Week 3 Progress (Vlog)

This week was definitely a lot better.

I got to practice a little more from a decrease in workload in school, but definitely not as much as I would have liked.

Is six weeks still a reasonable goal? I still don't know the answer. My original goal was to play both parts of the piece, the orchestra and solo part. I think this is definitely unreasonable, so the day before the TED talk my piano teacher and I will play the two parts together for the 1st and 4th song. For the 2nd and 3rd song, I hope I can get my grandmother to sing along with me which is what my piano teacher recommended.

I also haven't memorized the piece yet (which is obvious from the annoying page flips), so that is must-do for the next two weeks.

Here is the playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvGKb_s3uHgIuawbXY3-8Jyoo7PB0yvln

I'll explain a little more about my progress and what I want to do in my vlog. I have some good ideas, but I think I will stick in the hidden aspects of music theme. It is an interesting perspective on music that is not really known in the world today.

Sometimes I hate technology. Of course, Vimeo ruins my life and claims "Upload limit reached" when this is my first video and it is 4 1/2 minutes long...I guess I'll have to use Youtube.

Annoying websites have to be annoying!

Here is the vlog:

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Confidence (4)

I think I'm getting better and better.

I got some more time to practice this week with the snow day yesterday and a relatively light week. However, on the weekends, I am extremely busy. This is a disappointment since usually I blocked off time on the weekends to practice.

On Saturdays I usually do my school homework and other stuff. On Sundays, though, I have to teach a math class and then have a math practice. That's from 12-8.

This week I researched the hidden aspects of mathematics in music. I have to say, I am really surprised at this. I didn't know that everything fit like it did.

The Golden Ratio is approximately 1.618. It is most common by founding the positive value of x in the equation x^2-x-1. But it's not as simple as that.

Take the Fibonacci sequence, for example. The first two terms are 1 and 1. The next terms are found by adding the previous terms. So the Fibonacci sequence is 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, and so on. Divide each each pair of terms. Therefore, 1/1=1, 2/1=2, 3/2=5, 5/3=1.667, 13/8=1.625, 21/13=1.615, 34/21=1.619, 55/34=1.618. What do you notice? The numbers get closer and closer to the golden ratio! Something seemingly unrelated like the Fibonacci numbers are related to the golden ratio.

In piano, there are 13 notes in between an octave (including the black keys). A scale is 8 notes long and 5th and 3rd notes are the basis for all chords. Coincidence? Possibly, but the golden ratio and the Fibonacci sequence are known for occurring randomly in nature.

You can go even deeper. What happens if you divide any two Fibonacci numbers?

It's definitely a surprise that math is found in music. Now do you think math is useless?

Videos going up this weekend!

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Week 2 Progress

So I honestly think I haven't improved. At all.

Some of me wants to practice a lot more this week, because at the pace I'm going I won't go anywhere. I blame part of my lack of practice time because over the weekend I had a piano competition at Penn State. Theoretically I have a 1/6 chance of winning, but I did so bad that realistically I have a 1/9999 chance. Haha that was actually a joke. It's more like 0.

Anyways, I have the picture of the poster of my piano teacher for the Yellow River Concerto. Here it is:

If you couldn't tell, my piano teacher is the woman. You can definitely tell that she performed the piece often in China.

Video will go up tonight. I promise. Last night I tried to upload it but it said "16 minutes" FOR ONE VIDEO. No thanks, I would rather get an extra hour of sleep.

Here is the playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvGKb_s3uHgLy5UumONWOLZll6OZ5Wwya

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Luck (3)

I’m not throwing away my shot just yet.

Look around, look around at how lucky we are.


There’s a million things I haven’t done, but I think I have done well this week.

I am the one thing in life I can control, however. And I’ll admit, I didn’t control myself a lot.

Some days I played a little and some days I didn’t play at all, but never did I play a lot.

Oceans rise, empires fall, it’s much harder when it’s all your call. Truer words have never been said. Usually, when I play piano, there is a strict schedule I must follow; additionally, I am constantly worrying about how I sound like when I have piano lessons.

What comes next?

I hope to become more consistent in when I practice and how I perform the piece. There are off and on days when I play really well and then I play horribly. The only way to improve on my playing is to practice every day with a set schedule and a set amount of time.

I know that that will be impossible.


Hopefully...

I’ve seen wonders great and small, but I may not live to see my glory. This “glory” I get depends on the effort I put in for the next two weeks.

If I work well, I can hopefully use these habits for my school work.

Until then, I can only practice and practice.

When my time is up, have I done enough? Will they tell my story?

In three weeks we’ll find it, but I know one thing for sure: I’ll never be satisfied.

Anyone get all those Hamilton references?

I specifically used Hamilton lyrics because that musical is one of my inspirations in the competitive field of entertaining a diverse group of Americans.

In fact, Hamilton all started from one lonely person sparking a new idea.

I can only aspire to be as good as them at the end of this six week period, but this boost of confidence will be helpful.

Also, I think have an idea for my TED talk. I want to do the hidden mathematical side of music and what that means for the listeners' pleasure and how the song is composed. I'll research a little bit of this and hopefully next blog post I can give a detailed mathematical side of music. I also want to have an excerpt of my piece to relate to the part I am researching about.

Videos going up this weekend!

A picture of my piano teacher’s promotional of the Yellow River Concerto will go on this weekend as well.

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