We have a new WTFer of the month - perhaps we can extend a smidge into November to make up for my tardiness...

In the meantime, Grotriman, can you tell us a bit about...

Do you still have more than one piano? How is that working out?

What pieces are you working on?

Are there any pieces that seem a stretch but which you would love to play?

Do you think Doug would look cute dressed as a gladiator for Halloween?

Can you remind us of your musical background? Study as a kid? College? Played for how long?

What style of music are you most interested in?

(Me? Romantic Classical)

Seems you have a daughter who also plays well but I am fuzzy on that memory. Didn't she play at a recital in NYC?

quote:

Originally posted by kluurs:
We have a new WTFer of the month - perhaps we can extend a smidge into November to make up for my tardiness...

In the meantime, Grotriman, can you tell us a bit about...

Do you still have more than one piano? How is that working out?

What pieces are you working on?

Are there any pieces that seem a stretch but which you would love to play?

Do you think Doug would look cute dressed as a gladiator for Halloween?

WTF!

Well - this is an honor. I think. Unless people start to make fun of me. I'm very sensitive you know...

Well - I do have more than one piano. It is such a treat. And a curse. One is in our family house that my sister/brother and I inherited out on Block Island (Ibach 6'). The other here in NYC (Grotrian 6'4"). When I'm with one, I love it, but miss certain aspects about the other. Then when I'm with the other, it's the other way around. I guess it's just like women. Both of them are that magic length (6 foot long or longer) where I think the overtones start to have that orchestral factor and the bass a nice tone. Interestingly both pianos have a duplex system that is similar - untuned and a long gradual curve - unlike the Steinway or Mason Hamlin system. The Grotrian is a high tension design and the Ibach is a low tension design. The sound comes from the surface of the Grotrian, and it comes from inside the Ibach. You have to coax the Ibach in loud passages much like you need to warm up a gong. The Grotrian has a V8 and as soon as you punch the pedal you are pinned against the back of the driver's seat!

The Ibach is deeply personal and expressive. The Grotrian is strong and has so much WOW factor, and you can still play softly. I was thinking about renaming myself Grotribach but it just doesn't convey that superhero concept that Grotriman does!

I'm working on Ravel right now. I'm putting to bed Alborada Del Grazioso. The last part I need to take back to "white practice" again (devoid of any volume change, or any musical content, slow and deliberate so the muscles can absorb). But the whole thing is memorized and for a 55 year old I'm proud of that! But whoa what a job that was. Now I'm working on his Sonatine and first having to memorize the last movement (the first two seem to fall under the fingers) as it is too fast and furious to read. So this is another toughy. I also did his Minuet Antique but my wife hated to hear it and it made me self conscious to work on it. But I still like those scrunchy harmonies.

I'm going to work up some of the Bartok Mikrokosmos Vol 5 which are really compelling. Unfortunately my teacher is a solid 19th century guy and doesn't like to do those kinds of things (even though he's my age - just has to do with early exposure I think).

Last year I memorized the first three movements of Brahms Opus 118 which are all gorgeous.

So much music and so little time. :-(

I have two boys - Lex (17) a really good Jazz Pianist who gets small gigs in NYC since he was 15 (the jobs come to him, he isn't pushing himself to them right now) and Oliver (13) who gave up the piano for football just in time because he bent his middle finger backwards and now can't use it. Another teammate ended up in the hospital with a damaged spine and the rest of the parents turned yeller and pulled all the kids off the team and now... I think I heard him play a bit of Debussy on the piano this morning! (He had done the entire Children's corner minus snowflakes are dancing or what ever that movement is called - he's a sensitive musician who doesn't take instruction well.)

I'm making some recordings of Lex for college applications so I'll post them when I'm done!

Much fun to be a part of WTF!

Peace and Productive Practice to all of you.

Hugs

Grotriman

quote:

Originally posted by lilylady:
Can you remind us of your musical background? Study as a kid? College? Played for how long?

What style of music are you most interested in?

(Me? Romantic Classical)

Seems you have a daughter who also plays well but I am fuzzy on that memory. Didn't she play at a recital in NYC?

Oh I studied piano since I was around 6. I studied with Daniel Pollack even when I was 9-11. Then moved to Michigan for a bit where my piano teacher was more like my grandma who just wanted me there no matter what. I didn't practice and I had a mother who didn't structure my life or push me at all. As a result I only started to develop any technique late in high school and then in College. I've always played Clarinet too and was fortunate enough to play with the University of Michigan Symphony band which was FANTASTIC! I still play clarinet from time to time, I also reface and work on mouthpieces for professional Clarinettists here in NYC. But I can't do the Gym, the piano AND the Clarinet. So from time to time I go fat and play. Or get trim(mer) and only play the Piano. The trouble is - other wooodwind players in the city aren't necessarily as advanced and playing in woodwind quintets (the thing for amateur players round here) is a bit frustrating and so piano is safe. I only have myself to blame.

