Woking Hard, or Hardly Working

Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven who are some of the greatest pianist of all time, new the importance of practice. As young children they would practice for hours each day to become the best they could be. I started playing piano when I was about 6 years old, and have continued to this day. A couple of years ago I started with a very intense teacher named Carmen Hall.

She demanded that we practice 1 hour a day, 6 days a week, so this is what I did for many years of my life. There is one piece of music that is called a concerto. This piece of music is one of the longest, hardest pieces of music to learn, memorize, and master. The Concerto Competition in May is one of the biggest of the year; however, it is also one of the hardest. I usually would start to get ready for this competition 8 to 10 months before it would happen; however, one year it would take longer than that. I picked out my song around the usual time but as May approached I realized that this song was way beyond my expertise and I would have to wait till next year to unveil its awesomeness.

I practiced day in and day out for months on end, but it still was not good enough. I decided that I was going to have to step up my game in order to get this ready. I started to practice for an hour and a half to two hours every day so this song could be ready in time for the competition. Every minute that I was awake I was thinking of that concerto. Trying to memorize the 24 pages of the hardest song I had every played. Finally May came around and it was time for my competition.

As I always do before a competition, I would to do 10 performances to friends and family, so I could get used to performing my song in front of people. The Friday of the performance approached and I was extremely nervous. I felt like my stomach was going to fall out of my butt. I could hardly sleep the night before. I was running through the song in my head making sure I had it completely memorized. Finally the hour was near so I got dressed and went down to The Piano Gallery, the piano store where I would be performing.

This store was one of the greatest places for a piano performance. There were hundreds of pianos located through out the store. Black pianos, white pianos, electric pianos, grand pianos, any kind of piano you wanted that store had. I ran through the song a couple of times when I hear my name being called. My eyes grew 5 times their normal size.

I froze up instantaneously. My stomach felt like it was being ripped apart by a giant grizzly bear. My feet began to move, not because I tell them to, but because it is their naturally instinct. I move slower than a worm traveling up Mount Everest. After what seemed like an hour I make it into the room, play my song, and walk out.

Now the only thing that I could do was wait. The scores usually come out by the next Monday so I had to wait three full days until I knew how I did. Those were some of the most stressful days of my life. I spent most of my time trying to make time fly by playing video games and watching T.V. However time did not fly, but it seemed to go half the speed it normally does.

Monday came around and it was time to see my score. I head over to my Piano Teacher’s house were she flips through the papers until she gets to mine. I stare at the paper for about a minute until I can comprehend the letters on the page. 98! I got a 98! This was one of the best score I had ever received; I was so happy I felt like I was going to explode. I travel back home with my new happy attitude, and I felt awesome not only because I got a good score, but also because all my hard work eventually paid off.