the <a href=\"http:\/\/rosewhitemusic.com\/piano\/2010\/10\/07\/getting-reacquainted-with-chopin\/\" target=\"_self\">Chopin videos<\/a> in the fall I became very aware of how dangerous performing can be, especially on the Internet.\u00a0 It  can so feed my ego in an unskillful way. \u00a0That\u2019s what I was  feeling when I first did the videos, logging into YouTube every day to  see how many people had seen me and if they had left comments. \u00a0Pay  attention to me! \u00a0I want to impress you! \u00a0These are natural desires, but  it is not skillful to indulge them.\u00a0 So I avoided doing another one for awhile.\u00a0 I&#8217;d been enjoying playing so much that I was  concerned that I&#8217;d break something of the magic by doing  performance  videos.<\/p>\n<p>Last month our friend <a href=\"http:\/\/www.elizabethbrowncomposer.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Elizabeth Brown<\/a> came to visit, and I played <a href=\"http:\/\/rosewhitemusic.com\/piano\/category\/composers\/feldman-composers\/palais-de-mari\/\" target=\"_self\"><em>Palais de mari<\/em><\/a> for her and Frances.\u00a0 Because of the setting, the piece, and the company, it felt different than a &#8220;real&#8221; performance.\u00a0 It was another new experience for me:\u00a0 just sharing something I that could do without as much pressure to impress, be perfect, etc.\u00a0 It was truly <em>playing<\/em> for others.\u00a0 It was very sociable, another throwback to an  earlier time when the home piano was the center of one\u2019s musical life.<\/p>\n<p>So I&#8217;ve changed and relaxed my attitude towards videos.\u00a0 I&#8217;ve realized that these aren&#8217;t formal performances, really.\u00a0 Instead,  I think of them as playing for friends. \u00a0You\u2019re in my living room  (well, dining room, actually) and I\u2019m entertaining you by playing  something that I know.\u00a0 I&#8217;ve got a few more that I&#8217;d like to do before the piano wanders too far out of tune again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I haven&#8217;t posted a piano video on YouTube in awhile, but I&#8217;ve started doing that again.  There are a number of reasons for the delay, mainly because I was trying to sort out my thoughts and feelings about doing these kinds of performances.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[19,17,18],"class_list":["post-237","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-me-and-my-piano","tag-debussy","tag-performance","tag-video"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Playing, performing, videos - The piano in my life<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/rosewhitemusic.com\/piano\/2011\/02\/08\/playing-performing-videos\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"JamesP\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/rosewhitemusic.com\/piano\/2011\/02\/08\/playing-performing-videos\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/rosewhitemusic.com\/piano\/2011\/02\/08\/playing-performing-videos\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"JamesP\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/rosewhitemusic.com\/piano\/#\/schema\/person\/2f57a59cb3d4720c55cfc4960b5a3436\"},\"headline\":\"Playing, performing, videos\",\"datePublished\":\"2011-02-08T18:26:39+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2011-02-08T18:28:16+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/rosewhitemusic.com\/piano\/2011\/02\/08\/playing-performing-videos\/\"},\"wordCount\":824,\"commentCount\":0,\"keywords\":[\"debussy\",\"performance\",\"video\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Me &amp; 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