Hesitant/unsure about repertoire

[koreancucumber]

Hi, I'm new here (:

Next year is my senior year and I have to give a recital, so I want to put together a really good program that's also meaningful to me. Sadly, I have this weird hesitation to attempt certain pieces that I would love to play because I feel they may be too hard or my hands are too small (farthest I can reach is an octave).

I'm thinking about playing Liszt 'Les jeux d'eaux à la Villa d'Este' or Ravel Gaspard de la nuit, but I'm definitely skeptical of my ability to play the latter. I've played all of Ravel's other piano works which is why I want to "finish" in a sense by playing Gaspard de la nuit, because I love Ravel. Miroirs was really hard and honestly quite a painful reach for me at times. I've played a few pretty hard pieces with difficult reaches/stretches (i.e. Prokofiev Toccata, Schumann Carnaval, Jeux D'eau) but I feel like I might be setting myself up for failure if I try to learn these pieces if my technique isn't developed enough.

Any thoughts would be appreciated!

[anacrusis]

Hello and welcome! Gaspard de la nuit is hard but you don't need to be superhuman to play it. I'd be more concerned for the health of your hands if Miroirs was painful to play, though. You may have to work on developing a more supple and relaxed technique if that is the case, as I know my girlfriend plays Miroirs with her small hands (she can barely reach a 9th) without pain.

For my recital I would choose music that I love and feel passionate about practising and presenting. But I'd also want to be sure that I feel confident in playing the pieces technically. My worst performance experiences have all involved having to present music to an audience that I have not felt on top of You can always learn Gaspard later. But why not start working on Gaspard a bit, see if it looks like something you can pull off, and then decide?