During my vacations I was again in the Netherlands and I have visited Chris. We have completed the set of Antonin Dvoraks Slavonic Dances op. 72 by recording the four missing pieces: no. 3 (Allegro), no. 5 (Poco Adagio), no. 6 (Moderato, quasi minuetto), no. 7 (Presto) on 13th of july.
As always we have had a lot of pleasure and fun, not only by playing four hands, but also by windsurfing, though we had a rainy day , but it was a good strong wind .
I thank you very much, Chris, for the music and the windsurfing.
When Chris visited me at my bungalow at the Ijsselmeer he already brought the four edited audio-files of our recording-session.
He said he liked them and I agreed to that. Except no. 3 had two little flops which bothered me. So I have decided to edit this file once more. Now since I´m at home again, I have found the time to edit also the videos.
There are some little imperfections concerning playing together here and there, but we both think, we have brought out the mind of these pieces quite adequately. Even professionals have to practise many days respective hours together before recording a four hand piece, we just had one day to practise and to record. That´s the little, but fine difference.

And now: enjoy and comment, please!

Here are the video-links:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5oXReh7 ... ideo_title (op. 72, 3)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyS9i48w ... ure=relmfu (op. 72, 5)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGVJcZpL ... ure=relmfu (op. 72, 6)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tc0CnuDU ... ure=relmfu (op. 72, 7)

Below are the audio-files, which are exactly the sound-track of the videos.
Dvorak - Slavonic Dances Op.72 - 3: Allegro (3:08)
Dvorak - Slavonic Dances Op.72 - 5: Poco Adagio (2:37)
Dvorak - Slavonic Dances Op.72 - 6: Moderato, quasi minuetto (4:22)
Dvorak - Slavonic Dances Op.72 - 7: Presto (3:40)

Hi Andreas,

Nice job here. I enjoyed all the videos very much. Did you have more than one camera going? Or is it just one camera and stopping to make angle changes? Either way, I'm sure it was not easy editing everything, but it all looks good nonetheless. Especially I am extremely impressed at how fast you can change clothes!! (op. 72/6)

Hi Andreas & Chris,

Great job! I watched all of the videos. Noticed that you equitably exchanged places to take the piano primo and segundo parts. These pieces are very intricate and not easy to play. You achieved a marvelous performance, especially considering the short practice time. I thoroughly enjoyed listening. The one I most enjoyed was No. 6 owing to its flowing lyricism.

You have set a tradition for doing four-handed music. This is your third year making these videos, no?

David

Bravo Chris and Andreas! Nice effort with great results. These performances display a good deal of musicality and style. The only thing I would nit pick is that No. 3 had some unison issues. You guys look like you're in the penalty box - not much space with the music rack so close. But, you know what, I bet the grated pattern from the music behind the ears acts as a diffuser, and help disperse the sound by making the room sound a little larger. I am curious, how far are you from each other? I am surprised you haven't done a Bach duet/2 piano...

Thanks all for the comments ! There are some minor technical issues, but musically, I think all is ok here.

One camera, changing position with every page turn (a pity that with 4-hand music you have so many page turns...)

All of them have some nice moments, as well as some that could have been better. Dvorak does not make life easy sometimes, and however well you prepare on your own, problems arise when sitting together fighting for the keyboard.

Indeed. Hopefully next year we can complete the Op.46 set, replacing my old recordings which are not very good.

Yes, and the bummer is you don't hear that so much while playing, only afterwards. Staying well together at all times is really very hard.

It would be nice to have a little more room. Although it does not really bother me, and it's quite nice to be able to lean back

Only a 5-6 hour drive. We should really get together every weekend for practising


We did discuss that, specifically to do the 2-piano Contrapunti from the Art of Fugue (my old live recordings with Evelina are not so good on my part).

Dammit yes, wasn't it just. The speeds were exhilarating, but being blown off and smacked to the ground (the water is very shallow in places) was no fun sometimes. My wrist still hurts. I'm not doing it any favors by practicing piano, but what can you do...


I thank you just as much, if not more, for the hospitality and all your work on creating the videos. Pity we don't have any surfing footage this time (that was also becoming a tradition...) - but the weather was just too foul to shoot.


For the record, we had of course practiced our parts to near perfection. But once you sit together it feels like starting all over again.


Note, you're not allowed to say 'enjoy' anymore

Pianolady wrote:


It is just one camcorder, but I always had to move its position, which is not so comfortable in the quite small room, so the possibilities of different angles are limited. I like especially the angle, which shows the mechanique of Chris´ nice Gaveau. We should have choosen this angle more often.



Oh, seems, I have practised that most of all!

Thank you for your praise, Monica, also on YouTube.

Rachfan wrote:


Thank you for listening and commenting, dear friend! Indeed, as true sport men we wanted to be equitable and disperse the primo and secondo-parts equally on each of us. Thank you for your praise. Of course, as Chris mentioned, we had practised our parts alone at home each other before, but the time for practising together was only that one day. I also feel it to be quite a different situation, if you sit together at the piano, because very often there isn´t enough space and the fingers of the other person sometimes block the keys, which you need yourself for example. The greatest fun for me personally was to play no. 7, the Presto, but they all are ingenious compositions, which a lot of valuable musical moments and ideas.

