Patience - Brain power will increase with time

I had my first piano lesson with Gail this afternoon. We worked through two pieces from the Suzuki piano school book: The Happy Farmer by Robert Schumann (the one with syncopations I was talking about) and Hungarian Folk Song by Bela Bartok. She told me that mature students should practice two pieces a week, as only practicing one usually leads them to become fed up with it. I found that most of my attention was focused on where I was putting my fingers and I was concerned that I was training myself to memorise finger positions rather than actually read and play the music. She told me she was pushing me pretty hard by getting me to play the pieces start to finish, and that this can be a real brain strain for beginners. I learnt the C major scale with both hands going in the same direction to have the thumb-under technique ready for when I start learning harder pieces.

I almost completely rewrote the bar of the Britten arrangement that I spent all of the last composing session on. I must have been deliberating over the guitar part last time, because when I looked at what I had for the string quartet tonight it looked rushed. I referred to the actual melody of At the mid hour of night (as I do when in need of inspiration) and new parts for the 1st and 2nd violin and viola grew from there. I am still unsure about the length of this phrase and the broader structure of the piece. This is in part due to the fact that I can't hear what all the parts I've written sound like together. For the time being I'm going to continue composing bar by bar on paper, because I feel that if I keep at it then I'll gradually develop the brain power to hear all the parts in my head. This is probably a good time for me to pull out a fantastic book called Hearing and Writing Music by Ron Gorow. It contains many exercises for developing the ability to hear music in your head.