i need some kind of piano concerto for a competition. just to give you an idea, i`ve been playing for about 8 years.. and have just finished learning the moonlight sonata, fantasie impromptu...and the cadenza to rach`s 3rd (first movement one). the past two winners of this competition have played the first movement of the grieg concerto and a variation on the rococo theme by tchaikovsky for cello. i want a piece that i can have a good chance of winning with. something powerful and emotional and flashy would be prefered..and i only need one movement of the concerto. i have over two years if needed to learn the piece so give me something that i can work on for a while. don`t give me something stupid like rachmaninoff or the likes.

Try haydn`s Piano Concert N°11 it sound`s nice
i`ve got on CD but i haven`t got the sheetmusic...
It`s a typik Haydn thing, ie a emotionnaly happy (with an other "haydn mark": that sort of "baroque" style at one
moment)

Why is Rachmaninoff stupid?

He`s one of the greatest Russian composers of the century, and his piano concertos are some of the most powerful repertoire ever written.

i like rachmaninoff...i just can`t play it. his concerto`s are beautiful, but there is no way i can master such a piece in such a short amount of time. i would like a piece though that is just as powerful and emotional as his 2nd and 3rd though.

I don`t know exactly how hard they are, but you could try some of the Prokofiev concertos. The third one is his most famous and most easy to like. But i have HEARD that the 2nd is incredibly difficult, but all of his concertos sound impressive. He wrote five, and the fourth was only for the left hand (that ones a doozy). You could also try some of the more well known ones, like Tchaikovsky`s 1st, I espicially love the 3rd movement, but once again, I don`t know how hard it is. One last thing, i don`t know if you`ve actually looked at the Rachmoninoff and made your own opinion or just taking peoples word that the Rach pieces are hard, but you should try to take a look at them anyway (In the case that you took peoples word). They might be easier than you think. I don`t know if it is or not, it`s just that a similar thing happened to me. I considered La Campanella a huge leap ahead of me in skill level. But when i sat down to try to learn just a bit of it, for the sheer hell of it, i found that with a lot of practice, I could learn it. So there`s no harm in trying a bit of it.

Mendelssohn`s first concerto is pretty nice, its showy (although maybe not good for such a competition), and does it have to be concertos?

yeah it has to be a concerto, and can you please specify which movement to do? also i have actually tried the rach 3, hence i have played the cadenza. i spent a month on that piece and got basically no where learning the other parts of it. i have read some of the other posts about how people have played it when they were about 15 years old. i asked my piano teacher...about this, and he said that a professional would probably take at least 5 years to learn the piece while practicing it at least 8 hours a day. from experience alone, i can say that there is no way anyone can play that piece until they are at least 18. even if you forget about the emotions of the piece, no one at the age these people claim to be can possibly have developed that much technique to play the rach 3 95% right. by the way, it is a great piece, but i feel that "shine" has made it too overrated. in my opinion, it is a wonderful concerto, but others such as the rach 2 and tchaikovsky`s 1st are better.

I was thinking either the first or third movements of the Mendelssohn, but bear in mind its not the most advanaced concerto out there. Would the competition be with full orchestra? By the way another cool concert is Saint-Saens no. 2.

So you need a concerto piece....
I totally agree about all what was said concerning our dear Rachmaninoff...Yes, it`s very hard
to learn, though jumping on the 3d
for 5 years & working 8 hours a day
seems absolute nonsense to me...!!
No, no! You shouldn`t do that!
You will completely burn out within
a short period of time. I suggest
you study a fair amount of different styles, from Bach to
Mozart and from Schumann to Prokofiev...than let it rest and
return to the `3d`. Do all sorts
of exercices(incl. studies of all
kinds)- did you people know the great Rachmaninoff himself always
trained a few Czerny etudes before
entering the platform?!

Now for the `concerto piece`.
You might take a look at Schumann`s
piano concerto. The 1st movement
forms a sort of entity, there is
a lot of virtuosity, but also plenty of themes/motifs to elaborate; it is very varied;
different moods & tempi...
Chopin`s 2d concerto, 1st movement;
Idem, 1st concerto, 1st movement;
Brahms 1st concerto, 1st movement;
Idem, 2d concerto, 1st movement;
Just give it a try...I mean Rach`s
1st concerto, 1st movement(most
gratifying & satisfying! Do it!);
Idem, 2d concerto, 1st movement;
From Liszt: Totentanz; 1st concerto
or 2d concerto(lengthy but very
rewarding, too).
FRanck`s Variations Symphoniques!
A movement from a Bortkiewicz concerto...or from Medtner(a friend
of Rachmaninoff); or perhaps
the Introduction and Allegro by
Schumann; Ravel`s concerto for the
Left Hand)masterpiece!
I think I will end here! Good luck!

yeah dude, rach 1
lol
yeah sorry i`m obsessed, but it`s my favorite of the concertos

I really like the Schumann concerto too... He only wrote one but he did a hell of a job with it! The 3rd movement is a bit more difficult than the 1st, certainly more so than the 2nd, but it is simply beautiful, and packed with both emotion and virtuosity. Even if you don`t decide to give the Schumann Concerto a try, you should check out the EMI recording by Dinu Lupatti, it`s far and away the most magnificent rendition I`ve ever heard - in fact, I think I`m going to listen to it right now...

ravel`s g major concerto is wonderful. grieg`s piano concerto is also wonderful - oh i love the 3rd movement it`s really gorgeous.