L. Ravi Narasimhan" <[log in to unmask]> wrote: >Ruggiero Ricci conducted a wonderful master class at Whittier >College........... While helping one student through the fiendish >Wieniawski Scherzo-Tarantelle, he told a story about how he'd rigged up >an induction motor to a phonograph so as to play Heifetz's recording of >that piece backwards. He then proceeded to play it backwards, in tempo >and without any apparent effort. I heard that about five years ago Ricci gave another masterclass, during which a student played the Paganini Caprice No. 5, and here he also proceeded to play this piece backwards as well. Have any of the performers on this list used "backwards-playing" as a technique for learning a piece? I'm sure it can be done, but I'm wondering if the result is worth the effort time-wise. I'm wondering if this just happens to be something that Ricci is good at, or something that most virtuosos (and accomplished experts) can probably do. hector aguilar