Picking Up the Pieces: A Piano Practice Journal

Stephen asked for some manly pictures of Thuddy, and I felt obliged to oblige. Thuddy was in a mood for pictures. Here he is, smiling for the camera. Here's a nice one of Thuddy in profile. But then Thuddy didn't want me to take a picture of him from the back. He thought his butt looked too big. "Hmm," I thought. "It's not a 'guy' thing to worry that one's butt is too big. That's really more of a 'girl' thing, isn't it?" Sure, consoles and spinets and uprights have reason to be bashful about their butts, but still ... "I'm sure your butt looks fine," I told Thuddy. "Now pose." I walked around to snap the picture. Then I realized something. Thuddy is a girl. No self-respecting boy piano would dress this way. BTW ... My apologies for the grainy pictures. This was the best I could do with my cell phone.

Today’s analogy is a really bad one, but it’s the one that comes to mind, perhaps because it’s the “holiday season.” My practices lately have felt like Mardi Gras. Only sober. Let me explain. Say you’re in New Orleans at a Mardi Gras parade. People on the floats are throwing all kinds of trinkets, beads, candy, etc. If you try to randomly catch everything that’s thrown, you’re not going to catch anything. But if you look a float-person in the eye and yell “Throw me something, Mister!” you’re likely to get a handful of beads zinged right at you (unless, maybe, the float-person is not a mister). I don’t know if that’s how it really is. I haven’t been to a Mardi Gras parade since 1989, and I haven’t been sober at a Mardi Gras parade since … before that. All these new piano pieces—Bach, Beethoven, Shostakovich—are like Mardi Gras trinkets and beads sailing past me. They’re all so pretty and shiny and fun … I don’t want to have to spend my limited practice time focusing on just one. I want...

There was a ladies’ luncheon going on outside of Thuddy’s quarters, so I headed over to Zan the Grand’s sanctuarial abode today. There’s something wrong with Zan. Sure, he’s a Steinway, but there’s something even more wrong with him than that. The high notes are sticking. As in, I try to play several notes in a row, and it sounds like I’m using the damper pedal for a foot-rest. Sigh. Enough complaining. The kind folks at the church are letting me use Zan, Thuddy, and any other piano I desire for free, every single day, for an hour a day. I appreciate them a thousand times over. Today was another “short bits and pieces” practice session. After warm-up scales, inversions, and arps, I started with Shosti . I worked on the “A” section yesterday, so I went straight to the “B” section. A bit more of the “oom-pah-pah” in the LH—pretty simple—and lots of repeated notes (but some tricky fingerings) in the RH. I spent more time on the RH, playing and re-playing slowly, getting my RH fingers com...

After Saturday’s (somewhat) disappointing lesson, I decided to try to spend a few minutes of this practice on each piece. Scales and arps , blah, blah, blah. Sounding fine. Deborah said we could start doing scales in thirds if I want … I didn’t answer. I don’t know if my brain is ready for that yet. Beethoven : This is a fun little piece. It’s an interesting little piece. I started working on it HS and made analysis notes as I played through it. It seems a little schizophrenic, yet it is utterly charming. I once knew a guy named Kenny who was schizophrenic yet utterly charming. Maybe I’ll start calling this piece “Kenny”. So Kenny (the Beethoven piece, not the person) and I were on something like the first blind date today. I’ve run through and written in all the fingering, sized him up so to speak, and now it’s time to get to know Kenny, to start getting a sense of how he feels in my hands. OK, this is starting to sound R-rated. Suffice it to say that Kenny (the Beethoven piece, not ...

Last night I dreamed I was railing at my piano teacher. Then I dreamed I went to my old piano teacher--the one I had in junior high, the one I did not get along with--and told her how much better she was than Deborah. Why did I do that? A student's attitude and motivation (and lack thereof) has a lot to do with how "good" or "bad" a teacher is. I had a bad attitude when I was 13. I like to think I have a much-improved attitude now, 25 years later. Strange how times long past can pop up in dreams, and bring all the emotions and intensity with them. So I had a lesson Saturday and had several moments when I just wanted to cry. I hadn't had a lesson in a month. More than a month. For that time, I practiced 4-6 days a week, averaging approximately 50 minutes per lesson. Not as much practicing as I'd like, but it's what I was able to manage, so I was OK with it. Practice sessions were focused mostly on scales, arps, Schumann, and Bach. I didn't want to...

Practices have been both wonderful and frustrating. We’re working shifts, so I have one hour—no more, no less—for practicing. I’ve begun practicing on Thuddy Theodore every day simply because Thuddy is about four minutes closer to my desk at work than Zan the Grand is. Multiply by two, and I lose approximately eight minutes of practice time per day—that’s 40 minutes per week!) if I decide to practice on Zan. So Thuddy is my man these days. My scales are up to 88. They’re sounding good, and they’re looking good—by that, I mean my arms are doing more of the work and my fingers are relaxed, even when I’m playing the sixteenth notes in contrary motion. Today I played through A and f#-minor and it sounded flawless. So much fun to play these scales when I know I’m doing them right and they sound good and my hands don’t get tired. Arpeggios are at 56, or somewhere around there. The technique seems to be working there, too. I’ve never, ever felt comfortable with arpeggios, and I still don’t … ...

Length of practice: about 45 minutes Piano: Thuddy Theodora Today’s lunchtime practice went quite well. When I got to the church, Lou the Organist was practicing in the sanctuary, and some old folks were meeting in the choir room, so I was relegated to Thuddy Theodora in the downstairs chapel. I hadn’t played Thuddy in a while. I think Thuddy has been tuned. Thuddy didn’t sound quite so Thuddy today. Of course, it may have something to do with the human element. My technique has improved by leaps and bounds since I last practiced on old Thuddy. I went through two sets of scales instead of the usual single set. I was just having too much fun. It felt so good to be back at the piano again. Between work, being snowed in, and being away from home this weekend, I’ve managed to go several days without practicing. Not as many as are implied by my lack of posting here, though. When I was playing my chords and inversions, a man knocked on the door and peeked his head in. “Those chord...