{"id":338,"date":"2009-04-28T09:33:49","date_gmt":"2009-04-28T09:33:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp\/2009\/04\/one_note_at_a_time\/"},"modified":"2012-01-18T20:40:26","modified_gmt":"2012-01-19T01:40:26","slug":"one_note_at_a_time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/2009\/04\/one_note_at_a_time.html","title":{"rendered":"One note at a time"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The work of the performer may seem repetitious. We are measuring out time with our playing and practicing. We are measuring out life, one Beethoven sonata at a time.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nIn a sense, am I measuring my way toward death with my performances? I might speculate: &#8220;Will I play Beethoven&#8217;s &#8220;Path\u00e9tique&#8221; Sonata a hundred times more before I die?&#8221; Or five times? Or never?\n<\/p>\n<p>\n<span class=\"mt-enclosure mt-enclosure-image\" style=\"display: inline;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Thumbnail image for Mahlergrave\" src=\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/assets_c\/2009\/03\/mahler_begraebnis_schoenber-thumb-240x303-4178.jpg\" width=\"240\" height=\"303\" class=\"mt-image-none\" style=\"\" \/><\/span><br \/>\nArnold Schoenberg: <em>Gustav Mahler&#8217;s Burial<\/em>, 1911\n<\/p>\n<p>\nOf course, all kinds of people are measuring with their repetitious details &#8212; the increments of their lives. But the particularly ritualistic aspect of performing classical music lends itself to these morbid speculations. And since learning a difficult piano piece represents many hours of work, the time put into each piece is a significant fraction of a life.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nSo, how many more &#8220;Waldsteins&#8221; or Polonaise-fantaisies?\n<\/p>\n<p>\nLooking over a long list of pieces I&#8217;d written down when I was twenty &#8212; pieces I hoped to learn in a lifetime of musical work &#8212; the thought crossed my mind: &#8220;Not enough time left &#8230;&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The work of the performer may seem repetitious. We are measuring out time with our playing and practicing. We are measuring out life, one Beethoven sonata at a time. In a sense, am I measuring my way toward death with my performances? I might speculate: &#8220;Will I play Beethoven&#8217;s &#8220;Path\u00e9tique&#8221; Sonata a hundred times more [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1635,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[47,171,510,509,511,129],"class_list":{"0":"post-338","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-beethoven","9":"tag-death","10":"tag-mahler","11":"tag-measurement","12":"tag-morose","13":"tag-schoenberg","14":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=338"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1635"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}