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Listening to Schubert

It's been a while since I've listened to someone else besides myself playing the Schubert Impromptu, Op. 90, No. 2, so I watched/listened to a few YouTube videos this morning. I just wanted to remind myself of what this piece is supposed to sound like--the tempo, the phrasing, and particularly the ben marcato section. I'm never quite sure how much emphasis I should give to the triplets in the middle of each measure. Here are a some examples:


So I watched, and listened. I won't share the videos here, but there are some interpretations--the ones that are more rubato, the ones that are played too fast or too loud throughout--that I'm not crazy about. Others--particularly the Horowitz--are the gold standard. Of course Horowitz is the gold standard. And his triplet sections sound ... simultaneously tossed-off and glittering, rumbling and sparkling. And they each sound a little different from the others; there is no single "sound," but a variety of them, sort of like light shimmering on a lake creates no single image of "light," but a million different ones that result in the single picture.

Sounding like Horowitz. And sunlight shimmering on a lake. That's what this middle-aged mom sets her sights on.

Yes, just a middle-aged mom and an amateur pianist who has practiced seriously for just a handful of years (four years in college, a few years in my 20s, ages 34 through 37, and then now). But I feel like the world of piano is opening up to me again. I've worked hard in these four or five months that I've been taking piano lessons again. I have my contrary-motion major scales up to 80, my contrary-motion minors up to 72, and the arpeggios ... heck, I can play the arpeggios at any speed I want and they just sort of happen under my fingers.

And the pieces that I've been picking up--the Chopin, the Bach, and the Schubert--they're sounding quite good. None of them at speed yet, but I will get there. More importantly, the scales in the prelude are even and motoric, and the lines of the fugue are clear and distinct. The nocturne is sounding as good as it ever did--better, I think. And the Schubert--oh, the Schubert! How I love playing the Schubert! The notes are there, and now I'm experimenting with the dynamics, all while increasing the speed by a single  metronome notch each practice session.

I'm in the middle of the journey, and the destination is still a good long ways away. But I can't imagine wanting to be anywhere else.

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