So So Difficult

So I finally learnt the piece Inside Out which I have been working on for god knows how long. And by learnt, I mean that I know all the measures. So today I decided to take a shot at recording the same. That is when I realised how difficult it is to play the entire piece correctly end to end. I am not even talking about musicality, perfect timing or expressions. Just playing all the right notes, without hesitating anywhere and with decent timing. While any individual measures not be the problem, in every attempt, I would screw up one thing or the other. In the past couple of hours, I would have played the piece about a hundred times, and still wasn’t able to play to my satisfaction. Here is my attempt.

Here are a couple of performances I found on YouTube.

One big issue is the timing itself. Since playing this piece was hard for me, since the beginning I never counted while playing. Since I had heard the recording of the piece, I thought I knew what it should sound like and hence I play accordingly. But it is likely that I am missing a rest at a place or two and maybe I am playing an eighth note where I should be playing a quarter note.

Over the next few days, I will put in the effort to be able to correctly play the piece more consistently. I will also try to count while playing and refer the sheet to ensure that I am playing the notes for the right duration. It was a mistake not to do this from the beginning, but it’s my first hard piece, so it’s ok. It might be another week at least before I publish the final version of my recording of this piece.

I guess the good part about learning this piece has been that I am not so scared of pieces involving a lot of hand movements. When I look at the next piece in the book, it looks easier now than it did when I first attempted it. Of course that piece would present it’s own challenges, but at least there will be one aspect that won’t seem so intimidating any more.