Finished “Shadowlord” from Nier earlier this month! I’m happy I was able to reach the finish line with this piece in a relatively short amount of time. It was a fun piece that wasn’t super challenging, but it still offered some hoops to jump through.

Detailed Analysis

I think the opening improved with dynamics a bit compared to the previous take. The broken chord in the RH at 0:17 was really bad and I missed an entire note LOL, but oh well. I clocked in right at 55 bpm and hovered around it +/- 2 bpm throughout the section, so that’s good enough for me in terms of tempo.

I unfortunately clocked in way faster than 64 bpm for the section from 0:35 SIGH… I started out shakily at 64 bpm but as the section continued, I started verging towards 68 bpm =_= I know it’s a small difference, but when it’s this slow, it really makes a tangible difference to me. The decrescendo for the phrase from 0:55 to 1:03 was noticeable, I think! I tried to convey a subtle winding down from all the energy of this section before we leap into the next section which has even more momentum and grandeur. Aside from the tempo issues, I think this section turned out pretty well.

1:03… the first section I really had to work for lol. There’s a slight decrescendo I added at 1:13 that wasn’t there before; I hadn’t noticed that marking for a while, oops. The broken chord at 1:21 sounded a little less fluid than I’d like, but it’s too big for my hand so it’s a trade off for the rest of this take… honestly still a bit amazed at the arpeggio at 1:29? It was so intimidating for a number of reasons, but I’m really happy with how fluid it turned out by the end. Not perfect, but I’ll take it. Definitely could improve the notes being played evenly for weight in the future.

Clocked in at 55 bpm for the section at 1:46 after the fermata- for some reason, the 55 bpm tempo really comes to me naturally, but it’s the faster ones like 64 and 67 bpm that don’t… I feel like the different dynamics didn’t come through as well as I’d like here, but I’m happy with how clean all the RH octaves came out.

2:22 was supposed to be the fastest section at 67 bpm, but I clocked in closer to 70 bpm. I guess at least it was faster (marginally) than the section at 0:35. Overall, my playing was pretty solid for this section, so I’m happy with this take.

The last section (music box section) starts at 3:00, and I clocked in at 50 bpm as written, though I eventually slowed down a tad to closer to 48 bpm. I feel like I improved the delicate phrasing for this section, which I’m satisfied with. This mic will never capture the full range of dynamics, unfortunately, so it sounds a little louder in the recording than the live audio, but not too bad, all things considered.

Thoughts on the Learning Process

This take is from December 12, so I’d say I spent about 3 weeks on this piece. I picked up the first big chunk by sightplaying a few times, but I had to really start practicing For Real for the section at 1:03 and onwards. The big arpeggios at 1:29 were honestly the only thing that I felt intimidated by at the onset of learning this; otherwise, the suggested tempos are really lenient- lenient enough where I didn’t have too much trouble dancing around big intervals that would’ve proven much more challenging at something like 84 bpm or faster. Out of all the “serious” pieces I’ve learned so far, this was definitely the easiest. However, it had its own challenges like the constant sixteenths and the tempo changes, so it wasn’t a total walk in the park.

Conclusion & Final Thoughts

I’d give this recording a 84/100; I definitely nailed the 64 bpm and 67 bpm tempos during practice, but I missed the mark a bit during this take. And I think I could’ve done a better job with bringing the dynamics down for the quieter sections. Still, there are no blatant errors, and watching this over a week later, it sounds pretty good! There were no awkward starts or stops, which was something I looked out for with all the tempo changes (some more abrupt than others).

I’m really happy to see that my playing looks relatively effortless, especially for the sections where both hands are playing sixteenth notes. There are quite a few leaps in the LH that would’ve spelled trouble at faster tempos, but here, I had to really scrutinize my playing to remember where those were. They definitely didn’t stick out audibly, which is great; I tend to slam landing points after jumps for faster pieces because there’s too much momentum during movements.

I approached this piece rather casually; I was flipping through my books for something to learn and play properly, and this was one I’d always wanted to try. I was first scared off back when I got this book because of the Bb octave chords in the beginning where I use the meat of my thumb to hit the middle notes, but after a couple of years, it was something I could overcome. I feel like learning this piece improved my confidence a little in my piano playing, and also gained some technical growth through the arpeggios and the sixteenths.