God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen

After a long absence, I have returned to celebrate Christmas with you! It's not as long of an absence as you might think, since sometimes I've come here to update the broken links from old posts, or to re-record songs I shared previously, but it has been a year since I added a new song.

We don't know who composed the melody, or even the lyrics, to this song. It's just been passed down through the years. Maybe an entire church or family gathered together to create the song, each contributing a few lines of verse, then forgot who had written the melody. Hymnary estimates that the song dates back to the 18th century.

Who knows - perhaps a church singer wrote the song themselves, but didn't want their name to be written down for credit.

James Cooper writes on his website, WhyChristmas (where I learned a lot of information about Christmas traditions, as well as some reasons why Jesus was probably not born in the winter), that "Merry," a few centuries ago, did not have the exact same meaning as "Happy." It could also mean pleasant, successful, or having plenty. To "rest merry" was to remain in a state of plenty. Plenty of assurance, perhaps, that "Christ our savior was born ... when we were gone astray."

(Can't see a video? Click here to listen on YouTube.)

Keep filling your teacup with music!
~Liya

Hark the Herald Angels Sing

Listen to the song here
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Once you finish making a recording, it's fixed forever. Thankfully, musicians have a tool that can help them control their need for perfection. We can play a song better later and re-record it. This brings the two sides of the coin together: we can listen to how we sounded in previous years, use our new knowledge, consider all the ways we could have done it differently, and actually do it differently.

In fact, in case you're curious, that’s what I’ve done with today’s recording.

Enjoy your last 10 days of 2023 - and keep filling your teacup with music!
~Liya 

 

Carol of the Bells

We usually associate "Carol of the Bells" with Christmas because of its English lyrics. (I've seen many versions, but they're all about Christmas.) However, the original Ukrainian version of this song, "Shchedryk," was about the New Year. In 1919, Mykola Leontovych wrote it based on Ukrainian folk chants. The lyrics describe a little bird coming to a home, proclaiming all the good fortune that is on its way. If only it could visit us this year...

Listen to the song here
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In my last 2 posts, I wrote about how recording is a way of defining how you played at a certain time. It also lets you see all your mistakes and missed opportunities.

If I feel like recording your music doesn’t just entail perfectionism, but is perfectionism, how do the professionals feel?

How do they work up the courage to lay their music down on records? They’re in a public position, representing the peak of piano playing. The consequences of slipping up on a famously difficult section, or missing some information about how the music should be played, are an order of magnitude greater.

Now think about professional musicians in the early 1900s, the start of the recording era, who are now being listened to over 100 years later! They put their playing on full display, with limited editing capabilities, for future generations to hear. I was pleasantly surprised to find how many of these recordings we still have!

 

O Come, O Come, Immanuel

Listen to the song here
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Recording your music gives you a window into your past playing. On the other side of the coin, it can be more stressful than even a live performance. Once you play the notes, they don’t disappear in the air; they’re saved for you or others to listen to at any time. The recording defines how I sounded playing today’s song in 2021.

I'm happy with how this recording turned out, but oftentimes when I listen to my old recordings, I think of new techniques I’ve learned that I could have used. Sometimes I’m even disappointed with how I stumbled through a difficult section. 

I think I'm forced to be a perfectionist in some sense when I record. I can't escape it; it's just part of the process to keep trying until your recording is the best it can be.

O Little Town of Bethlehem

Listen to the song here
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I’m planning to post 4 Christmas songs this week, but I can’t think of 4 ideas to write about, so I’ll take my 1 idea and split it up. Who knows, maybe you don't have the time to read 4 posts in one week!

Today’s recording has gone through a long wait to be posted here, so now is the time. One advantage of making recordings is that I get to hear what my playing sounded like 2, 3, or 5 years ago. I don’t have to sit and try to remember; I can just listen!

Nocturne in Ab, "The Murmur"

At long last, Maria Szymanowska is coming back. Here is another piece I know by her, a Nocturne in A flat. It was written for 3 hands, so I layered two recordings of myself together.