88man wrotes:

Thank you very much, George!


Yes, right, and there also some small, sometimes nearly audible unisono issues in the other movements. But the problem really is, that you discover that much easier while listening to your own recording than while playing the pieces.


Yes, and we are punished by good reason, because we are sitting there in the narrowness instead of being outside on the sea, where we could have a nice surfing day!

Techneut wrote:

Yes, I also would like to do that very much!


Phew, yes!


Yeah, since the beaming is not yet invented, we should endeavour our old fashioned fuel motors to do that. (Though you have a hybrid, which is more modern.)


We really should consider that closer, the only problem is, that we don´t have two pianos in one room. (May be we could do that in the house of Franz.)


I also regret that, but as you said the weather was too bad to film with the camcorder. Fortunately I have some hot shoots of myself doing windsurfing, which we made on another day.


I agree to that (as I mentioned to David above). (Btw, is "record" correct? Is it not "recording"?)


Of course, I´m so minor, that you should tell me, what I´m allowed to say and what not! Please, forgive me my barefaced immodesty, that I dare to claim, that I personally am able to enjoy our videos and that I also dare to suppose, others could be able to do that, despite the small imperfections of playing together here and there. (Otherwise I would not publish them in the internet as you can imagine.)

'For the record' is just a common expression, similar to 'by the way'.


Hehe, seems like you did not read the little discussion there was recently about people submitting and saying 'enjoy'

Techneut wrote:


Nope, I haven´t, but I remember one of your posts, where you have used that word concerning your own recordings.

Btw, if I say "enjoy" I don´t mean, that critical comments are not allowed, just the opposite, you can enjoy a recording, but in spite of that you can make suggestions of improvements here and there perhaps. Or give some inspirations for another interpretation or similar matters.
If someone can´t enjoy my recording completely (though it is mostly in legitime and correct musical parameters), just because he doesn´t like my interpretation, I would like to say: o.k., you may tell it to me, but I have a well elaborated version and a certain concept, so it´s your problem and listen to another interpretation, which you prefer.
So, I have no problem to say "enjoy", but I would prefer to write "enjoy, if you can".

Oh don't take that so seriously. I was only poking sarcastic fun at Monica who recently wrote hating people saying 'enjoy' when they submit something.
Yes, I've done it myself. Little did I know.

These are up on the site. Now onwards with the Op.46 set.

Hi Chris,
oops, I only have seen your last message here now, because all the time I didn´t notice it somehow.

No, I didn´t take your remark concerning the word "enjoy" too seriously and I do be self-confident enough to think, that´s not my problem, if really someone should hate me, because I have written it. (I would write it again, otherwise I wouldn´t dare to post something here.)

Yes, I´m looking forward very much to the completion of the set of op. 46, too, and I hope you and Jane will visit us in the Easter-time again, so that we can record them (or would you like to do that again in summer in your home and record something other on Eastern? But we can talk about that also in a pm, of course, for not to get out of topic here).

Well, the interest in the Slavonic Dances seems not to be too big here, but mainly we do it, because we love that music, isn´t it?!

Hehe, that explains


I think we should complete the set on the Gaveau, to remain consistent. But I'd be very happey to come over at Easter and record something else. Maybe we should try the Moldau again Or another item of Ma Vlast. But I'm open to suggestions.


I think Dvorak's piano music is as badly underrated here as it is elsewhere. And 4-hand piano playing seems to have a certain homely amateur reputation, to be practiced by stuffy elderly ladies at tea parties. Not the 'real thing' for some, I guess. Well, up to us to change that

And of course, this particular music is simply the best there is

Of course, right, the argument to remain consistent of the instrument is very convincing! I had not thought about that somehow. For Easter I also would like to play a symphony-arrangement of one of the great symphonies by our old master, f.ex. Mozarts g-minor or c-major (Jupiter), a complete Haydn-symphony (with all 3-4 movements), or Beethoven/Tschaikowsky or Brahms. But I would be up for to ask Franz, if we may meet in his living room for to record some of the "Kunst der Fuge" on two pianos. (Would also be nice to meet us three, isn´t it? But, of course, we have to look how Franz´ state of health is at the time.)



Yeah, the elderly ladies should be impressed by real beer drinking guys like us! (Hope, they will drop their cups of tea, when they look at us.)

That is a great idea, if he is up to it ! I really hope he'll recover again.


hehe

Thank you for sharing your videos! I really enjoyed listening to your performance. The audio sounded absolutely terrific through my beats headphones! I was really impressed, not only with the performance (which was spectacular), but also with the quality of the recording. I felt the camcorder that yo used really did you justice. Often this is not the case with camcorders. Through my experience, the sound quality is usually substandard when used for this type of application.