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What Makes These Tunes So Hard to Play?

Nate Smith February 27, 2019

Grab your transcription here!

So there's something that happens when I see a difficult tune I can't play.

It's akin to Biff Tannen calling Marty McFly "chicken".

I'm all set for the day in the shed...

I've got my life in a good balance...

I don't want for anything.

All I have to do is walk away.

Then, I hear the tune calling "what are you...CHICKEN?"

"NOONE CALLS ME CHICKEN"

So it was was the tune that inspired this week's lesson. And, like many of the tunes that "call me chicken" recently, it's by Tigran Hamasyan.

But let's get deeper.

I realized there's something specific that make a lot of Tigran's tunes particularly difficult.

It's not just the shifting meters you have to remember - though some tunes certainly have those.

It's the way you often have to keep two rhythms - of two different phrase lengths - in your head at once. And, I realized, it's not unique to Tigran.

In today's lesson, I'll examine 3 tunes by 3 different composers, all-of-which place a similar demand on our cognition.

Oh - and don’t forget Le Transcripcion:

Grab it here

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