THE RUSSIANS FORCED SWANS TO DANCE

 
This is my second post on the subject of Russian collusions (and some of you are hoping it will be my last). Lighten up - my sole purpose is to charm and entertain.
BTW
If you're "into" Russian collusions, check out my previous post.

The very first "live" ballet I ever saw was Tchaikovsky's The Sleep Beauty at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. Rudolph Nureyev was the principal dancer, and he was at the zenith of his career. We had front row seats. 
I was nineteen years old at the time and was accompanied by my very close friend Linda (Linda and I are still close - a thousand years later).

This was the beginning of my ballet mania era. I signed up for ballet classes at college, but then quickly scrapped the idea. I not only had a bad back, I figured I was too old to dabble in dancing.
Besides, you have to be a narcissist to be a dancer...and narcissism isn't on my agenda.

Note:
Every dancer I've ever known vehemently denies that they are narcissistic. I vehemently disagree.

Let's fast forward to a year later.
I took my mother to an ABT performance of Swan Lake at the L.A. Music Center. It was a spectacular evening and I was completely enthralled.

Without ever seeing the music score of Swan Lake and without knowing much about the music, I sat down and quickly wrote a piano transcription of the final act.

It's a shoddy, choppy, haphazard rendition - but it's also very difficult, requiring substantial keyboard virtuosity.  I performed it several times at my college with great success.
And I used to play it everywhere else. In time, it became one of my concert "staples"...an encore favorite.

Nowadays, in grim retrospect, I'm not half as fond of it as I used to be. 
The particular recording that I've posted is old, with poor audio quality.

Anyway, so much for Russia and swans.

Note:
The latest update about Soundcloud is that they  intend to beat the odds and stay afloat.  They won't be shutting down as initially planned.