this week's lesson notes

Didn't play scales today. Talked a little bit about Roberta Rusk's performance (Friday evening) and critiqued her playing. Thought that she took too much liberty with the Mozart Fantasy piece. Also, her Chopin Scherzo probably wasn't her best performance. The Chopin Nocturne in C minor didn't sound like Chopin; sounded more like Debussy.

Well, anyway, I confessed that I didn't really practice the Beethoven Concerto; instead, I played a lot of pieces that weren't assigned to me, like the Chopin Preludes 1-4 and Mendelssohn Songs without Words. She then mentioned that she would like to see me play the Spinning Song. She also said that I could try learning the Ravel Sonatine..and work on the Mozart Sonata that I started last year (but set aside).

The Chopin etude (op. 25, no. 7) wasn't as good as last week's playing. I had a memory lapse somewhere near the beginning of the piece (probably distracted by people talking in the hallway), which hasn't happened before with this piece. Dr. N pointed out that my right hand melodies have improved, but my left hand melody seems muffled (by the right hand melodies). So work on bringing out the LH melody! Think of the LH in this piece as a cello or french horn.

The last half hour or so was spent sightreading a Bartok piece (one of the Bulgarian dances), the rondo (finale) of a Haydn Sonata, and a couple 20th century pieces by Robert Muzynski. Cool stuff, I must say.