🎙 Episode 59 – It’s Our Job

Welcome to Piano, Finally. This week brings a few changes in how the show is recorded. The entire episode has been produced in Cubase using Steinberg’s SpectraLayers for audio processing. Recording the MIDI data from the Kawai NV10 directly into Cubase has improved the quality of the piano sound—now I just need to work on improving my playing!

A warm welcome to new listeners who found the show through Marc Larochelle’s My Keys To Music newsletter. Thank you for joining the journey.

YouTube Feature – The Music Tab
Instead of a single channel, this week’s tip is to explore the Music tab in YouTube. You’ll find recommended videos across every style: brass arrangements, classical favourites, pop, rock, even oddities like “I’m a Barbie Girl in the style of six composers.” Clicking on things you wouldn’t normally listen to is a simple way to expand your musical horizons.

Essay – It’s Our Job
Jaime Martín’s pre-concert story about how hearing Pictures at an Exhibition changed his life sparked this week’s reflection. Every musician starts with a first experience. But with music education often shrinking, who is going to give kids those first experiences now? It has become our job.
Take the young people in your life to hear music that won’t come from a social media algorithm—live orchestras, jazz, folk, choirs. Every performance is a chance to spark curiosity and broaden their world.

Review – Editors Keys for Cubase
Learning Cubase can feel like learning a whole new language. This week I’ve been using a new keyboard from Editors Keys designed for Cubase. It has colour-coded keys and printed shortcuts, making it much faster to navigate. It’s Bluetooth and backlit, but I keep it plugged in so I don’t have to worry about battery life.
Editors Keys Keyboards

Theatre – Trophy Boys
At Carriageworks, I caught Trophy Boys, a sharp, funny and powerful play about private school debaters preparing for a final round. Performed by a female and non-binary cast, it’s on until 3 August.
More on the play

Progress
This week’s practice pieces are Spindler’s Canon, Türk’s Bagatelle in F, Craggs’s Afternoon Snooze and Blackout Blues, all recorded on the Kawai NV10 using the Native Instruments Claire Fazioli piano.

The contents of this podcast were entirely generated by a human. These show notes, however, were created by ChatGPT.

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Some of the links to books and other items mentioned in the podcast are affiliate links for Amazon or other providers. If you use one of these links, a commission may be paid to me at no additional cost to you. Thank you if you use a link.
All reviews of products, websites and services are unpaid, and no sponsorship has been received for any content on this podcast.

🎙 Episode 58 – Listening In

G’day and welcome back to Piano, Finally—where a bloke learning piano later in life reports in from yet another theatre foyer. This week’s episode was written from the Northern Foyer of the Sydney Opera House, in the sunlight beneath John Olsen’s mural Salute to Slessor’s 5 Bells. A pre-concert talk with Jaime Martín and Genevieve Lang turned out to be one of the highlights of the week—more on that later.

🎨 More on the mural

📺 YouTube Feature – Aspen Music Festival and School

The Aspen Festival is back, and even if you can’t be there in person, you can still tune in from home. There are seven livestreams on their YouTube channel and on their Virtual Stage, featuring student and professional performances. Highly recommended if you’re looking for fresh inspiration or a reminder of just how good live music can be.

🎥 Aspen’s YouTube Channel

📝 Essay – Listening In

A Bill Hilton podcast sparked this week’s reflection: should we listen to recordings of the pieces we’re learning? For most of us, the answer is yes. Whether it’s YouTube performances of AMEB pieces (like Blackout Blues), a demo from your piano teacher, or a playback from notation software like Dorico or MuseScore, hearing a piece before (or while) learning it can be a huge help. And thanks to playback tools, you can even slow it down for practice or play along without needing a metronome.

🎹 Nord Stage 4 Review – The Effects Section

We wrap up the main parts of the Nord Stage 4 with a look at the effects engine. From reverb (room, hall, cathedral) to filters, phasers, delays, rotary speakers and more—there are dozens of ways to shape your sound, and most come with dual variations. The real challenge? Knowing when to stop tweaking.

