Half diminished chord

I am playing BY A MEADOW BROOK from Edward MacDowell and here I found an example of half diminished chord.

We often hear about diminished seventh chord (Dim 7th). The note structure is very easy to remember - the interval between each notes are three semitones apart.
Example: C Eb Gb A makes a Cdim7th chord. And what's interesting about Dim7th chord is they are enharmonic chord for each of the chord member. So: Cdim7th is equal to (have the same chord member as) Eb, Gb and A diminished 7th chord. Which is why we only have three diminished 7th chord (so to speak :)

Right now let's move on to Dim7th twin brother. Here is the half diminished chord or halfdim for short. To make it easy to remember: halfdim chord has an almost similar interval with Dim7th chord except for the fourth note. The fourth note interval must be four semitones apart instead of three.
Example: C Eb Gb Bb makes a C halfdim chord.

Isn't that cool??!!! 😂😂😁
Happy practicing!

Impressionistic Art

So, I have been given a new piece from 20th Century. One of the stream of 20th century piece is impressionissm.

Music in older era (barouqe and classical) have no title to the song. They simply use Sonata, Rondo, Fugue, or Prelude and give numbers to it. They don't really name the song. It's practically similar to the painting from those age. Usually they have strong line and bold object. Just like in classical music we have bold melody line - mostly are pretty singable.

However impressionist painter will give you an impression of things or the atmosphere that they try to capture in their art work. They don't simply paint a flower. They want everything in the canvas communicate a certain feeling, or to give impression to the onlookers.

Based on that we can say the same with impressionist composer. The piece normally won't have bold melody line. The bass and the treble will work together to give you an impression of what the composer is trying to communicate. Claude Debussy is one of the most famous impressionist composer. He purposely put no title in some of his impressionist piece so we can play it according to our imagination. (Well he did put titles at the end of those piece just to help out of we ran out of imaginative impression :p )

The piece that I am going to learn called "By the meadow Brook". I can almost smell meadow and a sound of a running water in the little creek. And that's exactly what the impressionist composer wants to communicate. They are not after the water, or the bird, or the meadow, or the lilies, they want to capture the feeling of those things altogether. Beautiful!

Try to search in the google of impressionist art and you'll see what I mean.

Happy practicing!!

Sonata form

Sonata has a form.
1. EXPOSITION, including first theme, transition, second theme, and coda.
2. DEVELOPMENT. This part is like a solo part in modern music. This is where the composer show off his composing ability. That's why this part is normally complicated, jumping from one chord to another.
3. RECAPITULATION. Here is the summary of the song. We will go back to the first theme, transition, second theme, and coda.

Attitude

When you read music even if its just a sight reading make sure you play it with the right attitude. Most of the time I find myself just reading the music without paying attention to the dynamics or the little details like slure or rest sign.

Even when you just read music casually you must play it with the attitude to present the music nicely as if you are on stage.

Everything starts from a simple habit. Make it a habit to read and play music with an attitude, do it properly :)

Piano Sickness

I just got my piano tuned by professional tuner and I am so glad I did. My piano sounded so terrible, it gets worse everyday and I have contacted my last tuner but didn't get through until I found this one on the internet. 

To cut the story short, he opened my beloved piano and was surprised because the temperature of the inside was too hot. I explained to him that my room could be extremely hot at noon because it's at the highest level of the house so it gets direct sunlight everyday. Then he decided to open the bottom part where the heater is located and he told me that the heater is not of good quality that's why it did not do the job well rather it ruin my piano (huhuhuu).

The job of the heater in piano is to manage the temperature inside the piano so it won't get too hot nor too cold. My last piano tuner advised me that it's ok to turn on the heater all day while it is true IF the heater is of good quality (about $50). My heater came free with the piano so what can I expect?! 

Anyway, secondly piano heater is only necessary if you put your piano on the first level of the house/building because it can prevent the water from the soil to dampened your piano. Since I out mine on the third level, heater is totally unnecessary. 

When the piano gets too hot it will create expansion and cause the strings to get loose and no wonder the piano sounds terrible! ><"" Secondly, the expansion can also happen with the sound board which located at the bottom part of the piano. Thank God mine is still ok. 

It cost me a lot to fix this problem. The tuning of my piano is still not up to standard hertz because according to my tuner the string will need time to adjust due to the board expansion problem. Nevertheless it sounds much better now and I kissed my heater goodbye! 

Don't forget to regularly tune your piano. It's kinda like a check up time as well. The sooner you find out the 'sickness' the easier and cheaper to cure it ;) 

Bach Invention

Salah satu tehnik untuk memainkan karya JS Bach adalah dengan permain "Portato" yang artinya permainan semi stacatto. Lagu Bach biasanya terkesan lepas alias tidak legato karena pada jaman pembuatan lagu tersebut Bach menggunakan harpsicord bukan piano seperti sekarang.

Selain portato yang harus diperhatikan juga adalah penjarian di pada tuts piano. Penjarian harus matang dan full, tidak setengah suara.

Score yang dibuat JS Bach biasanya tidak mengandung performance direction karena sang composer memberikan kebebasan penuh kepada orang yang memainkan karyanya dengan gaya mereka sendiri.

Practicing Scales

Untuk latihan scales, baik tangga nada major maupun minor ada beberapa tips yang dapat membantu memudahkan latihan scales:
1. Untuk scales yang banyak not hitam (cth: F# atau C#), yang perlu diingat adalah not putihnya. Sebagai contoh misalnya tangga nada F# major terdiri dari semua not hitam dan dua not putih. Konsentrasi untuk mengingat not putih tersebut, dalam hal ini yaitu B dan F.
2. Cara mudah mengingat scales minor adalah dengan menurunkan setengah nada ketiga dan keenam dari scales major nya. Contoh: A minor - tangga nada A namun nada ketiga dan keenamnya turun setengah yaitu menjadi C dan F.
3. Setiap kali memainkan not hitam, patern jari yang digunakan saat scales turun atau descending biasanya sudah pasti. Untuk grup dua not hitam (C#, D#) gunakan jari tiga dan grup tiga not hitam (F#, G# dan A#) gunakan jari keempat.