Hello, hello! Here’s a piece from FFVIII (which I haven’t played) that I picked up near the end of December- I’d originally wanted to have it done by Christmas since it’s got some cozy holiday vibes in my opinion, but… that didn’t pan out. But hey, it’s still winter, right? It’s still winter… with 87F degree weather…

Detailed Analysis

The first phrase was deceivingly difficult; it’s relatively simple, yes, but there are some tricky fingerings for the intervals that you can hear me miss lol… I tried. After the brief intro, we hear the main melody at 0:18, which was disrupted at times due to my double-striking G key, but overall I really enjoy the peaceful vibes from this section. More of the deceivingly difficult stuff… fairly simple throughout, but the intervals are really easy to not play cleanly, in which case it’s super obvious due to how much space there is around each note. I liked the little fill at 0:29, though I definitely could’ve cleaned up the RH intervals a bit. There were a couple of chords I couldn’t reach like at 0:32, in which case I just opted for the higher two notes, since that’s what you hear more. Not too much heartburn over these modifications since I myself couldn’t hear the difference very well! The LH chords at 0:40 were weirdly difficult to play cleanly despite being small intervals…

We repeat the melody at 0:49, though it’s beefed up a bit in the LH. Also used my LH to support the broken chord at 1:06; didn’t put too much work into it, but I think it sounds relatively fluid. Something else I kept in mind was voicing for most of the piece so far- there are so many intervals, and while they’re hard enough to play cleanly with even voicing, it’s more difficult to emphasize the melody with moving intervals… but it was fun. After a little funky transition at 1:12, we hear a bit of the cozy Christmas vibes at 1:19 before I suffer with the RH trill LOL I am so embarrassingly bad at trills but OH WELL!! Made for a perfect place to page turn at, at least.

Things get more active at 1:28 with sixteenth notes (very spicy for this arrangement). I had to put in some practice for these 8 bars since it was so rapid compared to the slower pace of the first half of the piece, but it wasn’t difficult. I think I could do a better job with playing the sixteenths absolutely evenly, but at the same time, sometimes it was big enough where I had less control over my fingers, so not too much angst over this. Could I have made it better with practice? Yeah. But is it also something that I could only improve to a certain extent due to physical limitations? Also yes. Voicing was also important in the RH throughout this little phrase; it reminded me of that one phrase from “The Other Promise”, though that one went WAY harder lol. We have some lovely chords at 1:40, and I loved the section at 1:48, especially with the triplets!

2:04 called for piu mosso, and the arrangement becomes more dense with the triplets in the LH and intervals in the RH. Again, lots of intervals, so lots of voicing is needed. We get fancy with the RH with the descending triplets at 2:07, which I had been wary of at first, but came a lot easier than I expected, so that was nice. (This arrangement has fingerings written in!! Truly a godsend when I can reach them.) The LH extends at 2:13, but luckily the tempo is really manageable so I was able to just stretch and hop instead of finding an alternate fingering. The thirds in the RH at 2:17 were so hard and I tried to make them sound better but they’re so hard. This piece really puts the spotlight on a ton of things I’ve never actually practiced lol… that is to say, basically everything. The part that I felt was holiday-ish was 2:19; something about the chord progression here just feels very regal and… also Christmas-y LOL. It definitely feels like a grand conclusion, which it is, until we wind down for the only section I had to really practice…

2:32 was challenging for a few different reasons… 1) piano dynamic!! While playing nonstop eighth notes!!!!! 2) nonstop eighth notes in both hands 3) nonstop eighth notes with intervals and stretches that aren’t ergonomic therefore it was hard to play quietly, see 1). I’m not too satisfied with how this section turned out, but given my limitations, I guess I did okay… It was pretty difficult to play legato and quietly, though I also could’ve used some more practice. But, looking at it now, it’s not as choppy as I felt while playing it haha. Despite how frustrating these kinds of sections can be, I really, really enjoy phrases that have both hands play the same rhythm in tandem- the end product is so satisfying.

And then we repeat the section from 1:28 verbatim at 3:05, which was nice, and head towards the ending. I think I did a better job with the voicing here than at 1:28, though that might partially be because 1:28 was mezzo forte while we’re at forte here. There’s a decrescendo at 3:15, then we have a very quiet phrase with some huge broken chords (love the one at 3:25!!) before a final transition at 3:28. The triplets here are very charming in my opinion, and I think I did a good job with the voicing in the RH for keeping the melody on top with supporting RH triplets. Then at 3:34 we have the exact same phrase as the opening, which I played better here than at the start before one last broken chord at 3:48 (maybe my favorite one in the whole arrangement), and a resolution with an Eb chord.

Conclusion

I’m not sure in what context this piece plays in FFVIII, but in any case I really like the halcyon atmosphere of the arrangement. Something about it feels very comforting… like a lullaby? I had sightplayed this for fun a few times over the past several months while flipping through this giant book, and I’d always marked it as an “easy” piece. It was definitely easy in some ways, but I was surprised by how challenging it was to make it sound really good. I don’t think I quite hit the mark this time, but I’m happy with the progress I made with it. I think I did a decent job with the phrasing, and nothing sounded too atrociously bad. I hope.

The great thing about this piece was the repetition of some phrases- it cut down practice time a LOT, so I took this piece pretty casually, aside from that one phrase with the eighth notes in both hands. So casually, in fact, that I didn’t get to memorize it. There are lots of sections with intervals that I could’ve worked on more, but I think my technique in general with intervals leaves much to be desired, so hopefully over time I can improve.

All in all, this was a relaxing breather piece to work on, and I do think it was a nice piece to work on during the holiday break while staying indoors. Hoping to play a couple of other pieces from this game sometime in the future!