I came back to practicing after vacation and pulled out the accompaniment track I’ve been working with for Gavotte by Gossec, the final piece in Book One that I’m still seriously working on working up.  I was astonished to find that as I went back to the recording it’s just painfully slow.  Somehow while away my brain shifted to storing the tune in my head at a faster tempo, and to play it at the speed of the accompanist who set me down this path of playing with accompaniment is no longer really working for me.  It’s become an exercise in moving through molasses.

So I found another.  The pianist does not do any section repeats at all – I’m not sure why.  So the whole thing is under two minutes, when the previous recording was over four.  It probably not quite double the speed – the video is titled indicating 120 bpm – and while I haven’t checked it, the thing definitely moves.  As with my trying to bring Musette up to speed the other day, it’s challenging.  I know Gavotte far better than any other piece – I’ve played it for far longer and with more repetitions than any other song.

The degree to which I’m familiar with it is the only way I can work on it at this speed.  It’s a real challenge – I have to know what comes next so well that it doesn’t really matter what comes next, if you know what I mean.

And it’s fun.  I mean really, really fun.

Thanks for reading.

Ryan