Aaron Petit Piano

Hey all! It's been forever. I wanted to share a little bit about the last year of my development.

Since my last entry, I competed in my first international competition for adults Ages 19-32. (The Virginia Waring) That was a great experience and pushed me to my absolutely limits practicing 6 hours a day for half a year to prepare 2 hours of repertoire. I made it to the semi final 9 people and felt great about my playing in both recitals. Since then, I took about 6 months off of performing to increase my repertoire. (Learned 3 concertos and a bunch of new solo rep.)

Last Summer, I had the honor of being a counselor at the 2017 Young Musicians and Artists camp in Salem, Oregon. I taught 2 lessons and lead a master class every day for the 11 students who all demonstrated enthusiasm and great progress throughout the duration of camp. I also got to oversee a group of 8 guys in different instrument groups and help them along with camp events/ issues etc. I learned a lot about my self through helping others, both musically and personally. Words can't express how awesome these 2 weeks were for me and I am very delighted to be returning this year for an additional summer of fun. 

In August, I began my freshman year at the University of Miami, Frost School of Music as a pupil of the legendary Santiago Rodriguez who has proved to be an excellent mentor, friend, and support to me ever since. The first semester at school threw me curve balls I never would have expected and radically changed my life/ out look for the better. It was a time of figuring things out and bringing definition to unclear areas.

I also realized that I had a passion for film scoring that I was never very attentive to. The ball got rolling last December when I took Hans Zimmer's online Master class about movie music. I had enough transfer credits and placed out of many 1st and 2nd year classes here at the U which has made it possible for me to add "composition for film and media" as a double major to my piano performance degree. I am very excited about where this new career path will take me. I am already working on my first score for a feature length film set to release in 2021 (Not a major hollywood picture or anything, but it is an exciting first step.)

This January, an old friend of mine (John Fawcett) and I teamed up to play Beethoven's Kreutzer sonata in Portland. This was one of the hardest projects I have ever done but it was so rewarding. We over sold the building and had to cram people into the hallways and break the fire code! Haha. The performances from the Virginia Waring and the Beethoven are available on this site and on YouTube if you are interested in checking them out. 

Also, I am beginning to enter piano competitions again after almost a year hiatus. I have 3 planned for this year alone! I won't reveal which ones yet but stay tuned. There are some big plans ahead! 

That is all for now. Thanks for reading and I look forward to staying on this blog more often in the future. 

Aaron

P.S. I became absolutely obsessed with Michael Jackson this fall and he is becoming a huge influence on me in many ways. More on that later.