I waited for what seemed to be ages for the adjudicator to call on me, the bright stage lights were beaming down on all four of us making us squint. The beads of sweat were starting to gather around on my forehead. I could not calm myself, the butterflies in my tummy were only multiplying.

I kept telling myself in only a couple of minutes this would all be over, I’ve worked so hard for this; after playing the piano dozens of hours every week, whether it was performing, practicing or lessons I was always working and now here I am. I’ve been playing this particular piece for over a year now and I could not be better prepared. I told myself this is it, this is all that I’ve worked for and now it’s time to show them what I can do.

The silence in the room was heavy, and was only broken by the scratching of the adjudicator’s pen, I noticed that she writes a lot, she must have a lot of remarks on the performances. I was not sure if that was a good thing.

The clearing of someone’s throat tore me out of my thoughts, I heard my name being called in a loud distinguished voice, my heart felt as if it would beat right out of my chest. The chair creaked as I stood up, I tried to swallow but my mouth was dry and tasted metallic, as I walked up to the stage I could feel the hundreds of pairs of eyes following my every move.

When I sat down on the cushioned bench I could smell the old leathery seat beneath me, I wiped my clammy palms on my dress and I closed my eyes and took a deep breath in through my nose and out of my mouth just like Madame Holman had taught me and I swept the back of my hand across my forehead one last time to rid myself of any perspiration.

I carefully placed my hands onto the keys, they felt heavy and cold like wet ice cubes. I opened my eyes and I glanced down at my fingers to see that they were shaking. I could hear some whispers coming from the crowd ‘’here I go’’ I thought and I began to play.

I flew through the first few bars quickly and had no problem getting absorbed in the music, the keys seemed to twinkle under my fingertips as if it wasn’t even me playing the piano, the notes were flowing in a beautiful rhythm pattern played perfectly. I was soon coming up to the 52nd measure and I knew this was the most difficult part of the whole excerpt, I licked my lips and prepared my fingers for the C# minor harmonic arpeggio in the left hand, I was shaking again and as my fingers crossed the notes they seemed to play the chord with such ease that I, myself was impressed. I then knew I aced the performance even before I finished playing. As I ended the piece in a confident tone, I felt as if the weight of the world was relieved off of my shoulders and I could not help but smile. I knew that I had played well, I could not have played any better. The applause was loud and as I turned my head I stole a sneak peek at my mom who was giving me two thumbs up, I stood up to take a bow but as I got up my legs seemed to buckle under me and a pitch black haze swept across my eyes, I knew what was coming next as I fell to the ground and felt a giant smack to the front of my head on the cold hard stage.