It’s been two years since I got a piano. It’s been glorious.
I don’t think I play like someone that’s been practicing for two years – I wish I had progressed this year much more than I have. I’m probably now where I should have been a year ago. Oh well, I love it and I’m not stopping. And I’m not going to stop sharing – I want you, yes YOU, to get busy trying something you have always wanted to but have been afraid to. And I want you to OWN IT and not let anyone ridicule you into stopping doing something you might love.
I also want to note that research shows that the brain benefits from learning to read and play music later in life – after 50, after 60, whatever.
Here are my imperfect recitals for 2023 (I gave up trying to do them every month):
- Di Provenza by Verdi for December.
- The Skater’s Waltz by Émile Waldteufel and We Shall Overcome. November.
- The Blue Danube waltz (“An der schönen blauen Donau”, Op. 314) by Johann Strauss II
and
This Little Light of Mine. September. - Rondalla Aragonesa by E. Granados
Arranged for Easy Piano by Allan Small, butchered by Juana la Loca. then Beautiful Dreamer by Stephen Foster. Summer. - a practice piece with no title, All Through the Night and By The Light of the Silvery Moon. June.
- A Sonatina from Alfred’s Basic Piano Library, Lesson Book Level 1B, and Unfinished Symphony Theme by Schubert and Caro Mia Ben by Giordani, both arranged for easy piano by Allan Small. March.
- Two church hymns:
The Old Rugged Cross and Blessed Assurance. January.
I also played guitar a lot this year, but did very little recording of such – I was mostly working up to being able to play well enough to sing with my sister when I was in Kentucky in November. My last video for the year, as of this blog, is me playing and singing Away in a Manger and Feliz Navidad on guitar.
Also recently, I played a dulcimer for the first time ever!
Also see a year with a piano, my blog from my first year.
Get out there and do something you are afraid of! And make music!
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