Ready to be Played

Finishing work on a piece was always an exciting time, because Mr. Galimir and I generally worked on only one piece at a time. The end of the lesson would become a discussion about the next project. On one such occasion, we decided to begin work on Paganini’s first concerto. “Next week, the first movement, with the Sauret cadenza.” This was unusually strict for him, as he would usually leave it for me to prepare as much as I felt comfortable. This was a large task, as I had never worked on the concerto before, and the first movement is by far the largest of the three. In addition, he wanted the cadenza composed by the violinist Emile Sauret, a seven-minute stretch of admittedly monotonous virtuosity. I wondered if this would be too much to handle in one week, but made my best effort all the same. By the end of the week, I was fairly impressed with myself, having prepared the entire movement and gotten at least a start on the cadenza.

The lesson unfolded as usual, with me playing and Mr. Galimir interjecting comments and criticisms. It seemed to me that there were more “good!” or “very good!” comments this week than usual, so I was pleased. When I reached the end of the movement, where the cadenza would normally be played, I stopped. “And the cadenza?” he asked. I said, “I’m sorry, but I just couldn’t prepare it as well as I wanted to. It isn’t ready to be played.” Then Mr. Galimir leaned forward, cupped a hand to the side of his mouth, and whispered as if telling me a secret about someone else. “Truthfully...the rest of it wasn’t ready either.”