While We’re Young

TEXT: One of the great songs by Alec Wilder. Lead sheet is in The New Real Book Vol 2 Page 419 (Sher Music)
TEXT: Drums played first in real time in several passes, then bass and finally piano were each played in a single pass.
TEXT: Doug McKenzie [email protected]
MARKER: Last 8 bars - played freely
MARKER: On Eb13(b9#11) LH plays black notes (Db,Eb) RH plays white (E,G,A,C)
MARKER: In tempo
MARKER: On F7 Lydian dominant scale
MARKER: On Bb7 straight mixolydian (i.e. Eb Major scale)
MARKER: Single note lines in RH staccato with lots of accents and 'space' between notes
MARKER: 3 note diatonic 4th voicings in each hand
MARKER: On Bb7 RH plays thirds from Eb scale
MARKER: Very little pedalling - more staccato single-note lines
MARKER: Short diatonic motif repeated in different positions
MARKER: More diatonic thirds in RH
MARKER: Another melodic phrase moved around within the diatonic scale
MARKER: Brushes on last chorus
MARKER: Back to solo piano played freely
MARKER: Ascending diatonic scale played in note pairs
MARKER: Bb pedal tone in Bass with different triads over it
MARKER: On last note, the notes of a G triad over an Eb Bass note
MARKER: Resolution to Eb6/9 of the tension in the G/Eb chord
  • Path: Disklavier Jazz 3/295-While Were Young.mid
  • Size: 30 KB
  • Updated: January 31, 2026

Play (beta)

If you have a Bluetooth-MIDI adapter installed in your Disklavier and are using an app (such as PianoStream), you can stream these MIDI files right from your Apple device to your piano.

Otherwise, you can put them on a USB stick. Files will be playable natively on newer Disklaviers, such as the Mark IV, E3, and ENSPIRE. You can see my Disklavier compatibility table to see which instruments support USB.

For older generations of Disklavier using floppy disks or Nalbantov USB emulators, see my article on converting MIDI files to E-SEQ and creating PIANODIR.FIL.

Read more about the former Kuhmann Directory (Disklavier World).