Wednesday, Piano Day

Good morning!

I have been pretty good about practicing half an hour a day.  The only thing wrong with practicing half an hour is that you can't go on for an hour.  And I can't, really. My neck and shoulders get tired, and they hurt.  That is partly because I am old and partly because I have a neck and shoulders problem, and partly because I probably don't have the proper posture at the piano. Enough of that.

I know I am old because my music, the actual paper sheet music, has deteriorated so badly.  Sheets that were fresh and new in the sixties or seventies are showing definite signs of age. Just from being around. 

The music itself will never be old.  Thank God for that.

Anyway, I need two half hour sessions a day for any improvement or even any grasp on what I am attempting to play.  I don't know where I will find the second half hour, except late at night.  And I am not good for much after supper.

I am still struggling with Mompou in my recreational fifteen minutes. I spend about fifteen minutes on JT no. 2, getting my fingers into the position.  Then I play for fifteen minutes and right now it's Mompou.  My mind would like to go on forever with Mompou.   You can't imagine how many subtleties he can introduce into Chopin's Prelude in A Major.  And a child could play them, that's the strange part. A child could read them, and play them.  Then why are they so difficult?

I wish I had a big studio.  In that studio, there'd be a long fairly wide table in the middle of the room.  Around the edges there would be bookshelves and narrower countertop-like tables.  Knowing me, those surfaces would all be covered and I'd still have to move things over to do any work.  There would be plenty of natural light by day, and by night, many many focussed lights so that I could see to work.  There would be a space for the piano, and there would be a heater in there too because San Diego is cold, I keep telling you. It is!!!  I could have canvases, papers, paints in all the colors of the spectrum and all media.  I would like silver clay and a little kiln too.  Why not? I could make jewelry.  I'd have big empty vases that could be filled with bouquets of flowers, grocery store flowers, florist flowers, wild flowers. So there would be a sink too.  And a tiny hot plate so that I could make myself a snack there.  And somethere tucked away, there'd be a little soft bed with lots of warm covers, so that I could sleep in there--because I'd never want to leave that room.  Never.  YAZZYBEL