It’s been a bit since I’ve been able to get back to an open mic, between school, Christmas, and illness. Belting out the tunes is pretty tough when your voice is a froggy mess of croaks and squeaks (although I’m sure some people are into that kind of thing).
As such, I decided to cast about through the Portly Video Archives and pull out some golden chestnuts from yesteryear—or, in this case, something I recorded about eleven months ago.
Readers might recall my modern classical piano project, Péchés d’âge moyen, which I released on 4 March 2022. It was a frivolous and fun little project that, like most such things, was born of “an absurd, self-indulgent inside joke,” according to the album listing on Bandcamp.
The recordings were pretty lo-fi, but some of the pieces are actually quite good (others are self-indulgent experiments in multimeter quasi-tonality). I also loaded the digital Bandcamp album with tons of extras—including the video you’re about to see—like scans of the handwritten manuscripts and scores for each piece.
Here I am playing “L’il Divertimento in C major” in the Music Room at my school on 9 February 2022:
It’s a delightful little (or should I write, “l’il”) piece that employs some of my favorite elements of classical music—a jaunty 4/4 time, little turns and embellishments, and an ornamented sound.
Happy Listening!
—TPP
Other Editions of Open Mic Adventures:
- “Open Mic Adventures I: Oingo Boingo’s ‘Just Another Day’“
- “Open Mic Adventures II: Billy Joel’s ‘Piano Man’“
- “Open Mic Adventures III: Joanie Sommers’s ‘Johnny Get Angry’“
- “Open Mic Adventures IV: KISS’s ‘I Still Love You’“
- “Open Mic Adventures V: ‘There’s a Light (Over at the Frankenstein Place)’“
- “Open Mic Adventures VI: Journey’s ‘Lovin’, Touchin’, Squeezin’“
- “Open Mic Adventures VII: ‘Suite: Judy Blue Eyes’“
- “Open Mic Adventures VIII: Simon & Garfunkel’s ‘The Sound of Silence’“
- “Open Mic Adventures IX: Journey’s ‘Faithfully’“
- “Open Mic Adventures X: ‘Time Warp’”
- “Open Mic Adventures XI: Spooktacular Supergroup Covers ‘Monster Mash’“
- “Open Mic Adventures XII: ‘Ghostly’“
- “Open Mic Adventures XIII: The Penguins’ ‘Earth Angel’“
- “Open Mic Adventures XIV: ‘Hark! The Herald Angels Sing’“
- “Open Mic Adventures XV: ‘O Holy Night’“
- “Open Mic Adventures XVI: ‘Please Come Home for Christmas’“
The Portly Politico 
You always seem so surprised when you sign off at the end of a piece. Personally, I could see something of the playfulness of a young Mozart, not playing too many notes at all! 🙂
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Hahaha, I think it’s me concentrating on how to stop the recording.
I also made a mistake in the post—I said this piece is in 3/4, and it DEFINITELY is not. It’s in 4/4!
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