Personal Essay: Music Analysis

“It looks so easy when you do it.” My family and friends would throw their hands up in frustration. I chuckle and confidently take a seat from them. I take a look at a dizzying array of black and white keys that stumped them, and yet, give me the sense of familiarity and wonder. With a stroke of my fingers, a random cacophony starts fitting into a pleasing, harmonious tune on the piano.

I’ve played piano as long as I could remember. Unfortunately, I wasn’t one of those child prodigies who found themselves enamored with the world of classical music. At first, I was lost in the world of chaos, filled with notes, symbols, language, and craft that I couldn’t possibly comprehend in its enormity. As most people who have taken any kind of music lessons can relate, practicing without context in the beginning phase is daunting to any beginners. I spent more time

When I finally had the ability to comprehend and craft each music piece with my hands, I was thrown into the world of discovery—on a quest to find hidden meanings like characters from Da Vinci Code. With unfettered curiosity, I devoured and explored composers’ stories through music, history, and biographies. Sampling bits and pieces of 400+ years of music, I was a cryptographer who saw a big picture of connections, patterns, and deciphered the meaning behind the sheet music. I was their friend, and confidante who listened intently to discover what they had to say. Each fluttery run on the piano reminded me of Mozart’s giddy laugh. Beethoven’s silent weeping gripped my heart as I understood that Symphony No. 7 was one of the last compositions before his world was surrounded in silence. My duty as a performer was to give an audience a mosaic of my artistic understanding of their world and feelings. I heaped on hours, days and weeks of practice and research, hoping that my music will touch the audience’s heart the way composers did