Sonata Sonatina Celebration

Festival Dates: Friday/Saturday, November 7-8, 2025

Festival Summary

This festival is presented by the Northwest Arkansas Music Teachers Association (NAMTA). It was created to celebrate performing sonatas and sonatinas in a public setting where other students, their families, and teachers are in the audience. The non-refundable fee is $25. I provide a more detailed description of each festival in my page Piano Festivals, including the pros and cons of each festival.

This document is shared to the NAMTA community as a public web page. Some of the dates and preparation information are specific to my studio, but most of the information is geared to help other teachers and students.

Key Dates for 2025

• Preparation Begins: Mid-August
• Decision Week: October 6-10 (The official deadline is later)
• Halloween Piano Party: Saturday, October 18
• Warm-Up Recitals: Weekend of November 1-2
  • Steinway Gallery, FayettevilleSteinway Gallery, 4155 N Steele Blvd, Fayetteville (Saturday 11/1 – 6 sessions from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.)
  • First Presbyterian, RogersFirst Presbyterian, 1901 S 26th St, Rogers (Sunday 11/2 – 5 sessions from 1:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.)
• Festival at Central Methodist in Fayetteville: Friday/Saturday, November 7-8

Start Preparation

Participating in festivals like the Sonata Sonatina Celebration can be a rewarding part of piano lessons. However, festivals should not become all-consuming for months at a time, even though typically there will be a several-week period of intense, almost exclusive focus on the festival piece(s).

Decision Week

Your sonata/sonatina should be fully learned and on the way to memorization by this week of lessons. Even though the application isn’t due until the end of the following week, this is a good reckoning cut-off for determining whether or not to go forward.

Halloween Piano Party

The Halloween Piano Party began as an event for students to try out their sonatas and sonatinas, and later included more fun elements like a costume contest, random drawing, and music games. If you don’t participate in the studio event, gather your friends and family in your living room to try out your memorized piece.

You might be surprised at what you don’t know, including where your memory fails. It’s best to learn these things at least a couple of weeks before the festival, so that you have time to fix those issues.

Warm-Up Recitals

These are organized just for festival participants. They are group recitals for students of multiple teachers held in both the north and south of our region. All performers must perform from memory, which makes this milestone a great test of festival readiness.

Please note: If you don’t do a festival pre-recital, you should plan your own warm-up event. It should be somewhere that has a grand piano, since that’s the type of instrument you will play at the festival. If you don’t have one, you will find these at a church, school, library, or perhaps a neighbor’s home. Professional musicians organize warm-up recitals before their big events; you should do the same!

Festival Day

Bring Your Score

Please bring your score; that’s the only way your judge can evaluate your performance. Number each measure so the judge can give you specific comments.

Erase anything from the score except fingerings and essential markings that guide your performance. Non-essential markings would include practice zones, comments from your teacher, big circles or brackets showing problem areas.

Dress for Success

Adhere to the clothing guidelines for the festival, which simply put, advises against casual clothing items like t-shirts, jeans, shorts, Crocs, and white sneakers. There’s no need to buy formal shoes. Black or dark sneakers work fine.

Dress nice with an emphasis on comfort and confidence. If your finest outfit provides that, go for it. Finally, if you wear a dress/skirt, longer is better since you will be visible from many angles.

Arrive to Thrive

Make sure to arrive at least 45 minutes before your scheduled start time if you want to warm up on a practice piano. If that’s not important to you, arrive 20 to 30 minutes ahead of time to register and find your performance space. Avoid napping or doing activities in the car that will make you groggy or car sick when you arrive at the festival.

Practice Pianos

Several practice pianos will be available. However, given the number of participants versus rooms available, you will likely have just 5 minutes if you are able to secure an instrument.

When It’s Your Turn

You will be given about 30 seconds to try out the festival piano when it is your turn to play. You typically won’t bow at the this point, but may choose to do so if you receive some applause. Before you start your warm-up routine, make sure you’re seated correctly.

For bench height, you should be able to roll the adjustment wheels forwards (clockwise) to go down, and backwards (counter-clockwise) to go up. However, if the bench is reversed, you’ll have to do the opposite. If the bench is hydraulic, you simply squeeze the lever and adjust up or down. Also, make sure you’re sitting the correct distance from the keyboard.

Warm-up Ideas

Design a warm-up based on your piece that will quickly help you assess the instrument you are playing. A short routine should be enough to assess basic things about the instrument. However, don’t play too much of your piece, because that lessens its impact when you do begin. If you are curious how a key section will sound, try to just play a couple of measures to preserve the mystery.

Beginner Warm-up: Play a 5-finger pattern or scale slowly in the key of your piece. Follow that with a couple of chords, broken or solid. If you use the pedal in your piece, try some chords with the damper pedal. Locate your starting place of each hand on the piano so that you’re ready when the judge lets you being.

Intermediate to Advanced Warm-up: In addition to above, explore the sound of the different registers of the piano, so that you’re not surprised by the balance between the hands when you start playing. Play a long major or chromatic scale to learn about the voicing if it’s important to you. Focus on the piano’s action. Decide how you want to scale your dynamics, within reason. Don’t overplay to try to compensate for a dead piano or room.

Performance Spaces

Sanctuary: The piano is a Yamaha C5 Grand (6 feet 7 inches). It’s one of the best church acoustics you’ll ever experience, with a 3-second echo.

Choir Room: Sized for a large church choir with a Yamaha G1 grand (5 feet 3 inches) with decent acoustics. It’s adjacent to the sanctuary.

Chapel: It’s in the Wesley Building, with a Yamaha G2 grand (5 feet 7 inches).

Ready to Go

Indicate to the judge that you are ready to play, verbally or with eye contact and a head nod. Let the judge invite you to begin, and pause at the end of each movement. Put your hands in your lap to prevent yourself from going on.

While paused, make sure to stay focused on the next movement and where to place your hands when asked to continue. Don’t allow your mind to drift. Follow the rules of the judge, such as letting them decide when you begin and continue.

Done!

Make sure to bow after you finish playing. Show respect to your audience no matter how well or badly you think you played.

After Your Performance

You’ve done everything you can do. The judging results are out of your hands at this point. You may get the result you expected, but you also may not. It’s one judge’s opinion on your playing at one moment. Enjoy the process and not focus too heavily on the result. Make sure to read and understand the judge’s comments; you might learn new things about your playing from a different person’s perspective.

Was this guide helpful? Useful?

Please let me know. I also welcome feedback as to how to make this document better, particularly information that may help future participants. I apologize for presenting a Web form instead of a direct email address due to concerns about spam.