The third and last set of the Minutova Sola by Stephan Rak. This set completely consists of dances. As usual in collections, the last pieces are technically the most difficult ones.
Francousky Tanec (French Dance) clearly is an exercise in playing rests in the “bass” line on the third string. Because melody and bass are close together (all on the first three strings), this is tricky! OK, I only hit the wrong string once!
Venezuelsky Tanec (Venezolan Dance) was one of my competition pieces last year. I did remember the piece indeed! This time I took a slightly higher tempo and decelerated more in the middle section.
Rusky Tanec (Russian Dance) is not so very difficult to play, but it requires a bit of playfulness. A bit of acceleration and deceleration like in a Cossack dance. Just like the Gipsy Song this dance gets a tension between full speed and the chance to slip. In one way or another I can hear that in the result. So, next time I should attempt to play outside my box!
Cesky Tanec (Czech Dance) sounds like a nice folk dance with a few pitfalls. The jumps in the bass line attract haste in the tempo and the melody has two jumps that require careful attention.
Jihocesky Tanec (South-Bohemian Dance) shows a rare shifted rhythm on a monotonous bass. Too much speed was risky in this piece, so I keep it moderate.
Hradní Tanec (Court Dance) has a clear relation with the Renaissance dances that were played in the time when it was permitted in court to throw chicken wings at the dogs and to make a nice dance in between. The piece resembles a Branle.
Divossky Tanec (Barbarian Dance) was one of my tricky competition pieces last year. The weird measures and the regular meter changes are a magnet for hurrying effects. I still have to do more with the timbre to compensate for the monotonous character of the piece.
Spanelsky Tanec (Spanish Dance) attempts to imitate Asturias a veeeery tiny bit! The thumb has the melody here. I could not leave to add some chord tones in the slow middle section.
Valcik (Waltz) appeared a tricky piece to play as a waltz, because the melody is not quite waltz-like. The one-two-three of the waltz is a bit masked by the rhythm patterns. This remains so in the trio.
Rondino concludes the Minutova Sola. A joyful refrain with two couplets in a slightly different mood. Damping the bass strings in time was important here, else the piece would turn into a melodious bean soup.
All right, now I have recorded thirty small pieces. I will leave them for a while, evaluate them later and re-record the ones that can be improved (;-) all of them if I am in a pessimistic mood?) During recording I noticed that concentration is often not stable before the second repeat. Maybe next time I should try to record all thirty in a row! However, I will practice things with some longer pieces first!
Recordings
😊Play one tune at a time!