Oscar Peterson- Jazz Exercise No.2: ABRSM Grade 6 Piano 2009

[benzei2003]

I just did my G6 today... mine was jazz exercise no. 3 :> Ugh why is it always so nerve wrecking in front of the examiner? How was your exam?

[gurrrnieee]

@benzei2003 Well my Grade 6 was quite a while ago, but I got distinction :) So the pieces went really well! Lost marks on scales/aural tests (no surprises there haha). I'm always really nervous in exams and performances too :( Hope you did well in your exam :) x

[benzei2003]

I just did my G6 today... mine was jazz exercise no. 3 :> Ugh why is it always so nerve wrecking in front of the examiner? How was your exam?

[nimm2999]

Try putting accent on the upbeat quavers

[Wrooblas]

damn, I've been learnin' how to play this for about 2 months and it can't sound like that, fuck -.-

[BadassVGM]

Where's the soul? Where's the stylized improvisation, the emotion, the heat and smoothly understated of an Oscar Peterson piece? You play it perfectly, but Jazz should not be played perfectly. This is why I don't do classical grades.

[Piano8myhomework]

@BadassVGM i know what you mean yet at the same time i'm selling out (to get into music courses in university) and therefore i'm doing this piece. AANNDD she did play this quite well but you are right. Classical exams require you to be unemotional perfect little robots. There is no meaning or expression. But you really arent supposed to use rhubato or anything like that with mozart or bach. Anyways she did a great job within those restrictions! Oscar peterson did all his classical piano grades.

[gurrrnieee]

@BadassVGM I would love to learn to be able to improvise :) And I got a distinction in the exam I played this for, so my lack of soul, emotion and heat hasn't done me so badly..

[bentecho]

@gurrrnieee give her a break, that all comes in time and years of playing an instrument. jazz is all about the improvistion, you have to put your books down and understand all the stuff you know you can play where you want, not just where the book tells you to play it. But like anything in music it takes lots of practice and a serious want to do it. I think you play very well and there is nothing wrong with playing a peice perfectly.

[gurrrnieee]

@bentecho Thank you :)

[BadassVGM]

@gurrrnieee I've been playing improv for several years now and it is something that is incredibly rewarding to do. I'm not at all faulting your skill at performing the piece, as your skill is fantastic, but as someone who has played Jazz for a time I emphasize soul over perfection. When I just improvise something on the spot - I have inferior technique, but I play it with feeling and vigour. You're exceptionally talented and with practise will make a concert pianist, but not another Bill Evans.

[keyhitter]

sounds great! i'm curious about the benefits these exercises have for piano players learning jazz. technique is probably one thing, but i'm also thinking about improvisation and how that factors in (since it's important in jazz)

[foxmccloud44]

I've learned this for my exam in freakin 2 weeks, pain -_-

[BloodstainButterfly]

I remember playing this song two years ago for my exam. XD It seemed so hard then.

[Kankaito]

i love this song~ in the exam, only this piece sound perfect compare to the others XD i hope i can at least pass....i did badly for scales DX

[tishen09]

Oscar peterson, what a legend

[ilykfooddd]

-.- im playing this song for my exam and it not sound anything like that! D: how long did that take for you to perfect?

[gurrrnieee]

@ilykfooddd I'd been playing this piece for 5/6 months when I uploaded this video! And I still made a few mistakes, so I found it quite hard to perfect! Don't worry, just keep practising and you'll get it :)

Good luck for your exam!

[MMC2701]

Im spanish (i dont speak english very well)

Im going to have my exam today. do you use pedal for this piece?

[gurrrnieee]

@MMC2701 I personally didn't use pedal, I think it would probably be quite tricky. It sounds nice without pedal anyway though :)

[lewislef]

i can also play this i am going to play this one at a school concert in a few weeks im a bit nervous lol

[xroziirulesx]

i can play this too! but only until the end of page one sadly :(

[gurrrnieee]

@xroziirulesx

don't worryyy, keep practising and you'll get it! :)

[billhiltonbiz]

Believe me, I've heard much worse.