Listen to the song here
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Prelude in E

Today, I am playing a Prelude in E Major by Maria Szymanowska. It is the third in her set of 4 Preludes. Szymanowska was a Polish composer who doesn't get nearly as much attention as Chopin, but could be considered a forerunner of him. Who knows how many composers there were like her who have simply been forgotten despite their achievements?

Listen to the song here
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Waltz, op 64 #2

I've decided to continue with romantic era piano pieces, and that means it's time for Chopin. With so many admirers of his unique style, we couldn't forget about him. Even one who has heard very little classical music will have come across a Chopin nocturne or waltz at some point. "Favorite" or "most influential" composer lists can never be proven "right," but whenever one is made, he is usually in the top 5.

Somehow, I didn't know much about Chopin for my first, say, 5 years playing the piano. At that point, I had not learned any of his compositions yet. I remember having little to say when my teacher made a pun regarding a "Chopin board." Granted, I was very young during those years. This was the time when I didn't know how to pronounce Liszt and all I knew of Rachmaninoff was that he had big hands. As I noticed from my folders of sheet music, I have played a lot of Chopin since then.

Listen to the song here
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Liebestraum #1

Yes, I have already made a Liebestraum post, but I failed to mention in the title that it was the third Liebestraum. I have changed that now, but eventually, someone will be confused that I played the third piece in the series before the first one. (This was most likely because I heard it before the other two.)

If you have heard that piece, or if you saw me last month finding flour in Budapest, you also know who we are talking about today. Before someone suggests that I rename my site Tea with a Lisztian (TwL), I have a good reason to bring the famous pianist back.

I just discovered that Franz Liszt played this piece at his last-ever performance, just two weeks before the fateful day of July 31, 1886.

137 years ago. (Sometimes I don't appreciate the force of how long that is.)

Listen to the song here
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There Will Never Be Another You

I think now's a good time to get back to some songs that have been sitting in my folder, waiting to be posted. Here's one that has been there for 2 years.

Listen to the song here
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La Campanella

If you looked down, you would see "the greatest pianist of this or any other century," as one of his students called him. Known for hundreds of years now, he is still looked up to as one unlike anything else we've ever seen. Merely looking at him strikes fear into the hearts of pianists (but apparently not music researchers). So, this time only, I hope you have never played a piano, or this will remind you of your inferiority to him all over again.

(I do have a recording. I just moved it down so viewers on my home page will have to click the button first.)

I hope you're ready for it.

Christ the Lord is Risen Yesterday

Listen to the song here
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Round Midnight

Welcome back to Tea with Liya! I feel like 2023 is sort of an "odd" number -- not just in the sense of not being divisible by 2, but rather "different" or "unexpected." Does that mean this is a good time to add a song by Thelonious Monk, a jazz pianist known for being distinctly unlike any others? I think it's the right time. Today I will be playing for you "Round Midnight," a jazz standard that Monk composed in the late 1930s or early 1940s, and published in 1943. I hope you like it!

Listen to the song here
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When I Fall in Love

Welcome back to Tea with Liya! To finish 2022, I'm playing a ballad called "When I Fall in Love," composed by Victor Young and Edward Heyman. This one has been around for 70 years now, but you might know it because of the famous version by Nat King Cole. I hope you like it!

Listen to the song here
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Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus

Welcome back to Tea with Liya! On this Christmas morning, I'm playing an Advent hymn called "Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus." The lyrics were written by Charles Wesley in 1744, but they have been sung to several different melodies. The melody I'm playing here is a Welsh hymn tune called "Hyfrydol," composed by Rowland Prichard. I hope you like it!


Listen to the song here
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Sonata in C Major

Why are you seeing this post today? There's two reasons why. First of all, I've kept coming back to the thought that I haven't added anything here since Together Forever in.... when was it? Probably August. I didn't want any of you to think that I had permanently gotten stuck in 1987 after posting that.

