Finished February!

Okay, so I think two pieces in February makes up for the easy one I've chosen for March and for jumping the gun in January, right?

Getting a video of this one was rough. It was getting to the point where I was WAY overthinking it then and my hands were tense and practice definitely did NOT make perfect.  I'm kind of over it....SO, you get this one with a couple mistakes.  I worked hard on this piece though, so, even with the mistakes, I feel pretty good about where I finally landed with it.

Bach pieces are definitely some of my favorites to play! There will for sure be more like this in the future!

Adventure is out there!

March is a busy month for us. It's the start of birthday season for our crew AND we're taking advantage of spring break week at the older kids' school to embark on an amazing family adventure. I'm actually facing another huge anxiety hurdle of mine and taking a transatlantic flight for the first time. The excitement of the adventure ahead is currently outweighing any anxiety about the flight. Hoping it stays that way! 

At any rate, since March is busy and I'll lose a whole week of practice time, I've picked an easy-ish, fun piece. It's called "Married Life" and it's from the most sentimental scene in one of my all-time favorite movies, "UP!"

Here's a (very rough) video from the first round of attempts. It's a fairly simple arrangement to play and won't take long to learn.... BUT there are some stylistic elements and dynamics that will add a little challenge because those are definitely not my strong suit with piano! 

For those who don't know the adorable montage scene I'm referring to, it's linked over there on the right under March. :) --------------------------------------->

I did a small thing today, a silly thing, really...and I didn't even do it all that well. But it's one baby step closer to the place I want to be.

I went to a piano lesson this afternoon because it's almost March and I wanted to go over the piece I picked for the month.  No, this is not the small, silly thing, but I'm excited about my March piece! More on that later.

Before I headed over, I let C (my teacher/piano anxiety support person) 😂  know that I was also bringing my mostly finished second February piece to try to play. I asked her to please not let me run away without trying to do this.You see, my anxious alter-ego takes over when I get there and I knew if I didn't put some sort of accountability in place beforehand, I would DEFINITELY attempt to duck and run without trying, completely shamelessly, I might add.

The last five minutes of my visit, she kept her word and made me play.  I have to give her a shout-out for doing this because I have a feeling it can't be that easy to push someone into a what is really a very large amount of quite visible discomfort even though they've been asked to do so.

So, last time, I made it through barely two lines before my overactive fight or flight stuff kicked in, complete with Richter-scale-level shaking hands.

This time, it started to happen again at the EXACT. SAME. POINT.

(the following is accurate representation of my brain way more than I'd like to admit)


I yelled at all the voices in my head and attempted to take the control panel back over. It went something like: "OH HECK NO.... we are NOT stopping at the second line again! There is no t-rex chasing us through the jungle so cut this crap out!"

Then, I pulled non-medicinal idea #1 out of my "things to try" hat and asked the teacher to stand across the room instead of sitting next to me. I took a breath and I started over.

It was definitely still challenging, but it was the tiniest bit easier. I made a plethora of mistakes where I don't normally make mistakes. There were wrong notes all over, stops and starts, and I lost my place at least three times...but .... but... BUT!  I made it to the end! I feel like I punched anxiety in the face by doing so too. I also have a feeling if I had continued to play through the nerves they would have given up a little the second go 'round.

And THAT is my small thing I did today. Yep. I took a piece I've played at home WELL hundreds of times and played it fairly poorly in a different setting. 😂

I joke of course, about it being a small thing because as anyone with anxiety can attest to, even the smallest of forward progress is huge. I couldn't have done this a month ago.... or even two weeks ago.

So, yeah.... I'm just a girl,  over here punching anxiety in the face one little step at a time and laughing at  the ridiculousness of it all. (it's the only way to deal sometimes, honestly) 👊

Goal #1! All the way through without stopping! (the last two measures are still giving me tiny issues)

Next stop: Less mistakes and a little faster! :)

Musical mountains....

I'm THIS close (you'll have to picture me making the "this close" finger symbol. LOL) to being able to play this sucker all the way through without stopping. 

I've said it before and I'll say it again, one of my favorite things about piano (which really applies to any skill you work on) is how something that seems completely daunting and impossible when you first start becomes almost effortless with practice. You can actually feel the shift start to happen and it's AWESOME.

(I know this all probably sounds super dorky, but I've never been one to shy away from owning my interests loudly and proudly. 😂  )

Its just such a satisfying payoff every time I conquer a new piece. I'll never get tired of it!

My youngest son just started a new piece that was one of the first ones that really challenged me when I was a kid. I had heard a friend play it at a recital at school and went right home to find it and learn it. I had been playing things in first and second grade books at that point and THIS one... IT was in the third grade book. In my head, all the pieces in that book were crazy hard and intimidating.  With time though, I figured it out and I did it. It became one of my favorite pieces to just sit down and play at any random piano I found.

