June 20 & 21 - Gina Bachauer International Piano Festival

This piano festival, run by Paul Pollei, was awesome. The facilities, instruments, and administration were what every concert pianist dreams of. The concert series encouraged creative thinking and was willing to cater to the whims of whatever the pianists could envision. Liz and I enjoyed great lighting, working microphones, and a hearty and responsive audience. As a result, we were able to focus on our performances, which went pleasingly well.

Some musical highlights:
*The Cat's Fugue (a brand new piece that I composed for the event - I was surprised by how much I liked the composition ... we'll be playing that again ...)
*The 9th through the 16th minute of "The Rite of Spring." I was definitely on a musical high, unaware of anything else but the awesomeness of the music.
*The "Turtle Staying Alive," the "Cuckoo in Sussex," and "Jackasses." These movements from our New Depiction of the Zoological Fantasy were performed to my liking and received with great enthusiasm by our audience.

Since I'm supposed to be reviewing my performances, I will be honest and confess that I ran out of steam during our "Flair and Fury" concert on the 21st. While we managed to make it through the excitement of our Blue Danube walzes, I just couldn't barrel to the end with my usual gusto. Thankfully, after the non-stop virtuosity of that concert, our audience was forgiving. :-)

If you attended any of the concerts, what were your favorite moments? Least favorite moments?

June 15 - American Matthay Association Lecture/Recital

Give me an exciting topic and two hours of your time, and you never know what you might get! Today's transcription was titled Reminiscence de transcription: a history and defense. Yes, I know it's a cheesy title, but my other options were Paraphrasing on the Piano: it's purpose - past and present and Transcriptions: derangements, reminiscences, phantasmagoria, and more.

We began with a "Musician's Roundtable" that involved many of the greatest musicians from the past 200 years, including Liszt, Busoni, Schnabel, and Wanda Landowska. I am so grateful for all the theatrical readings provided by my audience of unsung thespians. It made for great fun.

The rest of the lecture was filled with poetry readings, complex graphs, and performances of Vivaldi/Bach, Bellini/Liszt, Lully/Godowsky, and Chopin/Sorabji. There was also a brief diversion into the popular realm, with a look at Everybody Loves Somebody.

How did it go? Well, I could have gone on for another three hours. To squash everything in, I barreled through the last half-hour of text like an auctioneer on crack. I apologize to all those who felt a little breathless following the presentation.

The performances went well thanks to a beautiful instrument and performing space; my favorite was the composite performance of pieces by Lully and Lully/Godowsky. The performance of Reminiscence de Norma, however, taught me a valuable lesson regarding cell phones on "vibrate-mode." My energetic little cell phone, situated in my pocket and pressed tightly against my thigh, rang not once, not twice, not three times; no, not even four times; my cell phone rang FIVE times during the 15-minute performance! It was a test in focus I had never expected. I succeeded admirably, although come the fifth call, I did consider pausing to answer the phone.

I'm so disappointed in myself! How could I forget to turn off my cell phone?!

On a closing note, I had an awesome time at the American Matthay Association Festival. The lectures, performances, and people were wonderful!

June 12 - PS 131Q elemetary school performances

Visit the Anderson & Roe blog, "Where Soloists Fear to Tread," to get the scoop.

June 3 - Anderson & Roe at Yamaha Artist Services

I made sweeping changes to "the new depiction of the zoological fantasy" and was very pleased with the results. Elizabeth and I have decided to include several movements on our CD to be recorded later this summer.

As for the performance: there were no train-wrecks, but something was missing. It could have been the paltry size of the audience on this rainy Sunday evening (thankfully we had several loyal friends who braved the weather!). It could have been Liz's persistent sickness. Perhaps it was the strange acoustics that did us in, or maybe it was our positioning on an unnecessarily long (3 hours!) concert.

Actually, most likely it was the fact that Liz and I were sitting a full 20 feet apart. The pianos weren't dovetailed like usual; instead they were placed tail to tail to fit the strangely proportioned stage. It was like we were screaming to each other across an energy-zapping chasm, and any hopes for intimate, conversational two-piano playing disappeared in the black-hole between us.

Thanks to Keats, David, Melody, Casey, Charles, and TJ for all your hearty laughs!