Guess what I found?

Yes, my camera. Which is also my microphone. I tore my house apart for two days, and it was hiding in plain sight! Isn't that always the case?

Anywho, because I found it I had to make a recording. And since I haven't recorded O Polichinelo, the Villa-Lobos number, yet, I thought I'd give it a whirl. This recording isn't that great of quality (I AM using my camera, after all, plus a 100 year old piano that is out of tune), and I am certainly not as talented as Bratke on this song, but here it is. But wait!!! My computer is having issues. So I'll post it tomorrow. Sorry.

Today's practice included 30 minutes work on the Chopin Nocturne, 20 minutes on the Bach Fugue, 10 minutes on O Polichinelo, 20 minutes on Modest Mussorgsky's "Ballet of Unhatched Chickens" from Pictures at an Exhibition, and about 15 minutes on Clair de Lune.

I am having a really hard time finding a recording of "Ballet of Unhatched Chickens" in piano for you. The thing is, Mussorgsky originally wrote it for piano, but it seems that most folks prefer to hear it orchestrated. Some other parts of Pictures is much more well known and popular, therefore there are plenty of recordings of those parts on the Internet. But I can't find my song anywhere! I'll keep looking, and hopefully I'll have something for you to listen to soon.

Or else, I'd better just get my act together and get this performance-ready and record it!

Yeah, that's twice that I didn't check in.

I'm having a bummer week. But I'm keeping up with the practicing. I also noticed I had been neglecting my journal blog, so I had to post a bit on that today.

Yesterday I got in about 50 minutes, practicing Bach and Chopin only.

Today I have spent the majority of my time on those as well, but I also played Clair de Lune. I was about to open to that tonight when I opened to "O Polichinelo" from Prolo do Bebe, No. 1 instead. This little ditty is by Heitor Villa-Lobos. It is very fast and lots of fun. Listen here as performed by Marcelo Bratke. I can't play this piece nearly as well as this guy, but at one time I played it fairly well. I believe it was included on my senior recital. The hubby thinks it is just a mess of keys, which is what it probably sounds like right now anyway, so I'll give him that. But I was playing it more like at moderato, rather than presto. So I can understand his dislike. My goal is to make him like this piece! 20th century music can be hard to appreciate sometimes, but this is a great piece and its so fun.

Today so far I have about 50 minutes in as well. I'm going to get back to those ivories before I hit the hay so hopefully I can get at least another 10 minutes in tonight!