Play the piano, relaxes my mind. I’m not a professional nor a virtuous or even an average player. I’m a frustrated pianist who had to left her studies because there were other needs at home and spend many years without touching a keyboard.

But recently a piano arrived at home. A good one: a vertical Yamaha. It was an inheritance from a distant member of the family. I tried to play easy pieces to begin, and I get discouraged because I felt like I had paws instead of hands and fingers. But one day, I decided to try the Chopin waltzes I had learned when I was a teenager. I thought I could at least “read” them again. Suddenly, the music began to flow from my fingers. It was stored in my memory, with its movements and expressions. It was not perfect, but I realized that I could practice and recall my old skills with the music I had interiorized so deeply decades ago.

I always wished to have freedom in my hands over the keyboard and be able to improvise variations of original melodies. I admire artists like Billy Joel. Very often, I’m in a “New York state of mind”:

Some folks like to get away
Take a holiday from the neighborhood
Hop a flight to Miami Beach or to Hollywood
But I’m takin’ a Greyhound on the Hudson River line
I’m in a New York state of mind

I’ve seen all the movie stars
In their fancy cars and their limousines
Been high in the Rockies under the evergreens
I know what I’m needin’
And I don’t want to waste more time
I’m in a New York state of mind

It was so easy livin’ day by day
Out of touch with the rhythm and blues
But now I need a little give and take
The New York Times, the Daily NewsIt comes down to reality
And it’s fine with me ’cause I’ve let it slide
I don’t care if it’s Chinatown or on Riverside
I don’t have any reasons
I left them all behind
I’m in a New York state of mind
Oh yeah

FDDA: Music