Week 1: A New Hope
Starting on May 4th...
Welcome to the Unfinished Business Challenge — and the beginning of our four-week musical adventure!
Every great journey starts with a first step (and some hope!) This week is about choosing your piece: something you’ve always wanted to learn, something you started and left behind, or something unfinished that keeps calling you back.
This Week’s Mission
Choose one piece (or excerpt) to stay with throughout the challenge.
A few ideas:
- A piece you’ve always meant to finish
- Something abandoned years ago that deserves a second life
- A new piece you’ve been waiting for the right moment to begin
- A small excerpt from a larger dream piece
Big or small, all choices are welcome. What matters is that it feels like your unfinished business.
This Week, Share:
- What piece did you choose?
- Why this piece?
- Is there a musical challenge or goal you hope to work through this month?
If you’d like, post a recording of where you’re starting from — even a rough first read. We’d love to hear it.
Over the next four weeks we’ll build momentum together!
62 replies
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I think I'll re-visit BWV 999 (Bach's Little Prelude in c minor). I started it last fall, then life became complicated and I didn't have the mental reserves to make any progress with the piece (like so much, perhaps all, of Bach there is a great deal of intellectual energy required when playing it), so it stalled and I decided to put it to the side and come back to it later. It is now later! My goal for the month is to put all the pieces together and play it all the way through with focus and energy.
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I am resurrecting the Barber Nocturne for my Nocturne project. I played it in my Junior recital decades ago. It’s still in my ears, but my fingers…not at all! This is a great challenge.
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I’ll jump into the pool too, as it looks like it’s going to be quite a fun party!
I’ll dust off either the Chopin opus 10/1 with the modest but achievable goal of playing it consistently through at 120 bpm+, or the Chopin Barcarolle (smoothening things out, expanding the dynamic range, and playing the bogeyman passages without stuttering).
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said:
Chopin opus 10/1I apologize for not having done proper distancing nor worn a mask 😞.
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so many to pick from...Mozart Sonata in C major and will see how far I get. Put in writing here so guess I better get to it.
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I will focus on “completing” a piece I just started- Brahms 117/2. I might also use this time to work on memorization for Rachmaninoff Prelude 23/6 (worked on it a few months ago and memorized some of the harder parts, but would like it all done and solid).
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said:
I apologize for not having done proper distancing nor worn a mask 😞.Joke fail😅. Back to the piano then.
Oh no, back to work. That lifey work. And you win the best new word (for me) award.
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There are indications in my two different editions of Debussy Preludes, Book 2, that I worked on no. 7, "La terrasse des audiences du clair de lune". This would be at least 10 years ago, but I never did perform it. However, one might think that some previous study would let me pick it up again, quickly. That's not happening!
In mid-July I'm attending a week-long immersion at the local School of Music, including an intensive performing class on the life and works of Debussy. It's time to finish that piece!
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I would like to finish learning the first movement of Rach 2. I started learning it this year. Our late beloved mother love this piece. I love this piece too. The goal for this month is to memorise this movement.
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