Sorry to get geeky, but is your piano a Dietman? I thought I had the only one in the northern hemisphere...

[gurrrnieee]

@billhiltonbiz

Nope it's a Calisia :)

[crazypianolady]

Really good :-)

[Cakey286]

i luv this song!! u play it reeli wel

[lalaland2501]

yeah i play this for grade 8 piano list D in canada

[efowler92]

ive had the same problem with this piece. slow it WAAAY down until you can fix all the mistakes, and then you wont have to worry about them. you have to progressively pick back up the tempo with the mistakes fixed. you'll get a higher score for sure.

[cattyandpanny]

omg that was really good. im learning that atm and i wish i could play it like that!

[yukikohohoho]

are you meant to play it dotted because my teacher taught me to play it regular? i'm so confused :(

[gurrrnieee]

umm well i don't know if you'd get marked down, you'd have to check. but i think playing it dotted just sounds more like the jazzy style :)

[yukikohohoho]

are you playing that for your grade 6 exam?

[ICHAS3I]

This is in the grade 8 book?

[gurrrnieee]

nope i played this for my grade 6 from the ABRSM 2009-2010 book :)

[ICHAS3I]

@gurrrnieee huh? Its in my Grade 8 book from 2009-2010

[gurrrnieee]

is it exactly the same as this one?

thats weird!

[ICHAS3I]

@gurrrnieee Yea, exact same piece. I'm in Canada though maybe there's a difference between the books?

[gurrrnieee]

hmm yeah probably. thats kinda strange though, you'd think the grades should be the same level everywhere! ah well :)

[ICHAS3I]

@gurrrnieee Is this the RMC Book?

[gurrrnieee]

no it's from the ABRSM book, the selected exam pieces for grade 6

[ICHAS3I]

@gurrrnieee Aha, thats where the difference lies, I'm in grade 8 RMC. How many grades are in ABRSM?

[gurrrnieee]

there's 8 grades in ABRSM aswell. maybe there's more exercises in your exams than in ABRSM ones apart from the pieces? :S i don't really know!

[shanglies]

i just played along with you and i can't keep along with you on the bit on the 2nd page when it goes up! well done!

[phoebe21112]

I play this piece! I can't play it as well as you though...

Amazing!

[factionxvt408x]

how long did it take you to reach this level?

[gurrrnieee]

to get to grade 6? about 4 years (but I could already read music!)

but to get the piece to this level took a while, i'd been playing it for 5/6 months when I uploaded this :)

[Bayc0n]

That's pretty awesome.

I'm still learning this piece, mainly bars 17-25.

Nice job!

[gurrrnieee]

yeah i find those bits really hard!

just keep working at them, practice slowly then speed them up :)

[pinkycow123]

wow your so good :)

loads better than me.

i make so many mistakes, because im trying to keep up with the fast rhythm!

have you done your exam yet?

[gurrrnieee]

aww thank you :)

it's so difficult to get perfect! i still can't play it without making little mistakes.

my exam is next monday! when is yours?

[pinkycow123]

GOOD LUCKK :)

haha ^^

i just started learning this piece.. so mine's really far off..

yeahh ive never played it note-perfect before :)

hopefully with a bit of practise i can make it close to that ((:

<3 xx

[gurrrnieee]

i'm sure you will :)

good luck xxx

[MaestroMan999]

grade 6? i'm going to play this for my grade 8 exam rofl

[chihuahuadog007]

You're soo good, I might play this for my grade 6 :)

[faldarazzo]

I may be wrong, but there seems to be a mishap between 0028-0030. The RH shell chord (Bb and E natural above) should play WITH the LH cadence; A D-G (II - V-I). At this point, your bar lasted 5 beats. I haven't seen the music, but I'd imagine it ought to last 4 beats. Have a look and make sure - examiners are awful pedants!

