Nice tunes for beginners + advice on the tremolo

[Guillaume C]

Hi everyone !
I'm quite new on this forum, so I hope my question hasn't been asked again and again. Also, I'm French. Which means I don't always write English as well as I would like to.

- I've been playing mandolin for about a year now, and I'm always looking for new tunes to play - more precisely, some nice classical pieces. But, you know, easy ones. Alas, my knowledge of classical mandolin music is limited (and I have neither the skills nor the right partners to play Vivaldi's concerto), so I find myself stuck with the same two or three pieces.

Does anyone have any idea on what I could play ?
If you have the music scores, that's even better (not the tabs though, I like to practice my reading)...


- Also, I'm having a hard time, a hard time, doing the tremolo right. I can do it quickly, I can do it with regularity, but never both of these at the same time. I'm either too slow or not regular enough. Any tip on how to practice the tremolo efficiently ?

Cheers

[crisscross]

Hi Guillaume,

here's my personal approach to tremolo and a nice little classical piece!
The piece is the Melody op 68 no.1 from Robert Schumann's "Album for the Young"
Here's the pdf http://www.klavier-noten.com/schuman...nn-Melodie.pdf
Just play the piano player's right hand. If there are double stops, play the upper note only.
I used this little melody as a tremolo study. I played the quarter notes at 84 bpm.
To practice the tremolo, I divided them into eight notes and played DUDU per eight note.
I started practicing at 60 bpm per eighth note and gradually increased speed.
At 168 bpm per eigth note, I switched to 84 bpm per quarter note and hoped that I succeded playing DUDUDUDU per quarter note.
The eigth notes of the melody I played staccato, that is non-tremolo.


Bonne chance!

[Hany Hayek]

Hi Guillaume, I suggest you check this site:
http://www.mandoisland.de/eng_kosten...l#.V9VpSjVuM8A
I also suggest you concentrate more on the Italian methods by old masters Carlo Munier and Calace.
You'll find all Calace method and scores here:
http://www.federmandolino.it/htm/spartiti_calace.htm
You'll find Munier's here:
http://imslp.org/wiki/Category:Munier,_Carlo
In Munier's "Metodo per la divisione", part two you'll find a lot of classical pieces adapted to the mandolin by the master himself.

If you want to get to play a good tremolo you'll have to master your up and down strokes. It took me a lot more than a year to do a good tremolo. Don't give up, keep practicing.

[pops1]

When you tremolo angle your pick so it hits the strings at and angle instead of flat. More angle the quieter the sound and the less resistance. If you use a lot of angle you can play quite hard and not be loud, with very little resistance, a good way to get the tremolo started.

[Gary Leonard]

What about the Anna Magdalena Bach notebook?

http://imslp.org/wiki/Notebooks_for_...ann_Sebastian)

Scroll down for some scores in PDF. I am familiar with the Marche in D Major as my teacher gave me this when I started playing.

[crisscross]

In addition to the methods Hany mentioned, may I suggest "L'art de la mandoline" by Silvio Ranieri. It's not downloadable for free, you can buy the Schott edition and I think it pays off. The text is in four languages, and to me, the French text sometimes makes more sense than the English translation.
It starts with tremolo, staccato is added later on. To get some idea of the music, see this thread:http://www.mandolincafe.com/forum/sh...Ranieri-thread

Another usefull adress is Astute Music with authors such as Alison Stepehens, Barbara Pommerenke Steel, Hugh Boyde and Mandoisland's Michael Reichenbach.http://www.astute-music.com/shop/man...7g4o1ohgimke20
In general, the approach to the instrument is a little different to the old Italian masters, more broken chords, the mandolin is treated a little more like a guitar, less tremoloed melodies.
But as an addition to a classical mandolin method, some pieces are quite nice, for example "Calypso" from Hugh Boydes "Signposts"

Or "Breaktime" from Alison Stephens' "Six Episodes", nicely played by Michael Reichenbach

The e-books are downloadable in Pdf format for moderate prices.

[crisscross]

Your name gave me an idea for another nice piece that I'll have to try myself one of these days:
L'Ouverture de Guillaume Tell de Rossini. In this Pdf play the alto sax part in C major, which can be played on the mandolin in the first position.
Keep your wrist relaxed for those sixteenth notes ! Nice exercise to prepare tremolo playing! http://makingmusicfun.net/pdf/sheet_...l-alto-sax.pdf

[David L]

Here's another vote for the Anna Magdelena Bach book. The minuets are great. You can play them straight, or change them into tangos. "Gymnopedie #1" and "Gnossienes #1-3" by Eric Satie are beautiful. Some of Schuman's easy piano pieces work well.

[crisscross]

Speaking of Bach, some of the movements of his cello suites are fairly accessible, for example the Bourrée I of the third cello suite.
You can find the viloin sheet music here:Page 19 http://violinsheetmusic.org/files/do...lo-suite-3.pdf

No absolute beginner's piece, but not too hard either

[Guillaume C]

Wow, thanks !

