The grande finále

Music, one of the best things in life. This winter, after getting used to the university studies, I decided to spend more time playing the piano. Not only for the pleasure of it, but I found it to be a great way of relaxing when the rest of the world seems to be spinning around mathematics. Letting the other half of the brain work, so to say.

Since my highschool graduation, I’ve only been rehearsing old pieces and not been learning any new material. This spring put a change to that, and I am now extending my repertoire with a handful of pieces, mostly compositions by Debussy. I feel quite new to this composer, and I enjoy discovering more and more of his music. La Fille aux Cheveux de Lin and the two Arabesques have proven to be beautiful, but what really is giving me a challenge is the fresh-sounding Étude pour les cinq doigts d’apres Monsieur Czerny.

The Etude is a not a little wacky, and has many interesting things going on. Starting with a decievingly simple and slow five-note scale in C major, it really goes on putting the “five fingers” to a test. An Étude (French for “study”) is a composition that is designed to practice a specific technique, and many contemporary Etudes in Debussy’s time were disguised as normal. performed works. Debussy, on the other hand, doesn’t even seem to try to hide the fact that this piece is, in fact, an Etude. Many of the melodic lines feel a bit too modern, even for early 20th-centrury modernistic music, and in one place I hear things that remind me of the blip-blopping chip music, a genre that Debussy  preceded with 70 years.

As with all classical music I start to rehearse, I cannot wait for the day I will master it, although I believe it will take some time to do so due to the fact that cinq doigts lies a bit above my current level. But, of course, that is the point of an Etude, isn’t it? Not to forget: I should also finish the Fantasie Impromptu soon.