Have a good time in Europe!!
[Journal] Brahms g minor piano quartet performance readiness
Thank you, all! The taxi comes in a few hours and it finally feels real. I'm gonna miss my cats! There are actually three of them now (three different cats from when I first chose my username almost a decade ago). Two of them spend a lot of time with us and I hope they will be ok.
I have muscle aches in my fingers which means I probably overdid it a couple of days back. I also woke up with the absolute conviction that studying the score will improve all the bits that aren't solid because I just don't know the notes well enough. So the cramming can continue even if I don't have a piano 
All the best! Have fun!
Good morning!
I don't know where you are in Europe, and you don't have to tell that of course, but you might want to check the weather forecast for this evening/night. For some parts of Europe there is a risk for severe weather.
We don't have airco at home, so I'm glad the temperature dropped since yesterday where I live.
The area I'm talking about regarding the severe weather is E-France into Germany and NW Switzerland.
Oh, I always forget the likes, and now you said it's uncomfortable I like your post, oops 
Have a nice day!
We arrived at the workshop town today! It's so hot here but thankfully it'll cool down by Monday. I studied the score on the plane on the way to Europe but we've otherwise been too busy and tired for me to even think about it.
Tomorrow we start the workshop and thankfully I'm in the afternoon group so I'll have some time to practice in the morning. My hands seem to have recovered from last week. I get a 75 minute piano lesson on Monday! It's such a nice thing that they do for the pianists because the coaches are all string players. I heard that the guy is super nice and people get a lot out of the lesson. Last year it was with a different woman because the poor guy had broken his hand (??) and I had a great lesson with her. I just hope we're able to cover a lot because the Brahms is such a huge work!
- Edited
Workshop: Day 1
I went in to practice and my wrists were feeling it even at the beginning. My favorite practice room old BΓΆsendorfer is a little more clapped out than I remember and definitely out of tune but it's ok. But then I played through the whole thing and my wrists felt better as they warmed up. It's easier to play than my piano at home.
We ran through the whole thing during our rehearsal and our coach suggested picking which movement(s) we wanted to play at the final concert today so that I can focus on them at my lesson tomorrow. Since this workshop session has fewer groups than usual, we decided to do two movements. He thought the 4th movement was a good candidate (it's upbeat and fun!) and then we decided on the 2nd movement for contrast (also that happens to be the movement I can play the cleanest).
I totally bombed the hard part of the first movement, twice! Once we reached the part with octave jumps I think I got shifted by a note or something and then it was just a mess. He said let's do it again and then a similar thing happened. So I'm glad we're not playing it. And the 3rd movement still has some tricky stuff I'm working through with octaves jumping around a bit in both hands. The "military section" was better than it was a week ago but definitely not solid; it really needs to be semi-memorized. They took it at a much slower place in that section than how I was practicing, which really helped!
I had not practiced much with metronome which was ok for most parts but the Trio in the second movement is very tricky with how the strings interact with the piano and I am not playing the triplets at a precise tempo. Need to practice it with metronome tomorrow morning before our rehearsal and my lesson!
Also the cellist asked me during one section if I had ever seen Menahem Pressler play and that he always has his head to the side looking at the strings, and could I memorize it and do that, and I said no 
This is an amateur workshop! It was so ridiculous.
Going to bed super early and then plan to get up early for breakfast and to go practice early.
Oh dear, I found out about a workshop in Southern California and maybe I'll go next summer with my violinist friend if we can put together a trio? In which case I'd have to learn two chamber works and one cello sonata over the next year. Nothing as hard as Brahms though!
We'll see, but I may be putting Dr. Molly's schedule to good use
- Edited
Workshop: Day 2
We worked on the 1st and 3rd movements today during rehearsal and will focus on the final concert movements for the rest of the week. Since I keep bombing the hard part of the 1st movement, the coach asked me to just play the left hand. I also dropped out my left hand in the military section of the 3rd movement. I'm a little disappointed in myself that I wasn't able to show up fully prepared but c'est la vie.
We also played the second movement twice today, after I practiced the Trio with metronome this morning as advised by the coach. The interactions between piano and strings don't make musical sense and you just have to trust yourself and keep going and count the rests properly and then somehow it all ends up in the right place!
I had my piano lesson on the 2nd and 4th movements and it was really great! I got musical, technical, and pedaling advice. I never learned about half or quarter pedal and instinctively sometimes do light pedal but it's not really a conscious thing. He advised me to shift my foot back a little to have better control over pedaling lightly.
Turns out the piano coach is one of the top concert pianists in this country and he gave us a "little concert"! I thought maybe he'd play some Chopin or something but then he played Rhapsody in Blue as a piano solo for us. What a massive piece! It was fabulous. There are two other pianists here and one is an English guy who sounds really great from what I hear through the windows. He's playing DvoΕΓ‘k's second piano quartet which is a wonderful piece and is at the top of my piano quartet wishlist. It looks very challenging, though.
In the evening, I met up with the cellist from my group last summer and we ran through Beethoven cello sonata No.2 and the first and second movements of No.3. I've only prepared the second one for a couple of weeks years ago to read with someone, and last year I was sight reading it with her. Somehow having it sit in my head for the last year made it magically better! I wasn't playing all the notes but I really did quite a decent job faking my way through it. I think maybe I should learn both of these sonatas. Even if I run through them once a week, if I keep getting better eventually I'll be able to play them properly. I used to think the Rondo of the second sonata would take a lot of effort to learn, but now I don't anymore?? I'm amazed. I think I've become a better pianist!
I hope I don't get overambitious with all my plans 
Though there's a big difference between "fun commitments" and "official commitments" and as long as I don't overdo the official ones I'll be ok!
I'm very much enjoying following along with your journey as well. This is not something I will ever experience so it's really interesting to hear about!
A crazy thing: the violinist in my group (who lives in the Portland area) offered me a harpsichord when I met her 5-6 years ago. I didn't have room for one then. Now we have a finished basement and we were talking during break today and I ended up asking if she still has a harpsichord looking for a new home. Turns out that she has two harpsichords and a hurdy gurdy that she picked up at estate sales! I asked her how big the harpsichords are and she said both are 9 feet long!! Really long but narrow. I was just talking to my husband about it because part of me is a little tempted (apparently one of them is a very nice one) but I thought it was going to be 5 feet long or something like that. I don't think I actually have space to put a 9 foot instrument unless we got rid of the dining table and made the dining room a harpsichord room instead
I care about having airy spaces and nice aesthetics so I don't think a 9 foot harpsichord is in my future! I'll go to her house at some point and play some Bach though.
twocats
Wow! Do you know how much I love harpsichords?
When I was shopping for a house 6 years ago there was one with a harpsichord. I made an offer, with the condition that the harpsichord stays! They didn't accept! I wish I were in Portland. I would buy a harpsi to play one Rameau prelude over and over. But 9 foot is big.
Rubens I've only played one briefly in an antique shop! I can't really play by ear but somehow some Bach came out of my fingers! I can't imagine that they're both really 9 feet but I'll go check them out. I only play Romantic pieces these days (plus the occasional Beethoven) but I think I could enjoy Bach if I had a harpsichord. Maybe if it's a really pretty one I could justify fitting it somewhere?? 
This was on the board today (I whited out the piano coach's name)