When I was talking about classical music, I was thinking about classical pieces written for the mandolin, but actually playing other pieces seems like a good idea.

[Johnny60]

Hi Guillaume - welcome to the Cafe! I had to smile when I read your first post. You said that, because you're French, you don't write in English as well as you'd like.

Well, your written English seems to be better than quite a few English people I know, and you certainly write better English than most of us here could write in French!

Have fun,

Johnny

[JeffD]

Hey Guillaume, these guys may be of interest.

http://www.mandomontreal.com/

[crisscross]

Hi Guillaume,

still at it? Another piece I alwaxs liked is your compatriote Gabriel Fauré's Pavane op. 50.
I just didn't know how to articulate it, and the original version climbs a little to high for my limited skills.

The first problem was solved when I found this version by the Kemal Quartet,

Quarter notes and eigth notes are played tremolo,
Eighth note triplets and sixtienth notes are played staccato.

I also found a simplified version in a-minor that can be played entirely in the first position.
To make playiing tremolo easier, I also used the second and third position.
It's in the book "Easy classical guitar Duets" which has 32 arrangements of welll known classical pieces with the first guitar always playing a single note melody, so it can also be played on the mandolin. https://www.amazon.fr/Easy-Classical...y+guitar+duets
To work on my tremolo, I played 4 DU on a quarter note and on the dotted eight note followed by a sixteenth note i played DUDUDUD. At least when I practiced slow. Up to tempo I went more by feel...
It's still miles away from the nice version of the Kemal Quartet, but it was fun working on.

[JeffD]

Wow, thanks !

When I was talking about classical music, I was thinking about classical pieces written for the mandolin, but actually playing other pieces seems like a good idea.

The thing is that so much more has been written for other instruments than has been written specifically for the mandolin.

Just about everything written for violin (which of course is a metric ton of music) can be played on mandolin, and at all levels of virtuosity.

[Cosmic Graffiti]

Hi, Take a look at the Suzuki Method Violin Books. Volumes 1-4. They start very easy and then progress to some pretty complex pieces. I have these in my library from way back in the day and frequently grab them and play pieces on my Mandolin. Its a great selection of composers and styles from Bach to Paganini.

[mandolin breeze]

For tremolo, listen to lots of the Dawg, aka David Grisman . . . the master!

One little tip that might help, it helps me whenever mine gets off track . . . I usually begin the tremolo on a down stroke, and what helps me is to concentrate on the second (up stroke) and try to hit that up stroke as quickly as you can, it just seems for me that it really helps in getting the tremolo going.

Hope it helps

[bagpipe]

Speaking of Bach, some of the movements of his cello suites are fairly accessible, for example the Bourrée I of the third cello suite.
You can find the viloin sheet music here:Page 19 http://violinsheetmusic.org/files/do...lo-suite-3.pdf

No absolute beginner's piece, but not too hard either

Thanks for posting this. I'd only ever heard the 1st cello suite being done on mandolin. I'd like to try and learn this piece.

[Beanzy]

Worth a rummage through the Astute music offerings;
http://www.astute-music.com/shop/man...vkj4u0iu3pej22

[StuartE]

Check out August Wattters, Exploring Classical Mandolin, from Berklee Press

BTW, he's a MF member and sometimes poster.

I skimmed this at a local music store and it looked very interesting, even though classical mandolin is not my style.

From the link above

Repertoire includes music for solo mandolin and small mandolin ensembles at varying levels of difficulty:

25 classical mandolin pieces by Fouchetti, Barbella, Denis, Beethoven, Mozart, Nakano, and others
14 mandolin arrangements of classical favorites by Bach, Telemann, Beethoven, Puccini, Foster, Dvořák, and others
Original etudes and concert music composed by the author

[crisscross]

Worth a rummage through the Astute music offerings;

Among other titles, they offer the (E-)Book Favourite Mandolin Solos of the 18 century.
It's a collection of baroque pieces arranged and edited by Alison Stephens, including phrasing advice, fingerings and pick direction markers.
The Bourrée above is included as is the Minuet fom the first cello suite.
And their respective minor companions.
http://www.astute-music.com/shop/man...-int-p-99.html

[crisscross]

Another nice tune to practice measured tremolo is the Italian song "Vieni sul Mar". http://www.free-scores.com/download-....php?pdf=47041
I guess, it's originally in e flat major, but this version is in d major, which makes life on the mandolin a little easier.
I practiced every quarter note as four times the same sixtienth note DUDU.
Up to 13o BPM, I succeeded in counting it out, at tempos above I just tremoloed by feel, with some variation of the tremolo speed on the longer notes.

BTW:for my uke strumming in the background I simplified the chords in the PDF a little bit.