I'm studying now for the past 3 or 4 years (I can't remember) with Michael Blum who has done amazing things for me. I lack a fundamental musical theory background so when he tells me that this is a simple progression from a french dominant to a first inversion of a whachyamacallit I'm like... "so what?" I don't have any of that innately in my fingers or my mind's eye. But trying.

Favorites are all over the place - love Haydn, Scarlatti, Chopin, Brahms, Schubert, Ravel, Debussy, Bartok, Hindemith. Now sightreading Mompou stuff for fun. What's not to like in this world of piano? Oh wait Phillip Glass. OK but aside from him?

But enough about me.

How about you when did you start? Are you still studying?

Regards,

Grotriman

quote:

But enough about me.

but, but, but... you are the WTFer of the MONTH! no diverting questions back onto others.

how did you end up in engineering with such a strong music and arts background?

and how does your right brain help or hinder your left?

quote:

Originally posted by piqué:
how did you end up in engineering with such a strong music and arts background?

and how does your right brain help or hinder your left?

I went into engineering because I liked inventing things. I had no idea it involved math when I applied to my master's program (I was zoology undergrad wanting to be a marine biologist until I found out I would have to be on a boat for 4 months with no girls).

After I got in - I could tutor all my classmates on what the math meant, and they loved having me help them, but they got the A's on the tests and I did not! But still I ended up using it quite a bit. Pretty funny actually. I think I backed out of 4th semester calc as an undergrad 3 times before I thought I could get a decent grade in it.

Solving problems - that's right brain, correct? But anyhow I didn't go into music because my piano teacher's husband told me there would be 100 pianists my age who could run circles around me so "don't even try". Sort of hard to hear but what a save that was!

The right brain hinders the left in all manner of ways - you only have to look at my desk to understand this, or my shop. I'm hopeless. But I have a patient family. And I live like a college student (still don't have grownup furniture). So no appearances to keep up! So the right brain rules! If I had a strong left brain I'm sure I'd practice better, but maybe sound worse?

quote:

So the right brain rules!

awright!

quote:

But anyhow I didn't go into music because my piano teacher's husband told me there would be 100 pianists my age who could run circles around me so "don't even try". Sort of hard to hear but what a save that was!

i managed to figure that out for myself. two flute spots in every orchestra. very poor odds.

still, i hate hearing adults say to young people "don't even try." did your piano teacher agree with him?

quote:

Originally posted by piqué:

quote:

But anyhow I didn't go into music because my piano teacher's husband told me there would be 100 pianists my age who could run circles around me so "don't even try". Sort of hard to hear but what a save that was!

i managed to figure that out for myself. two flute spots in every orchestra. very poor odds.

still, i hate hearing adults say to young people "don't even try." did your piano teacher agree with him?

Yes she did.

BTW nobody is going to call me on my politically incorrect statement about pianos and women?!? I expected a tempest in a teapot.

;^)

hey i'm the one who wrote in a certain book that i was like a young man smitten by an unobtainable woman. got the market cornered on that one.

Where did you grow up and do you have musical siblings?

What's a typical day for Grotriman look like these days?

quote:

Originally posted by Grotriman:
Now I'm working on his Sonatine and first having to memorize the last movement (the first two seem to fall under the fingers) as it is too fast and furious to read. So this is another toughy.

Love that piece. I haven't played it in a couple of years, though.

quote:

Originally posted by kluurs:
Where did you grow up and do you have musical siblings?

What's a typical day for Grotriman look like these days?

I spent my first 12 years on the upper west side of NYC. Then moved out to Ann Arbor Michigan where the band program was incredible (and many other musicians in the band program were studying with professors at the School of Music).

No other siblings are musical, except they like music, my Dad got a scholarship to the U of M school of music during the depression (violin) but he got to the University and discovered he also had to pay for lessons ($25/term I think) and so he couldn't attend. He walked the campus and went through the art school and saw the drawings and decided he could do better than that and submitted some drawings and was accepted to the art school instead. He ended up being a professor of art at the U of M by the end of his career. He stopped playing violin when I was about 5.

My cousin's son (mother's side) is a pop musician (Mackie Underdown), and my mom had a very good ear.

I moved back to NYC when I was about 25.

quote:

Originally posted by kluurs:
Where did you grow up and do you have musical siblings?

What's a typical day for Grotriman look like these days?

Actually - I think the reason I like music so much is that I was born and spent the first two or three years in the apartment of Madam Vangerova (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabelle_Vengerova), immediately after she died.

I think I inherited a teeny bit of her aura left behind. Not the technical part mind you...