Masterclass

A very famous pianist and teacher, Professor Zitta Zohar holds masterclasses at my school these two days. I was very lucky that I had a chance to play Liszt Hungarian Rhapsody No.6 for her.

Usually, masterclasses are held in a hall. Yet, Professor Zohar's masterclass is held in a small room. There are a few good things to hold a masterclass in a small room. One reason is that most students tend to feel nervous when playing on stage and besides, the teacher help you polish the piece in front of lots of people. This is tough because all the audience put their attention on you. Sometimes, you may want to work on the things taught by the masterclass teacher but you are not able to do it because of the nervouness. You will probably feel awful and this will be even worse if the masterclass teacher is mean. Besides, if a masterclass is held in a hall, the audience rarely ask questions because they are not supposed to do that. It happens that it is like spoon-feeding in which the student works on the piece with the teacher while the others just sit and listen.

Professor Zohar prefers teaching in a small room because she likes to work on details. Namely, to have a lesson with the student. This afternoon, my professor, another professor and his wife came to the class. During the one hour class, the two professors raised questions occasionally. They were not trying to challenge Professor Zohar but to share their different ideas. The learning atmosphere was very good because everyone was so devoted into the class. For me, I couldn't feel that the masterclass teacher was "teaching" at all. Instead, it was like a discussion. On piano playing, there are many possible hand movements to play the same notes. Every pianists have different hand size, flexibility and shape and we don't play with the exact hand motions. We discussed different hand movements and then tried to figure out which one was better.

It was such a wonderful experience. Participating in a masterclass is quite boring for the audiences (if it is held in a hall). However, today's masterclass was definitely exhilarating. Though I was not satisfied with my playing, I still enjoyed the lesson very much. I was not nervous but I did feel insecure because I only practised the piece for about one week and then I had to play it in a masterclass. Professor Zohar worked on the piece with me in a very fine way and her suggestions were very helpful. She explained everything clearly whenever I asked her questions. No wonder she is so popular among students.