Unexpected Revelations
Two more days to my lunchtime concert.
It's interesting how practice pays off sometimes in unexpected ways.
Over the years it seemed like I was aiming for a certain kind of style of playing and would practice to achieve that goal. I felt like I totally got lost in the process and the recital I did last autumn was a real test as I felt that I had lost a grip on what I was doing.
From the beginning of this year I've been trying to find out what it was that had gone wrong. I think I went too far in thinking that playing in the moment is the most important thing and that I had tended to practice in a way that made my performance unpredictable ( which would sometimes be a good thing) and also very unstable. I went back to the very basics - seperate hand and slow practice and it's made a huge difference in the stability of my playing which has enabled me to be even freer than before. This was totally unexpected! I feel I have now found the way to get to where I want to go.
Also I've found that it is so easy to lose sight of the bigger picture. One can get so caught up on the quality,colour,nuance,balance of every single note that it's often the case that we lose sight of what the composer wants to actually say through the music. I now can really see that the details are determined by knowing the bigger picture. Easier said than done but at least I now know what I have to look out for.
Sometimes it seems that all the time and hard work that you put into practicing doesn't pay off,but in the long run,it really does. ( I hope some of my pupils are reading this!!!)
