I was taught the second etude from Op. 10 in the most painstaking way by Olga Barbing, who prepared me for the Chopin competition. For this etude, she actually had me figure out, quite scientifically and very unspontaneously, the best fingering for my hand. There aren’t too many choices (laughs) but everybody wiggles – it’s a good word - a little differently. I’m lucky I have a big hand that’s flexible. So she had me prepare the melody, the 3-4-5 stuff, for the next week as a sort of flute-solo. I had to have the right fingering with no cheating, as well as the left-hand accompaniment. She didn’t want me to just play or practice that – she wanted a performance. That’s already very difficult. The assignment for the next week was to play that solo with the added thumb. The week after that was to play the solo along with the index finger. I can’t say that it ever got easy, but I know that a member of the jury in Warsaw told me, afterward, “We thought you were it from the beginning, but when you played the etudes…. No. 1 was fantastic, but No. 2, it seemed so easy for you,”. I can’t do that unless I practice for a month or so now (laughs). But this was one of Olga’s tactics: divide and conquer.
Garrick Ohlsson