Dear all,

I have recently been working on a piece by Liszt called Rigoletto Paraphrase de Verdi.

I am currently experiencing numerous difficulties:

1) There is a place, which is before a group of descending sixths. I need help not only to play fast, but also to play it accurately, smoothly, and lightly.
2) There is a passage, or cadenza, as one may say, near the middle. It is situated before the main tune in the left hand and the flowing passage in the right hand. It is quite hard to describe; this place, the right hand has continuous triplet passages, and left hand with chords. After that, there is a place where the right hand descends in 4's. How can I manage that without stumbling, having smoothness and also not becoming tired?
3) There is a place - the octave passage. It is not so much this place that requires help, but the place after that, where there are continous repeated 4 octaves at a time. How may I achieve the best possible outcome of it?
4) Is there a recording or information site I may refer to about this? Thanks!!!

Thank you in advance!

Can't help you much as i don't play the piece, or have the music for it. But I have a recording of it, with Daniel Baremboim playing( Deutche Gramophone), and it sounds like you got your work cut out!!! with some pieces, i just have to play them very slowly, for what seems like an age, until things click. Good Luck...

Jeez, that is a real fearsome piece. I heard a young fellow play it at a Master Class given by Stephen Hough a few months back. Way beyond me to attempt it!

I havent played this piece, but could offer advice with the descending fourths and repeated octaves.

Also, having just looked over the sheets, you're not being very specific- for example there are a few places that could be referred to as an "octave passage".

The Liszt Technical Exercises (Alfred publishing) have some amazing exercises for getting fourths fluent. It's a really good book to get hold of *cough*iknowwhereyoucoulddownloaditfromifyouwantsendmeaPM*cough*

As for the octaves, when they are manageably fast you have to practise them with as little effort as possible as if you are bouncing a ball- that is the movement you want. If it is just not happening, a good cheat to do is not to repeat the thumb- ie hold the lower octave with the thumb and use a 545454 fingering on the top note. This is only unnoticeable though if they are played fast enough.

1 & 2) Do you know the bar numbers of where each of those sections begin? I cant think where straight off....

3) Keep your thumb and finger in contact with the keys when playing each group of repeated octaves. Also, start each group with your wrist just slighty lower and raise it gradually... and if you watch some of those videos ive linked to below you can kinda see the performers do that if you look closely(or at least I thought I saw it). Ive found out the hard way that exaggerated hand movements here only makes things much harder... I also did a search of this forum and found another much older topic from somebody also looking for help with this piece, here.

4) There are a number of videos of the piece on youtube, heres a few...
http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=gDo31wyt7nA
http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=JoU8xZ9D3ew
http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=j_UGj40STM8
http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=L1Oczss9RmM



I love this piece too by the way. Have fun with it

This is an amazing fantasy on the 'bella figlia dell'amore' aria, particularly the soprano part. Of course the rigoletto being most famous for 'la donna e' mobile' or 'questa e quella per me pari son'.

It not as difficult as some other Liszt, assuming you are of this kind of standard of course, could you be more specific about bar numbers? The advice already given should be plenty though.....have fun with it

Dear all,
Thank you for the excellent advice! I've taken them ALL into account.

Yes, I'd have to agree that I have to be more specific! The point is I don't even have any bar numbers....

Well Ill atempt to describe it better:

1) A passage of descending minor Sixths going down chromatically after a semi climax, I daresay it is in the first few pages.
2)A place where left hand is chords, and right hand is triplets, going up, down up (3 times), and after it descends in fours. It is sort of a "breath holding" time. It is generally chromatic though there are some places where it is not.

I hope I described it sufficiently.

THanks again!

Does nobody have an answer?

Hello,

I was actually having a go at this for the past 4-5 days, out of curiousity. Needless to say it's a beast of a piece of music but I got up to page 8, which means playing it fairly accurately at least. Reading again now you should be talking about the bit after the big jumps on Ab dom7 over Ab bass, B major over A bass, Ebminor over Bb etc...It's really satisfying to play, but you probably can't play anything else afterwards.

1) The way I could play it is by practicing the left hand with just finger 5 going down chromatically, so start on c, b natural, Bb etc... Do the same with your thumb individually, then try both fingers an octave at a time, by trying to get the shape of the run with your wrist (hard to explain maybe). The same with your right hand except here you use 1-5, 2-5 fingering, basically crawling. I think the only way to do it is by moving your wrist in and out with the shape of the run.

2) The triplets is where the left hand has the melody I think (I hope otherwise I'm typing for no reason!). Each triplet lasts one semiquaver so play it slowly to see how they fit together (apart from the bit with hemidemi's). It's a run in F major, if that helps at all, so maybe try and make the pattern second nature with your right hand and then figure out how it fits rhythmically by breaking each bit down (i.e. one triplet plays through one chord of the melody).

I hope all that helps you, I will try and have another go this weekend and if I find any other tips I'll probably post them (assuming you haven't figured it out by that time). I think the main thing to understand with Liszt is that you should use your whole body, i.e. fingers, hand, wrists, shoulder and upper body depending on what the music is doing.

I did a forum search on this out of interest. With regard to the octaves, there is some useful stuff in an old thread at http://forums.abrsm.org/index.php?showtopi...etto+Paraphrase

Thank you for everything! I have really cherished everyone's help! Now i have almost perfected it!

Lots of thanks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was going to reply to this question:

"2) There is a passage, or cadenza, as one may say, near the middle. It is situated before the main tune in the left hand and the flowing passage in the right hand. It is quite hard to describe; this place, the right hand has continuous triplet passages, and left hand with chords. After that, there is a place where the right hand descends in 4's. How can I manage that without stumbling, having smoothness and also not becoming tired?"

by saying that if you can play the six or so pages leading up to this section then it should hold no further technical difficulties for you.

But then came:


"Perfected it"

Then you are a genius.

And I doubt whether anyone on this forum either knows enough, or has the technical proficiency to teach you anything. You should really be telling us the story of how you came to the piano, and how you got so good so quickly. How do you study, what do you do in your practice routines, who were your teachers and so on?

As for the piece, all the fancy figuration and cadenza like passages throughout are fiendish enough, but the presto double octaves of the finale are a real killer, especially as they start pp and end up fff.

First hope everyone had a good christmas. I was actually going to take you up on your first point, which I dont think is quite accurate. I have infact looked at this piece with more and more interest throughout the holidays, since the transcriptions by Liszt are usually discarded in favour of the more popular rhapsodies or 'Mazeppa', 'Mephisto waltz' etc etc...Out of interest I can only find one video of his transcription of Beethoven's 5th on Youtube played decently (at least get the notes right).

I think actually after the first 6 pages is probably where there is a greater technical demand on many levels (i.e. hand independance, co-ordination, strength and loads of other stuff). The most difficult parts in the first 6 pages are the cross-hand runs from bar 7, then the chord leaps from bar 37. These are all patterns which can be memorised into habit, by repetition, playing them slowly and building up speed (i.e. the run on bar 15 'velocissimo'). Also the chord leaps are mainly about geography, if you play a bit of ragtime or some Chopin it shouldn't prove to be hugely difficult. And lastly but most importantly this piece isn't about just getting to the finish line quickly, as the original aria wasn't very fast anyway (i.e. the part Gilda has).

On the latter point however, you are probably right (I speak for myself obviously).