Brag time

Last Friday, Rachel competed in the 2013 State Fair Young Hoosiers Piano Competition. You won’t hear her talk about it (unless you ask her, and then she would just smile and nod and say it “went well”) because she is quiet and modest about these things. However, being her (less quiet and modest) mom, I have the distinct right -- nay, even the duty – to tell others about what a great job she did in the competition. :-)

This year, her instructor, Ms. Kim, suggested she perform songs in 4 different categories:  Sonata, Tchaikovsky, Bach and Classical. The Sonata was a Beethoven piece, Piano Sonata No. 10 in G major. I remember when she first heard this song, she doubted she could ever learn it. She really pushed herself to get through it, and spent many, many hours working on this one section:

Clip of Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 10 in G major

Really, this short clip is indicative of how well she played each of the four songs. She was very focused and afterwards, admitted she “wasn’t really that nervous.”

We expect to find out within the next week or so whether she advances to the Finals. Each song is judged separately, so if she does advance, it may be with one piece, all pieces, or any combination. We don’t make any assumptions about whether or not she’ll advance; of course, we feel like she did very well, but the contest is very competitive and the judges have lots of criteria they judge on.

Ms. Kim has a very pragmatic approach to competitions: the goal shouldn’t be to win, but to get a piece to the point of being “competition-ready.” That is a goal we were happy and proud to watch Rachel accomplish last Friday.

“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above …“ James 1:17

Lord, we thank You for Your gift of music.

“The Montagues and the Capulets” by Prokofiev

When I started the Worley Family Library series of posts, I explained how I wanted many of my blog entries to be “slice of life” type entries.  It occurred to me last night while Rachel was playing the piano, that just like chronicling the books being read, I could chronicle the songs being played on the piano.
The song Rachel is playing here is one that we were introduced to during ballet lessons.  Ms. Hume uses the beginning and ending parts for the grande batte mente exercises and the middle waltz part for the   brushing waltz and travelling waltz exercises.  We have always liked the song, and came across it one day on YouTube, so that’s how we finally found out the name of it!  Who would’ve thought it was written by Prokofiev, who also wrote “Peter and the Wolf”? So this is one of the songs Rachel is learning just for fun. We all enjoy hearing her practice it and someone is guaranteed to start doing ballet as soon as the first few notes are played.  :-)