🎼 Progress

Back to Wild Chase this week—polishing bars 9–16 and rounding out the ending. It’s shaping up well for the September showcase.

Also included: early work on Riders on the Storm using the Nord Stage 4 and presets from My Keys To Music. The sound is right, but the timing still needs work.

🎶 Pre-concert talk highlight: conductor Jaime Martín on childhood concerts, music in classrooms, and what Taylor Swift has in common with Diaghilev. A brilliant conversation hosted by Genevieve Lang.

🎼 More on the pre-concert talks

Send me a text message.

You can contact me:

• via email at david@pianofinally.show; this is probably the best option
• the show website, www.pianofinally.show
• Instagram and Threads @pianofinally
• and on YouTube
• all the podcast directories - list
• here's the RSS feed

Some of the links to books and other items mentioned in the podcast are affiliate links for Amazon or other providers. If you use one of these links, a commission may be paid to me at no additional cost to you. Thank you if you use a link.
All reviews of products, websites and services are unpaid, and no sponsorship has been received for any content on this podcast.

🎙 Episode 57 – Reading and Writing

Welcome to Piano, Finally, a podcast about learning the piano—later in life and without the pressure. This week’s episode has been recorded a day early as I head off to the Opera House for another concert in the Sydney Symphony Orchestra’s subscription series—more on that next week.

🎧 The latest episode of the Chopin Podcast focuses on the Polonaises, including one I hadn’t heard before: the Polonaise-Fantaisie, which has quickly become a favourite. Denis Zhdanov’s performance on YouTube is a good place to start—though the double flats in bar four suggest it’ll be a while before I try playing it.

🎭 I also caught Prima Facie at Carriageworks this week—powerfully performed by Sof Forrest in a one-person show. A brilliant actor in a confronting work staged by Black Swan Theatre Company. If you see it advertised, make time—but check the content warnings.
More on the production

📺 YouTube Spotlight – James Shawcross
If you’ve ever wondered what hidden pianos lurk in American thrift shops and antique stores, James Shawcross’s new channel is for you. He plays the pianos as he finds them—no tuning, no touch-ups—just character. His earlier channel, The Piano Forever, also has some lovely playing and thoughtful commentary from a younger James.

📝 Essay – Reading and Writing
This week’s reflection connects two developing skills: improvising and musical literacy. Inspired by Devi’s suggestion, I’ve started experimenting with basic improvisation (hint: two low Cs go a long way). While I’m not composing yet, I’ve realised that music reading feels a lot like early language development—sounding out notes like syllables, slowly growing into musical fluency. If we’ve learned to write entire essays and emails, maybe staff notation isn't so impossible after all.

🎹 Nord Stage 4 Review – Sampling
We wrap up the review of the Nord’s synthesiser section by looking at its sampling capabilities. You can trigger ambient sounds (like thunder and rain for Riders on the Storm), or load full sample libraries of other instruments. The Nord Sample Editor lets you build your own playable samples—imagine turning your mandolin into a Nord patch. Check out Nord’s tutorial here.

🎼 Progress
Still working on Wild Chase by Wynn-Anne Rossi, now officially chosen as my piece for Devi’s September showcase (if I can get it there). Recorded on the Kawai NV10 with the Claire Fazioli f308 virtual piano.

🎶 Sydney Symphony: Ravel and Falla

Send me a text message.

You can contact me:

• via email at david@pianofinally.show; this is probably the best option
• the show website, www.pianofinally.show
• Instagram and Threads @pianofinally
• and on YouTube
• all the podcast directories - list
• here's the RSS feed

Some of the links to books and other items mentioned in the podcast are affiliate links for Amazon or other providers. If you use one of these links, a commission may be paid to me at no additional cost to you. Thank you if you use a link.
All reviews of products, websites and services are unpaid, and no sponsorship has been received for any content on this podcast.