Chapter Eighteen - Performance Anxiety

The last time I performed in Zipper Hall the audience was dark. So pitch black, in fact, that a friend of mine who was sitting in the second row for “A Concerto for Claire” was mad that I didn’t see her during the performance.

When I peeked out the stage door ten years later, the front house right seats were empty. I was sure I would not be distracted by anybody.

I took a deep breath, stepped on stage, heard all the clapping, and as I turned to take a bow, my eyes panned across the 350 people in attendance... all lit bright as day, and my heart started racing. Apparently “recital lighting” is different from “theatre production lighting” where the house is darkened.

Stef had asked me if I got nervous, and I told her no. I learned only then that this was blatantly untrue.

I opened with “Chopsticks”. Laughs. Which led into the Mozart Twinkle variations that went something like...

Twinkle, Twinkle, little KLUNK. How KLUNK wonder KLUNK KLUNK are.

All I kept telling myself was “please calm down”.

Variation 1 started: KLUNK. Variation 2: KLUNK.

In the rehearsals leading up to the recital, Michael suggested that while playing I really needed to be “in the moment”, a phrase many actors are familiar with. I had never heard it applied to music, and it made a lot of sense. But let me tell you, it is extremely difficult to stay present when mistakes start wildly attacking from every which way.

If you listen back to the recording, maybe it isn’t as bad as I’ve made it out to be, BUT it sure felt like that at the start. My solution was just play it faster and faster and faster until I reached the KLUNK end.

I hadn’t really performed in Zipper Hall before. Yes, I whirled through a few bars of music for “Claire”, but I had been lucky to get through those bits. And it was on the Steinway... because apparently when you want to drop a bicycle chain onto the strings for a George Crumb piece for a scene in a play, you are immediately barred from even stepping close to my dream piano, the Fazioli.

The Fazioli. The Ferrari of pianos. Rich, lush bass strings. Bass strings that are soooo grand that they overpower and drown out your right hand. Heewon had warned me about this in advance, but it isn’t until you actually get onto the piano that you realize the enormity of the whole rebalancing act between your two hands. Crazily, there is no sense of this sitting on stage. Your music sounds fabulous while you’re playing. Apparently, not so much in the audience. It took relying on lots of other people’s ears. Even though I made this a priority and was intent on readjusting, one of the recital attendees asked me if I was left handed because of the sometimes-thundering bass notes.

Zipper Hall itself... amazing acoustics. But with those acoustics comes the need to get your foot off the pedal and slow everything down for clarity. In theory, playing slower should be easier. In Akira world, it is insanely difficult. Fast, flashy passages that I had kinda glossed over in rehearsal, suddenly had to be played with precision and perfectly articulated. Ugh!

While much of the music felt ridiculously slow when performing it live, in reviewing the recording, the sections where the tempo was pulled back with the foot off the pedal sounded right in the pocket.

Here is the KLUNK performance.

Lesson learned, Heewon & Michael (heretofore referred to as H&M).

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Next up... PICTURES AT AN EXHIBITION... or an interpretive version of.

Mussorgsky begins the piece with “Promenade”, a stroll through a museum.

This theme comes back numerous times with varying meters, characteristic of walking at different speeds as one passes from picture to sculpture to painting. Mussorgsky then composed pieces to represent Hartmann’s sketches and watercolors.

“Gnomus” (The Gnome) - a sketch of a gnome-like nutcracker with large teeth and crooked legs, clumsily running

“Interlude, Promenade”

“Il Vecchio Castello” (The Old Castle) – based on a watercolor of a medieval Italian castle with a troubadour singing before it to suggest scale

“Interlude, Promenade”

“Tuileries” (Quarrels of Children at Play) a painting of the Jardin de Tuileries near the Louvre. Children arguing and nurses were added for scale. I largely remember this song being used on “The Smurfs”.

“Bydlo” – a picture of an oxen-drawn, Polish cart with giant wheels

“Interlude, Promenade"

“Ballet of the Unhatched Chickens” – was based on the production design from the ballet,

“Trilby” featuring hatching canaries. (Kim thought this should just be called “Eggs”.)

“Samuel Goldenberg und Schmuyle” – based on two separate paintings by Hartmann depicting two Jewish men – rich and poor

“Promenade”

“The Marketplace at Limoges” – where two women violently argue in a city near Central France

“Catacombae & Con Martuis in Lingua Mortua” – Viktor Hartmann draws himself with friends descending into the Catacombs and exploring the dead Latin Language

“The Hut of Baba Yaga” – based on Hartmann’s drawing of a clock, Baba-Yaga’s hut on fowl’s legs

“The Great Gate of Kiev” – Hartmann’s design for the city gates of Kiev to commemorate Tsar Alexander II’s escape from assassination. Hartmann regarded this as his finest work and won a national competition, though it was never built.

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Fact: I have “Pictures” memorized.

Second Fact: With the last minute changes to the program, all the extra rehearsing on the Rachmaninov that came before said changes and all the additional time spent on improving technique, I had developed something akin to a fear of failure.

Third Fact: I decided to use the sheet music with Michael turning pages.

Fourth Fact: This turned out to be a pretty big mistake, because for whatever reason, in sections that I usually played off-book, I decided to look up and could not find my place on the page.

Fifth Fact: The lid of the Fazioli is extremely reflective.

Ridiculous Fact: After getting lost in the score, I looked down and could not find my fingers amongst the black and white jumble of keys.

Pathetic Fact: The result was not brilliant.

I was certainly not “in the moment” during this whole piece. To me, it felt as if I were progressively getting worse and worse with every wrong note. In acting, mistakes are embraced. In music, not as much. But if mistakes are part of your piano performance, you are not supposed to telegraph them by reacting. (No one believes me when I tell them I may have an involuntary muscle spasm in my face.) The performance was not nearly as bad as it sounded in my head, and had I stayed in the moment, “Pictures” probably would have been better and a helluva lot more fun.

My sister came backstage at intermission and told me to stop flinching. And to my disbelief, Fro, who had driven in from Albuquerque for the recital, told me everyone was loving it.

Real fact: Failure is a part of creativity and artistry. Fear of failure is a mental block and gets you nowhere. Don’t be afraid to fail.

The majority of my practice time leading up to the recital was on the Rachmaninov. But the hurried together rendition of Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” replaced it and fortunately turned out to be a good programming choice just for a difference in musical style.

The two piano version of “Totentanz” rounded out the ridiculously long program. For me, playing the Liszt this time, on this program, with Michael, was the most meaningful rendition I have ever done of it.

The encore was a lush version of the 2nd Movement of the Shostakovich “Piano Concerto No. 2". Turns out everyone loved the slow breather at the end.

The recital was a rousing success. I had worn three different pairs of Paul Smith socks provided by the boss.

It was surprisingly my mother who said, “Who says this has to be the last concert?”

This recital was supposed to be an end-all. If I had not gone on this amazing journey of learning with H&M, then this would have been the only concert, and I would have put the Rachmaninov up and trudged through it.

At this point, though, I wanted to continue studying and maybe perform the “Rhapsody on a Theme” in a year or so.

Find what you are loving to do and pursue it. And if it’s a crazy thought, try it any way.

The desire to learn was a credit to Heewon & Michael. I’d found what I loved.

A friend of mine recently turned the Big 4-0. Her question was “How do you know you’re okay? Because you’ve made really good use of the first half of your forties.”

It was at this performance. I had not built an audience base yet, so everyone in the theatre was a friend of mine or a guest of someone I knew. They were all ethnicities and classes, representing a broad spectrum of political and religious beliefs. When they are all there enjoying a night of music, supporting you, you are on top of the world.

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