Chopin's Opus 69 No. 1

I have been very much enjoying my piano lessons, which I started to take up again a few months ago. I had piano lessons until I was 18, and although I am sure I am not very talented, I really enjoyed them and passed quite a few exams (music grades set by the London music schools). Between the ages of 18 and now, I was just trying to teach myself new pieces and playing the (very) old ones that I used to play when I was at school. I wasn't really progressing so I decided to start lessons again last October.

The lessons are pretty expensive and I take them at the music school in our town. I'm the oldest pupil in the school! I'm even older than most of the teachers! But of course they have helped tremendously. And I have a lot of freedom in what I can learn and play, not like when I was at school and I just had to work for the music exams all year.

Things have been going pretty great with my teacher as well, up until the moment about 3 weeks ago when I said I would like to learn how to play Chopin's "Waltz Opus 69 No. 1". I've been teaching myself Chopin from a book with simplified arrangements of Chopin's music for the last few years. This is a new piece which I hoped that I could learn together with my teacher.

The trouble seems to be that Chopin is very popular, and his works appear as background music in various films, saunas, elevators, even supermarkets. And everyone has their own interpretation. I guess I have heard so many different interpretations of Opus 69 No. 1 that I don't know what it's supposed to really sound like. I try really hard to play it properly, but my teacher - strangely - has almost no patience when I play this piece. She keeps telling me that I have the timing wrong, but (and I don't really understand why this is) for some reason, I really can't understand how she wants me to play it.

It's got to the stage where I'm really nervous about playing it at all! And I'm beginning to think I must be a little stupid not to be able to understand what I should be doing.

Last week my teacher made the comment that as there were not very many notes in this arrangement, it shouldn't be that difficult for me to play it without so much misinterpretation.

That would actually be quite a funny comment if I could see the funny side of this! Clearly, the world of music is not less sarcastic than the world of business.

Vielen gleichfalls

I have to tell you I'm beginning to find it quite confusing how often we have to congratulate and wish people well these days.
It wasn't like this when I was growing up in the 1960's! Back then you got on with your life and you were lucky to get a "Bless you!" when you sneezed!