[piano cover] Song From A Secret Garden

[topitmunkeydog]

Hey I forgot to like post it here
This is me playing a song by Rolf Løvland. And here is a video:
Thanks for listening! :3

[Alycs]

I couldn't see the video, so I'm going on what I can hear in the soundcloud for advice. As I don't think I've ever heard the song before, I'll focus on technique.

First, you main thing that you need to work on is pedaling. Is sounds like you are releasing the pedal after a phrase instead of pressing it before one. The difference is that when you are focusing on releasing rather then pressing, it ends up making the song sound muddy, as it basically lets you say, "I'll release it when it sounds too loud" or something in that line. Even if you are following the markings in the book, you can still hear the difference.

What you should practice doing is playing a simple C major scale, but pedal on every 4 notes. Try to push down the pedal just after you press the note; only about a nanosecond. It might not sound like much, but it changes the tone immensely.

Also, your left hand sounds like its being held low to the keyboard. In a song like this, you can't be heavy handed in the lower register. Bring up the wrist and bend the fingers a little more - it feels awkward at first, but it will help make the notes sound less muddy and make it much easier to bring out the melody.

Just a few things I noticed while listening. As I was basing it off the audio only, I might be a little off in my diagnosis (especially with an electric piano) but is still something to work on. Overall the song was really nice, I can tell you've put some work into it

[topitmunkeydog]

Ah yes thanks so much for this advice, this is exactly what I was looking for. See, I made this like right after I performed it for a recital and by that time I was just super sick of playing it so I was like oh forget it this is good enough. My recital performance was atrocious though because I messed up. At least here I played the right notes but I agree it doesn't sound as good as it could have. So I'll work on some of the things you said and then hopefully stuff will happen :3
Something else I'd like to know is what do you think of the recording quality and stuff? I ended up doing it with this sort of cord thing that I got in the mail (audio interface?) and used Garageband or Audacity or some silly thing. And I didn't really do anything to it after that. So yeah that kind of happened :3
Thank you!