Etude Op. 25 no. 5 - Frederic Chopin

Hi there👋 I'm Noah Vazquez, a baker and collaborative pianist based in Cincinnati. I created the Program Notes Project for others to share their stories and help introduce classical music to more people. You can find my work on Medium @programnotes or follow the project @programnotesproject on Instagram.

Open Windows

There's something magical about summer music programs.

Of course, they present an opportunity to work with new teachers or add another masterclass performance to our all-important music resumes. They're a place to make connections or learn a new piece of chamber music we might not otherwise have encountered. But most importantly, for our young eyes and ears, these trips across the Atlantic present an opportunity to experience worlds entirely different from our own, the excitement of a new adventure bubbling away beneath their surface.

I look back fondly on one such program that took place in Piedmont, Italy. It was one of those small European towns that seemed to exist in a time before all the widespread globalization we've now grown so accustomed to, as its population embraced our group of annual American arrivals with open arms and scarcely a word of English. Tiny cafés on every corner, cobblestone alleys and slanting stairways outlining the region's arching hills, and not a trace of air conditioning far and wide.

These programs always start with such a buzz of excitement and activity. The first morning kicks off early with a brief orientation before everyone sets out, maps in hand, in search of the assigned practice rooms scattered across the city's schools and churches. The air was cool on these summer mornings, as we navigated quiet streets still shaded from the rising sun. A small, sloping stairway led us down to the town center, onto a piazza already filling up with market stands, and past customers sitting down to their morning cappuccinos and pastries.

I found my practice room on the top floor of a local elementary school just off the main square. Someone had already been by to unlock the classrooms and open the windows, and the morning breeze now guided us down the empty, unlit hallways. I opened the door of my assigned classroom to the image of billowing curtains and the memory of a jubilant last day of school: a chalkboard filled with the colors of summer, drawings lining the walls, fallen decorations and a forgotten jacket still hanging loosely over back of the tiny chairs.

At the front of the classroom stood a small upright piano. Unlike the grand pianos I had grown to expect in the small, soundproofed spaces of conservatory practice rooms, playing my first notes here sent an astonishing amount of sound reverberating around the classroom's high ceiling and echoing down the halls. As it dissipated, I could hear the sound of other young musicians sharing this experience through their own open windows: tentative scales and arpeggios of various warm-ups, the left hand part of a Beethoven sonata, an ornamented Chopin melody, all blurring together as the dormant school slowly came back to life with the sound of a different kind of learning.

Stepping out of the school to walk back for lunch revealed a landscape bathed in that hazy, sepia sort of sunlight that only shines at the height of summer. The town’s inhabitants had seemingly vanished at some point during the cacophony of our practice, leaving behind eerily deserted streets, blurring in the heat now rising off the bright pavement. Curious of the population's sudden disappearance, we learned from program faculty that this riposo was a normal occurrence as, much to our surprise, this small town completely shut down in the early afternoon hours of every day, as customers and business owners alike sought to escape the noontime mediterranean heat with an afternoon nap.

And oh, the heat. Returning to my practice room through the empty streets after lunch left me drenched and exhausted, the sun beating down relentlessly as I waded through air so heavy and warm if felt strenuous just to breathe. Finally heading back upstairs, the open windows now offered much-needed relief in this world of ancient buildings, the air somehow still cool in the empty stone hallways, despite the oppressive sunlight just outside.

And so began a routine that lasted two short weeks in this sleepy little town. It's a setting now shrouded in the haze of nostalgia, and it's those languid summer days I'm reminded of when I hear this short Chopin etude.

It tells the story of all the wrong notes we had no option but to play loudly for all to hear and of dissonances we couldn't prevent in those echoey old classrooms.

More importantly, it's a study of music so routine to us upstairs, yet so magical when heard drifting down from an open window.

We step into the shoes of a lucky passerby, gentle melodies carried to us on a breeze so delicate and warm as if out of a dream. It describes the soft hum of a quiet city coming alive with new music and fresh young faces during its hottest and drowsiest days. It's the warm, knowing smile of the shop owner as we rush awkwardly by again the next morning, maps and music totes still in hand, on our way to another day of practice and unwitting performance.

It's all the fleeting repose of an afternoon nap, and the shimmering, sunny magic of a summer we can never get back.