Secondly, I've heard reports that one can never tell when this sonata is going to end -- it seems like it's "going on forever." Since I'm the one who learned all the different parts, I have to know in my head where the end of the song is, so I'm not really the best person to comment on that. I want to know what you think, as the listener.

Third of all, we're coming up to the day when Tea with Liya will have been open for 5 years (since November 8, 2017). In fact, I thought at first that the 5-year mark was going to be November 15th or 16th, but then I realized it was coming up on Tuesday! So it's a good thing that I'm adding this song now. It wouldn't be right for me, out of all people, to miss the 5-year mark, right?

Listen to the song here
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Together Forever

If you've been around in the last few months, you don't even have to ask what's happening today - you know the rules and so do I. In fact, I don't even have to put a single R in this sentence to make you know what's happening today.

"Huh," one of you is saying. "You just quoted the lyrics for Never Gonna Give You Up instead of Together Forever. You should really stay quiet, since you're another one of those people who can't even tell the difference between two songs." Well, I'm about to prove that the two songs you're thinking about are pretty well connected.

Together Forever often gets referred to as "the other Rick Astley song." Of course, I've been around long enough to know that musicians generally don't make 2 songs and then disappear. What these commenters mean to say, most likely, is the other song that he became famous for around the same time. After all, it was 1988, and Rick had just been broadcasted around (quite literally) the entire world. Listeners had quite a reason to be excited when the radios announced that he had a brand-new song.

Listen to the song here
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Never Grow Old

The more time passes, the more I realize that there are some years that are never coming back. I used to not spend time thinking about such things, but they just seem to get more and more obvious whenever I think about the past. And unfortunately, it's not just events that disappear into the sands of time, but people too. I'm sure if anyone coming here has lost a relative, they've had to face the reality of being separated from the past, and eventually even forgetting some of it.

Listen to the song here
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I had the opportunity to play this song at a memorial service once. It makes you think about how eventually, over the years, you'll witness the deaths of most people older than you. Sometimes it seems like it would be more convenient if age wasn't a factor.

James Cleveland Moore Sr. was having similar thoughts when he wrote this song. While studying to become a minister, he heard his father singing at his church. Moore realized that because his father was getting older, eventually he would reach a point where he would no longer be able to sing in public. That thought inspired him to write a song about "a land where we'll never grow old." He dedicated the song to his parents and published it around 1930.

Music was a big part of Moore's ministry in the southeastern United States. He was known for singing, writing music, teaching others to sing, and leading music associations in Georgia. For him, music was a way to give hope to people. Even though there's nothing we can do to control the passage of time, "there's a beautiful home," where we "never shall die." "All our sorrow will end ... 'tis a land where we'll never grow old."

Keep filling your teacup with music!
~Liya

Don't Say Goodbye

I told you in June about my plan for my next few posts. Although you might not have realized it, I'm taking that statement seriously. And that only means one thing.

Rick's back!

If you're closing the page as I say this, you've got the freedom to do that, but you've just defeated the point of the song. What's happening in the lyrics is that a girl is about to say goodbye and we're trying to convince her not to. So if you're heading out right now, you're saying goodbye before I can even persuade you to stay.

If you know anything about Rick Astley, who sang this song 35 years ago, you know that he's the kind of person who doesn't just say goodbye to people. (Giving up has never exactly been his thing.) So the least he can do is expect someone else not to leave him. It's a fair position to take, right?

Listen to the song here
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La Fille aux Cheveux de Lin

Here's a short little song by Claude Debussy, one of the most influential composers of his time. You may remember me talking about him on a Bill Evans song. The title refers to a girl with flaxen hair (blonde hair). But somehow, the melody reminds me of a cat walking around. I don't know why. I just got that image in my head.

This one was written in 1910, and it was known to be simpler than most of Debussy's other writing. For example, it has some more common chord patterns (though not the most obvious ones), and it doesn't change into a lot of different keys. It isn't that long, either.

Listen to the song here
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