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Question:I am an advanced-intermediate level pianist. I'm learning how to play Chopin's Raindrops Prelude. I really like stuff that in minor keys or stuff that's very unusual pieces or stuff that's very dramatic. Better yet all of the above. Please please help me out because I don't know what to play next.
Thanks a bunch.


Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: I am an advanced-intermediate level pianist. I'm learning how to play Chopin's Raindrops Prelude. I really like stuff that in minor keys or stuff that's very unusual pieces or stuff that's very dramatic. Better yet all of the above. Please please help me out because I don't know what to play next.
Thanks a bunch.

anything by rachmananov

How about Billy Joel's "Fantasies and Delusions" published by Schirmer! It is both amazing and unusual. Mr. Joel won't let anyone hear him play it, choosing instead to have someone he considers more competent on the keyboard, but he wrote it. Just might be fun to support the work of a composer who is still living as long as you are looking for something mazing and unusual, this would certainly qualify!

you mention classical music and i would agree with the first answer in that Rachmaninoff is the best classical style music to play to make people notice.

but for sheer flash (and I mean that in a positive way) and if your sight reading really is THAT good ;)) then there are no two ways about it.=
Get a book of transcriptions of Art Tatum. The one I have is written by Jed Distler and Ive had it for 20 years..it is nothing short of fearsome.
Now Im not a great sight reader - so a final option if you want to dazzle is bebop piano. Dont underestimate it...the left hand plays shells (2 note chords) but they set up the harmony perfectly...and then the right hand plays at about 100 mph...really you can make twinkle twinkle little star sound like a masterpiece.
good luck. For this - Id work on works by Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk. (Im currently working on this aspect of piano). One aspect of bebop playing I genuinely LOVE is that you need to know the rules - but once you've absorbed them you can play as fast as you think - and thats damn fast ;)) also you'd be able to get as unusual or 'out there' as you wish.

good luck