[faldarazzo]

Try not to talk about of it as dotter quavers. Swing - in Classical terms - is written as being 3 quavers (ie, first half of a 6/8 bar). You then tie the first 2 quavers of that group of 3 quavers, together. So instead of; q q q , you get Q-q. So the Q=1 crotchet and the q= a quaver. The result (difficult without manuscript!) is DAA-da DAA-da (which i one 6/8 bar).

[Welfareofhorizon]

im starting on this piece! exams next year though :D

[eViL1686]

is it possible for a grade 2 student to play this?

[gurrrnieee]

hmm well this is grade 6 so it might be quite tricky.

Buf you like a challenge then I think go for it :)

[chemicaljazzz]

ive got a secret recipe to this piece which will give me extra marks for my exam.

And the rhythm(the dotted quavers) is quite confusing.

Its like:1(play) 2 3 +(play) the 123 is triplet by the way. You have to play the semiquaver straight after the triplet 123

[cullanwing]

im 13 and i just started this piece

which part of the piece is the most difficult?

[gurrrnieee]

hmm the bits i find the hardest are bars 8-12, and also the scales in bars 18, 20 and 22, just because the fingering can be quite tricky! have fun with the piece :)

[redfox04]

i agree with u, i too, can neva play this piece a hundred percent perfect... but u play a lot, lot better than me!!

[jesusloveyouxD]

U r same as me T.T and exam is less than 1 month time and im so nervous

[justincaseidie]

i can never get the rhythm right on this, so thanks for the help and really well played

[fenix8634]

wao u plyed lot better then me lol there's a little mistake there.....my teacher keep saying when i ply i no feel , like dyt97 said cant bring out the beauty of de jazz = ="

[dyt97]

it takes a pro to bring out the beauty of jazz. nice performance. nice piece. nice

[gurrrnieee]

aww thanks :)

[dradradra7]

You played this very well! I really enjoyed it very much! Thank you!!

[gurrrnieee]

thank you!

[HR18yrs]

Lovely playing but I'm wondering if the pianists playing on YouTube will lose marks in their exam for not playing the quavers between the triplets evenly on the first page (apart from the few bars where they're written as dotted quavers and semi-quavers). Similarly at the bottom of the second page. Playing the quavers a little more unevenly tends to hide the contrast between the different ways it is written - anyone else care to comment ? It would be a shame to lose marks if they can be saved.

[houhouhoumregg1014]

HR18yrs, I also wondered about this. I'm doing it for my exam and played the quavers unevenly at first like here - I personally think it sounds better :) However, I'm trying now to even them out as I realised there was no contrast between the dotted quavers and the even ones. Lovely playing by the way :)

[gurrrnieee]

thank you :) i'm not sure which part you 2 are referring to though? maybe some bar numbers would help :)

[miracles95]

i hope this helps but the guy who recorded it for the cd played the even quavers like dotted quavers... and it doesn't sound nice when u play them evenly:P still i'm not sure if they'll deduct marks for tat...

[RoyalDecapitation]

My teacher was reading this booklet written by the head of ABRSM herself, and she said that the dotted quavers are to be played the same way as the crotchet+quaver triplet. But I guess they'll understand, as not all people buy that booklet...

[nickytyt2002]

I also play this piece for my Grade 6 examination.However I find it really difficult .

You've done a great job.I really appreciate it.Work hard!!!!

[gurrrnieee]

aww thank you :) good luck, keep working at it!

[xxjennifaxx]

loving ittt!

[Dedesleepy]

thanks!

it's awsome!

[gurrrnieee]

thanks :)

[defineintervention]

I agree. I like the slower tempo on this one - all the other youtube videos are a bit too fast for me, even if that is how it is (apparently) meant to be played.

It was hard to choose which C piece to do, but I think I've chosen this one now. I'll most likely end up playing the others anyway, haha.

Anyway, this was awesome, well done!

[gurrrnieee]

thanks! this one was definitely my fave of all the C pieces :)

[ashlepash]

that was awesomee !!!!!

[gurrrnieee]

thank you :)