I had the most wonderful weekend, particularly Saturday, practicing Chopin. I practiced other things as well (more on that in another post), but Chopin definitely got the most attention. I worked on the whole piece, but particularly on the sections I call The Transcendence and The Voice from the Dead. Here they are in the video below. I could write a treatise on what I still need to fix, but to be honest, I'm happy overall with my playing. I'm just thrilled to be able to play The Transcendence.
I'm in a room. There's a door in front of me. On the other side of that door is a whole world of adventure and imagination and joy and delight, but for the moment, I'm locked in this gray little room. The door itself has a lock that is all rusted. I've tried to open it in the past, but I've never gotten very far. Sometimes I try to scrape the rust off the lock. I also have a rusty old key that I occasionally try to polish. Each time, after I've made a little progress, I'll put it into the keyhole in hopes of opening the door. It turns a half a millimeter or so, but the brief excitement at my progress dies quickly when I realize, once again, the lock isn't opening. I set the old key aside, and from there I can forget about the door, the lock, and the world outside, for months—years, even. But then something happens—I hear birdsong, or I catch a glimpse of color—and I pick up the key and start picking away at the stubborn rust. That dark little room is my ...
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