I've wondered in the past in this blog whether I would be able to keep up old repertoire while adding new stuff. Well, I'm finally losing some of my old pieces. And it just doesn't really seem worth it to me to be spending more time on them when my new pieces are so demanding. I always thought it would be a good idea to keep the old ones to pull out in case people ask: "Do you play any Rachmaninoff?", or "Play that Beethoven I like". But let's face it. People aren't exactly stopping me on the street and demanding I play the third dance from Ginastera's Op.2. And now that I have (HD) videos of most of the pieces I've played in the last couple of years, I feel better about letting them go.
So what's this new stuff that's taking so much time? I have two new pieces in the can: Leopold Godowsky's Alt Wien ("Old Vienna") and George Gershwin's Prelude I. These two are memorized and up to speed. Maybe not quite ready for public performance, but close. A third piece is in the works, and I'm pretty sure I'll be able to get it down. It's Toccatina Op.36 by Nikolai Kapustin. I have half of it memorized and close to speed. It's a pretty insane piece, so it's taking a lot of work.
Beyond those three, I've been reading a lot. I'm trying to decide between two baroque pieces (Bach vs. Scarlatti). I have a classical piece I might do (Field). There's an Albéniz I'm considering, but I'm still hunting for this year's "gotta play" Spanish piece. Still on the lookout for a big, over-the-top romantic piece, too.
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