Play It Again Alan Rusbridger by Alan Rusbridger 9781250875402, 1250875404 instant download after payment.

The Guardian editor’s account of a remarkable musical challenge during an extraordinary year for news which witnessed the Arab Spring, the Japanese tsunami, the English riots, and the Guardian’s breaking of both WikiLeaks and the News of the World hacking scandal.

"An absorbing and technically detailed book… Rusbridger is a vivid writer who is able to make the physical experience of playing the piano…very gripping."  -  Nicholas Kenyon, Times Literary Supplement

As the editor of The Guardian, Alan Rusbridger’s life is dictated by the demands of the twenty-four-hour news cycle. It is not the kind of job that leaves time for hobbies. But in the summer of 2010, Rusbridger determined to learn, in the course of a year, Chopin’s Ballade No.1 in G minor, one of the most beautiful and challenging pieces of music ever composed. With passages that demand feats of memory, dexterity, and power, even concert pianists are intimidated by its pyrotechnical requirements.

In Play It Again, Rusbridger recounts trying to carve out twenty minutes a day to practice, find the right teacher, the right piano, the right fingering — even if it meant practising in a Libyan hotel in the midst of a revolution. He sought advice from legendary pianists, historians and neuroscientists, and even occasionally from secretaries of state. But was he able to conquer the piece?

"This wonderfully illuminating and entertaining chronicle shows Mr Rusbridger's incredible dedication and energy in pursuing the mastery of an iconic Chopin piano work. He is an amateur of the piano in the way that we all should be--he truly loves the music and the instrument. I am inspired by his example.”  -  Emanuel Ax

A book about distraction, absorption, discipline, and desire, Play It Again resonates far beyond the realm of music, for anyone with an instinct to “wall off a small part of... life for creative expression.”