Dear Friends,

As I mentioned in last week’s newsletter, I’ve created a listening series called Piano Lit — a self-guided mini-course delivered as a weekly email over six weeks.

It's been fun to imagine people listening and discovering new music from this series. To learn more, click here.

This week, I had the good fortune to hear the Juilliard String Quartet perform Beethoven’s Opus 130 live here in Indianapolis, at the Ensemble Music Society series.

I love Op. 130 - when I was younger I used to listen to it over and over at night. I especially love the extraordinary Cavatina movement. Written in 1825, near the end of Beethoven’s life, the Cavatina captures a mood of profound inwardness—pain, resignation, and a trembling kind of beauty. According to Anton Schindler (Beethoven’s somewhat unreliable biographer), composing it moved Beethoven himself to tears.

The Cavatina reminds me of the Arioso dolente from his Piano Sonata No. 31, Op. 110, written just a few years earlier. In the Arioso, the pianist has to shape a fragile, halting singing line purely through touch and tone. It feels like a lament: grief still searching for meaning. The Cavatina feels related, but slightly different: bittersweet resignation, a letting-go, peace at last.

In the Op. 130 string quartet, I love hearing how a violinist shapes these lines compared to the way we do on the piano in Op. 110 (the piano sonata). On both instruments, the goal is the same: imagining a human voice. The voice that struggles, breathes, hopes.... and finally accepts.

The morning after the performance, I learned that a beloved piano colleague here in Indianapolis had passed away this week, after a long illness. Knowing that her struggle had finally come to an end was especially poignant after hearing the Cavatina the previous night – it was as if the music was telling me something I did not yet know.

It’s experiences like this that remind me how fortunate we are to have music in our lives: not just to perform, but to feel, to connect, and to carry us through whatever we’re living. I hope you find a moment of beauty at the piano this week.

👋 Have a great week! Happy practicing! 🎹

-Kate

Practice TIP of the week:

Here are the most recent practice tips I have covered:​
​🎵 March 23: Playing with Rubato​
🎵 April 6: Dynamic Contrast​
🎵 April 13: Pacing Hairpins
​🎵 April 20: What is Phrasing?​

Each month, I focus on a specific theme for practice tips. This month’s theme is Dynamics and Expression.

Today's Practice Tip: Connecting Dynamics to Emotional Expression

Dynamics are one of the most powerful tools we have for bringing emotional meaning to a piece of music. And yet, it's easy to think of dynamics purely in mechanical terms: play louder here, play softer there.

But if you stop and think about the purpose of playing louder or softer, it all comes back to the composer. At some point, there was a composer sitting in a room, feeling some kind of emotion. They then communicated that emotion through a series of sounds—manifesting as pitches, rhythms, and dynamics.

Dynamic markings are not arbitrary. A composer doesn’t simply decide that the music should be forte or piano for no reason. They use dynamics to intensify or change the emotional meaning of what they are expressing. A dynamic change in the music is the composer’s way of signaling that the emotional temperature is shifting: rising, falling, or evolving.

When we connect dynamics to emotion in performance, the music becomes much more compelling and personal. When you attend a recital that moves you deeply, you don't walk away saying, "I loved the way that pianist played loud and soft." You talk about the emotions the performance elicited in you.

If you find it difficult to make dynamics expressive, one helpful exercise is to imagine a story behind the music. A good starting point is to think in terms of a movie soundtrack. We hear music tied to emotion all the time when we watch movies or TV shows: the background music signals what is happening in the story. Try asking yourself, "If this were a movie soundtrack, what would be happening on the screen?" That can be a powerful way to begin connecting your playing to the underlying emotions.

Another useful exercise is to sing your music away from the piano and exaggerate the volume as if you were acting it out dramatically. Notice how the louder parts naturally want to surge with energy, and how the quieter parts become more delicate and fragile. Then go back to the piano and try to capture that feeling through your touch and sound.

But remember, not all loud playing has to feel aggressive, and not all soft playing has to feel weak. A pianissimo can be intense and focused, while a fortissimo can be open and radiant.

This week, when you practice, don't just think about how loud or soft you're playing; think about what emotion you are expressing, and why the composer asked for that change. Starting to cultivate that habit of mind will move you away from thinking simply in terms of louder/softer and more into the realm of emotional expressiveness.

💜 Some of My Favorite Things

1. Beethoven 🎶: Here is a link to the Cavatina movement of Beethoven's String Quartet Op. 130, performed by the Danish String Quartet. The section that starts at around 4:40 especially reminds me of the Arioso dolente sections of Op. 110.
2. More Beethoven ❤️: Here's a link to a wonderful performance of Beethoven's Piano Sonata Op. 110, performed by Hélène Grimaud. You can hear the first of the two Arioso dolente sections at around 10:16.
3. Equipment 🪑: Hidrau Hydraulic Piano Bench. This is the piano bench I use in my teaching studio, and I absolutely love it. While it’s admittedly not the cheapest option out there, the quality is excellent and it's been well worth the investment. I especially appreciate the hydraulic adjustment—you can raise or lower the bench easily (just like an office chair), without having to crank it up and down like a traditional adjustable bench. If you’re looking for something durable, supportive, and easy to adjust, I highly recommend it. Check it out here.​