Prokofiev Is more difficult for my flute playing style. I hate the High register of the flute, articulation are difficult, buy I have to admit that not all the flutes are equal. Playing High register with a professional flute Is more simple than with a study economic model.
For number one it’s the speediness of the fingering and notes but for number two is the tone and holding the notes and the notes are long in number two
Every time - no. 2. Ignoring the uncommon 9/8 time signature for a moment. The level of breath control needed there is immense, and shows far more technical proficiency than being able to play a lot of notes in quick succession. Don't get me wrong both are impressive, requiring skill and dedication, but the 2nd demands orders of magnitude more. Well played! 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
This reminds me of katieflute's "What people think is hard on the flute VS what is actually hard" video where she does a similar comparison with a fast piece and the Debussy one. She did not breathe while playing Debussy for 27 seconds which honestly shocked me so much.
Idk I really enjoy playing the Debussy solo which in my mind takes some of the difficulty away. Both are very fun; I struggle with the Prokofiev a bit more 🤣
Beautiful playing! Each piece has its own obvious difficulties, in the first piece the player must have a very fluid upper register, high D! The Debussy demands great sound, an understanding of what the piece is saying, and self expression
definitely have to agree with the Prokofiev. i have struggled with that one for years ,mainly because the alternate fingerings are tricky. i find Peter and the Wolf much more difficult than Faun.
I could definitely do the first one with a whole lot of nonstop practice. The second one though is so vulnerable and you need to have amazing tone. I'm not sure I could pull it off lol.
Well played, the Prokofiev was brilliant and fingered out with no cheats really impressive. Debussy was beautiful, I can't play it in one breath and those who do play it ppp.
I’ll be using Debussy’s piece as a warm up for my first practice of 2022 before I start learning Mozart’s ‘Turkish March’. A challenging, but fun practice session to be had on Monday before I go back to learning my Grade 4 pieces/ studies on the Tuesday xx
Violin player here. I picked and played Prokofiev Classical for a professional live audition. The stage can make all the pianissimos feel super exposed.
Debussy, definitely. I love the Prokofiev I think because I love it so much. I've played it a lot and therefore I don't consider it really hard. However, if you were to pull out the whole Peter and wolf score, it would definitely be a tough decision, which was more difficult between that and the Debussy. By the way, gorgeous playing is always🎉
As a 12 year old going on to my 3 year of playing the flute, Debussy, the second solo is hard because you would easy run out of breath quickly, but the notes were not hard to learn, I played the whole thing in one day of practice for my band director, she said I sounded like a professional! Never thought I would have a talent for playing flute before, but I couldn’t change that for the world and I’m glad I picked flute in 5th.😊
They're both extremely challenging and each have difficult issues. Debussy requires incredible tone, different nuances of color, dynamics, and TONS OF AIR. Whenever a conductor asks for it in one breath, I can do it, but honestly I feel that somethings gotta give..ie.-the tonality is so much better when you can take one quick breath in the solo, not to mention the projection is much easier too. 🎵 The Prokofiev is an adrenaline rush to play, and is much easier when you're actually performing it with your orchestra. In an audition, it's hell.. Trick fingerings or real ones, bottom line- learn it correctly slowly, and gradually increase your speed. If you're not patient with this process, then you'll always have issues with this solo. It goes way too fast to even think about the notes, what fingerings to use, etc. You have to have this one 100% down, perfect. No substitute for patience and determination. 🎵
Here are a few others that I would like to hear your opinion on: Beethoven's Leonora #3, Rossini's William Tell Overture, and Ravel's Daphnis and Cloe.
They are both challenging in their own ways. Prokofiev: this solo is hard because of the technical aspect and your ability to read ledger lines and play at the hight of the flutes range. Debussy: is a hard solo because how slow your playing and having to count it at duch a tempo. You also have to control your breathing and your tone has to be on point. Both: they both are also hard because like any other solo, you are the only one playing it, the only ones that can hide a mistake are too quiet so the line can be heard. And since they are difficult, your more pressured to play it right.
The second one is definitely harder! Just relearning the flute and when I’m warming up with longer slurs and slower scales it’s harder than just jumping in and playing.
I'd say "Afternoon of a Faun" because as a flute play the lower notes are hard to make load enough to be a solo as well as the fact that it's slow so the breath support is an important factor into sounding good you can hide under your good tone you can't breath very often and the emotion is a must!
For me, Classical Symphony is harder (I’m not really a technical player). I started studying the Classical Symphony around this time 8 years ago (when I was in my senior year of undergrad) and I couldn’t play it back then. Now I can but I struggle with the lick with 4th octave D. What’s difficult for me about Faun is the pacing of the breathing and the phrasing.
As a pro at the flute. I say the slowest one. I know the first one sounds more difficult, but the slower the song is the more breath you need. You can learn how to play the first one easily
However, playing that "scale" so cleanly with such dramatic dynamics is not easy at all. Not to mention that the entire movement is full of that kind of stuff, which also requires stamina.
Personally my problem are a bit the fingers, so for me defenetly Prokofiev the classical symphony together with the fire bird of Stravinsky are the most difficult
To me, the Prokofiev is harder. My fingers and reading are not that nimble. I have mastered "Faun" and written my own scoring of it. "Faun" is all about expression and imagination. Debussy always did an amazing job of precisely notating subtle timings and expression. The secret to playing this piece is imagination. Picture/feel/embody a sleepy fawn, a little unsteady yet on its legs, waking, stretching, catching its balance, and taking in the world around it.
Fast, faster, fastest is easy. Slow, expressive, tone while maintaining clean tempo is where you’ll find the maestro. Both lovely. But Debussy is technique masterclass.
i played afternoon of a faun my junior year at district music contest and recieved a superior rating (i was the only person from my school who recieved a superior, and i arguable had the hardest piece to play)
Number 2 is way harder. That D ain't nothing for me and my flute in the 1st excerpt. The 2nd would have me freaked about every single part of my tone, and I feel like it's tough breathing. And on C#, the worst note.
I tried to learn the Debussy piece when I was in high school/college but I never liked it, I couldn’t get the right tone for it. Debussy is not one of my favorite composers… I have always preferred Bach, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky, Mozart, Chopin (although I don’t think that Chopin ever wrote for the flute… I also play piano and Chopin is one of my favorite piano composers…). I never could get the hang of the Debussy piece.
Faun seems like it couldn’t be played well by every flutist that tried and that’s even with practice. They are both extremely challenging just in different ways.
Debussy has too much vibrato. It’s actually fine to play it slightly out of tune and with various tone colors because it’s supposed to sound un-human like a fawn is actually playing a
