Just got back from my lesson. For the little amount of practice done through the week, it went tolerably well. Learning to sight read from left hand to right is helpful - was doing it back to front.

Had to laugh after the first two pages of the Scarlatti sonata. It's the Longo 325 (K98 in E minor). It's supposed to be allegrissimo but my version is dirge-issimo - about a hundredth of the appropriate tempo. Oh well, slow is better than not at all.

I was snooping around Wikipedia and saw the Bisson photograph of Chopin, possibly taken in the year of his death, 1849. He looks very unwell. He's bulked up with several layers and a coat. He has the hollowing of the cheeks, typical of someone with chronic hypoxia. I wonder if he had "clubbed" finger tips as he looks to be almost trying to hide his hands.

What a wonderful link to the 19th century is this photo. Just like the recorded snippet of Brahms speaking over an early telephone and recordings of Rachmaninov playing his own works, it brings the man alive in a way the oil portraits, death masks and busts cannot.

I enjoyed my lesson this afternoon. I wasn't sure it would go well because I've had a recurrence of a left cervical nerve root impingement that sends pain down my left arm and into my back. It started about ten days ago and after three trips to the physiotherapist it is finally starting to settle. Mind you, it's my own jolly fault because I don't sit up straight enough when I'm at the desk or driving the car.

Anyway, the Chopin ballade went well enough including the second page of the coda and the other smaller pieces, the Scarlatti sonata and a Czerny etude are coming along.

I really get a lot of inspiration from watching other people who are artists. For instance, just last week I was watching a documentary about the Sydney theatre company staging Hedda Gabler, with Cate Blanchett in the title role. All the people they interviewed had this incredibly honest enthusiasm about them and a curiosity about what the development of the play would unearth. Talking about what they were doing, they had no fear in their voices.

So, I tried to remember that feeling and it helped me to go and really want to play. Maybe there's a key in that somewhere.

I had learnt the first page and a half of the Suite Bergamasque (SB). It isn't that practically difficult but I'm sure the difficulty is in the nuances and colours.

Still no start on the new Scarlatti sonatas. If I was an ancient pyramid builder, I'd still be there today with people honking their camels at me to get my stone blocks out of their way.

The Chopin ballade is getting a move on now. It strikes me as funny how a piece will sort of suddenly gel. The two Rachmaninov preludes have done that.

Tickets for SIPCA (Sydney International Piano Competition) will be on sale soon. Haven't completely made up my mind whether to go or not. There's a lot of extra stuff that you hear on the radio that you don't here if you are actually there eg. interviews with the judges etc.

The lesson on the 27th was fine. I have a recording of Kathryn Stott playing the Debussy. Arthur gave me Richter's live performance to compare. It is wonderful.

Of the Chopin, I need to tackle the next two bars of the coda - the bit with all the thirds.

I decided on two more Scarlatti sonatas. The first is K98 in E minor - allegrissimo. The other is the F minor K 466 - andante moderato. I have Horowitz playing the first and Pletnev the second. It's good to study the score with the CD recordings away from the piano and then leave the CD's whilst learning the notes and then come back to them later.

The four Rachmaninov preludes now make a nice set to play over twenty to thirty minutes or so.