It's a really fun, fast piece (which he always loves) and he was so excited to sit down and start it last night. He took right to it.  He has heard me play it a LOT over the years and I joked at his lesson the other night when he picked it that my life has now come full circle. It will be especially fun to watch him climb this mountain and hopefully enjoy being able to play it all the way through as much as I did when I was his age!

I hope to post a video soon of my own mountain pictured above.... first goal, to play it at a consistent speed without stopping. Second goal, to bump up the speed little by little to get to a number I have in mind. I have two weeks! ;)

Is there a Richter scale for hands?

As I've mentioned before,  I am afflicted with an absolutely horrible case of performance anxiety. 

I'm not sure I've really captured in my posts just how severe it is.  I've spent SO many years avoiding this feeling entirely (basically since I became old enough to just opt out of things that freak me out) that I had almost forgotten how bad it can get. 

Just for some perspective, in high school,  I actually willingly took a D (and I was a good student, so this was painful) in a required speech class because I would write my speeches and then come to class and just lie and say I left them at home. I just couldn't bring myself to stand up in front of the class. 

Another time, I had to present an award on behalf of the student newspaper and I was physically ill both before AND after.

I could go on and on.

So yeah, lifelong battle.  

I KNEW piano lessons would bring it out even though it's truly the most non-threatening, no-pressure situation ever and with a sympathetic teacher I genuinely like and enjoy being around. (shoutout to Cecelia Prinkey and her infinite patience!)

This is why I waited so long to try though. I was avoiding this feeling.... especially since with it comes completely involuntarily and uncontrollable hand tremors, which are not at all conducive to piano playing. 

I want to play badly enough and I love playing enough though that I'm determined to push through it. And every failed attempt makes me even more determined.  This week, I made it through two full measures before the shaking kicked in, so I'm calling that a win. But once it started and wouldn't stop, I just got so annoyed. It drives me crazy.  So now I'm researching ways to get it under control. If there's anything I'm an actual pro at, it's researching things obsessively and exhaustively. 

In the meantime, here's some video to show where I am with February's second piece. I'm pretty happy with this! The last two lines were giving me a TON of trouble, but they are finally getting committed to muscle memory. Still never fails to amaze me when that happens. I love this process! Onward to page 2!

Sidenote: Video features a guest appearance by non other than Davey the Cat,  known around these parts as, "Best Cat Ever". He finds that my piano playing interferes with him getting fed second dinner in a timely fashion. 😜

Old habits die hard....

35 years or so of mostly teaching yourself something means sometimes you develop some bad habits you don't even realize are bad habits. 

In my case, I have a slight (okay, huge) tendency to blatantly ignore fingerings written in piano pieces unless I end up really getting hung up on a passage and then I'll go back and try it the way they suggest. This always fixes the problem, so you'd think I would have learned to start there by now. But, it slows me down and I hate being slowed down.  

Also to be noted, I harp on my kids CONSTANTLY when they practice about not ignoring fingerings. One of them always insists he has no idea why it matters, and I explain to him why it's important over and over again.  So not only am I stubborn, I'm also a hypocrite. 😏

SO...  in the interest of my project,  (and being a good example to my kids, LOL) I'm trying to break this habit. 

It's definitely testing my patience and focus.  

Actual photo of me at the piano right now

Here we are four lines into the new piece. My brain and muscles are starting to understand a little bit at time. Not gonna lie though, there has been some banging on the keys in frustration with this one! A couple of times I've been tempted to do my own thing, but I have mostly stuck with the fingering that's written,  so I'm going to call this a small win. 

February's Piece

Here's where I am with February's piece, On The Meadow.  It's almost finished. (Yes, it's only February 1. Yes, I am a giant nerd)

I just want to smooth out the middle a little more.  It's such a fun little piece to play!

One interesting thing I've found -- taking video when I play replicates, to a certain extent, what happens when I try to play in front of people. (though nowhere near as bad! In front of actual people I sometimes forget EVERYTHING) Normally, when I do a video, I just play until I forget the camera's there, so a BUNCH of times in a row.  This time, in hopes of sort of dealing with nerves a little, I only shot it twice and just went with the better of the two.

Anyway, you'll notice there are some little flubs and it's definitely not perfect.... at one point, I even mutter something to myself. LOL! So enjoy my "messy" video.  I'm trying to be more okay with making public mistakes. ;)

Soooo yeah.... since I jumped the gun on this piece, I also just started Bach's Two Part Invention #13 as a second piece for this month.  I'm knee deep in the very slow, beginning stages of that while I wrap up this one. I love the process though! There is something so satisfying about stumbling through a piece of music and then bit by bit, having it feel completely comfortable on your fingers. 

March is going to be crazy busy month at our house, so I'm picking something super simple that won't take a ton of time to learn, so a fun challenge for this month is good!  :)