pianissimo

Morning :) I have been fighting a cold the past week. I side effect of 150 students x 5 days per week. And colds are NOT fun if you are any kind of wind player. Pain. So, instead, I play piano. Lots of piano. It is my other love. But you have to do it right.

Step one: make some fresh, hot coffee.

Step two: try and move the cat. Yes, this is my cat Grishko, named after, well...the Grishko company. We call him Grishi. I love the cat.

Step three: Indulge.

Step four: Play until your back hurts.

Step five: Close up shop.

My favorite things to play are anything from a ballet class...Chopin, Tchaik, Prokofiev, even Beethoven. How do I know? I recognize the first three every time I take class, but anything I don't know, I seriously go up to the piano player at the break in the class and ASK. Haha! They're always a little surprised anybody cares what they just played, but...I DO! Then I go home, find it, play it, love it.

Did you know there is a SWEEEEEEEET app on the iPad called PIANO SCORES Master's Collection and it is magical. Has everything from Albeniz to Webern. You can search categories--Baroque to Modern-and it has hundreds and hundreds of pieces. It also has a metronome button and a YouTube button on every piece. So if there is a recording on YouTube of the piece you're working on--you can tap it once and LISTEN!!!

Other favorites are Tchaikovsky "Seasons" op. 37b, especially

March "Song of the Lark" ("The field shimmering with flowers, the stars swirling in the heavens, the song of the lark fills the blue abyss." A. Maykov)

Aaaand May "Starlit Nights" ("What a night! What bliss all about! I thank my native north country! From the kingdom of ice, snowstorms and snow, how fresh and clean May flies in! A. Fet)

And of course, June "Barcarolle" ("Let us go to the shore; there the waves will kiss our legs. With mysterious sadness the stars will shine down on us." A. Pleshcheyer)

Sorry, one more. Different composer. Ottorino Respighi. I discovered this piece when my dear, dear, dear friend performed it in a summer piano recital series in 2009. Of course, I prefer it at half the tempo, just like everything. ;) You HAVE to listen to this piece:

Happy Sunday, loves! Hope it goes nice and slow for you and it is filled with cats, coffee, and pianos!

xo