Music

Below is a clip from a WSJ piece, 5/21/2008. The author buys a nearly 7ft Steinway for $22K. I'm guessing it's a B or C. Damn, girl. That is a deal. Most people pay at least 50k, even for a one that's not new. I had a chance to get a Steinway B for a good price, similar to the author's buying price, but there was a old crack in the harp. Uh-uh, not going to buy that one.

I picked this piece because of the dramatic 4th movement. In the middle, I love those 7 descending chords, just waiting to be banged away.

This piece is nicknamed "Hunt", and is obviously playful. You can imagine the stages of the hunt along with the piece. The first movement, the trumpet call to start the hunt. The second movement, the chase. The last movement, the final kill. Maybe "Hunt" is a bit too dramatic as a nickname though.

The first bar is already problematic for me. The repeated notes in the right hand played after the opening chord I can never get right. Switching fingers made it much easier as I ignored the fingering in the score initially. It's also easy to bang on these and hard to finesse them, the second repeated f, a little more piano, than the first

Then you come to this little roundabout. There's barely enough room for the last three fingers to fit in while holding down the bottom chord. I wonder how folks with thick fingers handle this.

The opportunity for literally anyone to take piano lessons, or more officially, Piano Performance (I-IV), at a top conservatory, is something I'm guessing you could only do in a handful of cities. New York is obviously one of them and Juilliard's Evening Division is the official teaching arm that lets you do this.