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LeadingTone: 2002 That final autumn, you’d given me Paganini’s Romanza, saying, learn this. I’d want it for auditions. It was the hardest piece I’d ever played, and, in time, I knew it better than you did. I remember evening light, heavy with the color of apples—I played the piece for all of your studio. The coda’s bass line twinged rubato,A minor descending to murmurs, then nothing.That moment, I hated you, couldn’t bear how still they were. I said, the B section’s wrong; did you hear my buzzes 36 among the low notes? It’s a guitar, a student replied, what do you expect? I couldn’t answer, couldn’t look at you.What should I have said, my mouth as it screwed up, and my gut playing ponticello, which means near the bridge: the rawest sound on stringed instruments. 37 ...

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