Take That, Pendejo!

The piano is the weirdest thing. I've been playing around with the prelude to Espana for what, three weeks? And I thought I would never get through it. Tonight I was working on a section I thought was horrendous; I started on it last week. I was sitting on the bench, toiling away, feeling sorry for myself, when suddenly the section started playing itself. This afternoon, I could barely play it. Now it's so easy I feel like I need to stop practicing it separately.

I went on to the next six measures, which worried my teacher, and it turns out they're incredibly simple. I can actually play them NOW, with a very lumpy tempo.

This leaves the few measures at the end, which are crap, compared to what I've done so far.

When I started learning the beginning of the piece, I found it hard to get the feel of it into my head. It's possible to play a piece with the correct timing and still end up with something that doesn't sound like what you're trying to play. I have been listening to Barenboim's recording (the only recording I could find), but the melody of this prelude isn't obvious, and it's hard to keep in your head. I thought I'd never get it.

Then while I was working on the section I conquered tonight, I started to feel the melody. There was something about the fingering of that section that almost forced the melody to come out right; there was only one really enjoyable way to play it. And because the rest of the prelude is musically related to it, now I'm playing the whole piece that way.

I turned on Barenboim tonight, fearing the worst, and I'll be damned if it didn't turn out I was playing an infinitely clumsier version of what he played. We emphasized the same notes and took pretty much the same liberties with the timing. Is that cool or what?

This is so great. On Monday, my teacher is going to crap himself.

Oddly, that does not sound like good news.