"The most memorable day in my musical life"

Last Friday our student from Vilnius University organ studio "Unda Maris", Arnoldas Leleika substituted me in the diploma ceremonies at the Vilnius University St. John's church. He had to play the opening march, student's anthem "Gaudeamus igitur" and the postlude at the end.

In the evening I asked him to answer briefly these 3 questions:

1. Why did you enjoy playing today?
2. What was the most challenging thing for you?
3. What would you like to learn in the future?

His answer is too inspiring of not to share (I'm translating from Lithuanian):

"It was the most memorable day in my musical life because I wielded myself, without any help, the largest mechanical organ in Lithuania. It's extremely exciting to discover for yourself the beauty of the stops and to hear the majestic organ sounds which could be enjoyed not only by myself but also by hundreds of people. This was one of the most important days in their lives - the graduation day."

"The most difficult thing for me was not to lose the place in musical text because I also needed to play pedals together with the keyboards and keep tracking the timing of when to stop playing. It seems like multitasking is possible after all!"

"In the future I would like to perfect my pedal playing - what kind of an organist would I be who can't play the pedals? Also after learning a certain program I would like to participate in the organist competition which would give me some new experiences for my playing technique. As they say, there isn't really boundaries for perfection and while seeking it a person discovers an inner joy..."

If you want, you can enjoy Arnoldas' playing in this video where he plays the fragment of Marche Pontificale by Charles Gounod (thanks to Mindaugas for doing the recording).

Let's congratulate Arnoldas and wish him a lot of creativity, persistence and bravery!