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A pianist on stage realized she'd prepared the wrong piece. Then she pulled off a miracle.

The encouraging conductor helped turn her "worst nightmare" scenario into a viral, magnificent feat.

Photo credit: Canva

Imagine showing up on stage to play a piano concerto and finding out you have to play a different one in two minutes.

You know that nightmare where you show up to the final day of class and there's a huge test and you panic as you realize you've missed the whole semester and haven't studied at all? Or how about the one where you have to give a big presentation at work and you show up totally unprepared—no notes, no visuals, no speech—and you have to wing it?

For musicians, the equivalent is showing up on stage to perform without preparation or rehearsal, which is exactly what happened to Portuguese pianist Maria João Pires when she was on stage in front of an audience of 2,000 people in Amsterdam in 1999. As the orchestra started to play, she quickly realized she was in trouble—she had prepared the wrong concerto. As the musicians played the two-and-a-half-minute intro to Mozart's Piano Concerto No.20, Pires sat at the piano in terror. She had not practiced that piece and she didn't even have the sheet music for it.

She had, however, played that concerto before, and in an inspiring feat of musicality, muscle memory, and sheer human will—along with some encouraging words from conductor Riccardo Chailly—Pires got herself centered and locked in, playing the correct concerto in its entirety, miraculously without missing a note.

The full story actually feels even more daunting for those of us who can't sit down and pound out a piano concerto at will. It turned out that Pires wasn't even the original pianist who was slated to play at this concert. She was asked the day before to be a replacement for the pianist who couldn't perform, so she didn't have a lot of time to prepare anyway. However, she'd misheard the number of the Mozart piece over the phone and thought it was a piece she had played only a couple of weeks before. If that had been the case, she would have been fine, even with the short notice. But having the wrong concerto in mind and then not even having the sheet music for the correct one was an extra pile-on from an already high-pressure situation.

The fact that it was a general rehearsal and not the official performance wasn't much consolation, since it was an open rehearsal with a full audience. A rehearsal audience is likely more forgiving than an audience that paid top dollar for a concert, but it's still mortifying to have thousands of people expecting you to perform something you have not prepared for.

Thankfully, Pires had performed the concerto multiple times, most recently about 10 or 11 months prior, so she wasn't clueless. But perfectly recalling something you did nearly a year ago at that level and under that amount of pressure is absolutely incredible.

The conductor who encouraged her later talked about how impressive it was. "The miracle is that she has such a memory that she could, within a minute, switch to a new concerto without making one mistake," said Chailly. However, Pires insists that her memory is not exceptional at all and that she is "very, very average" among musicians.

- YouTubewww.youtube.com

But it wasn't the only time this happened to Pires. "I must say, this happened to me another two times in my life. In total, three times," she told ClassicFM's Joanna Gosling. "I hope it never happens again."

Pires already gets nervous about performing, despite being a world famous concert pianist.

"I normally feel very stressed on stage," Pires said. "It's not the stage, it's not the public, it's the responsibility. I feel insecure. And that's why I'm not a stage person somehow. There is one side of me that feels okay—I feel okay with the people. But being on stage and being responsible for something can give me some panic."

As Gosling points out, if you were just listening to the performance, you'd never know there'd been an issue. But the camera on her face tells an entire story during the orchestral opening as we see her grappling with the crisis she'd found herself in. Watching the moment she decided she had no choice but to just go for it, whatever happened, is remarkable. A true testament to the power of repetition and the resilience of the human spirit, and a reminder that musicians truly are magicians in so many ways.

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Joy

A poet wrote about meeting her younger self for coffee and launched cathartic viral trend

Women are creating healing "I met my younger self for coffee" poems as they reflect on how far they've come.

Photo credit: Canva

If you could meet your younger self for coffee, what would you say?

Life is complex and our feelings about our lives even moreso, which is why we humans so often turn to art as a means of processing it all. Poetry in particular has the power to distill complexity into a beautifully simple form, allowing us to succinctly express feelings that are difficult to describe. As Robert Frost wrote, "Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words," and a skilled poet can help us all find words for our own thoughts and emotions.

A poem by Jennae Cecelia from her upcoming book "Deep in My Feels" has kicked off a viral wave of poetic expression as women reflect on how they've grown and changed since they were younger. Cecelia's poem begins, "i met my younger self for coffee at 10:15," and goes on to describe a lovely, compassionate interaction with her younger self, all while contrasting that younger self with the woman she has become.

People loved the poem so much they used it as inspiration for their own "meeting my younger self for coffee" writing exercises, and the various iterations, at once so personal yet universal, have taken TikTok and Instagram by storm. Some are just written on blank backgrounds as images. Others are videos with the poem overlaid and music in the background.

But what they share in common is the sentiment of wanting to let our younger selves know it was going to be okay. That life is hard but there are good things coming around the corner. That whatever she's feeling or going through now will someday just be a memory.

Some poems have come from women who are still young but fully adult now, speaking to their teen selves.

@jasbethany_

I’d do anything to talk to my 15 year old self 🥲 #nostalgia #coffee #youngerself

Others come from moms in the thick of parenting, reassuring their younger selves that their dreams of having a family have come true, while others show that they took a different path than they planned and it turned out fine.

@katrice_taylor

🤎 #imetmyoungerselfforcoffee #momtok #momsoftiktok #blackmomsoftiktok

The trend is moving people to tears, offering hope to people who are still in those uncertain younger self years, when the possibilities of life seem endless and yet so much feels impossible. Many are finding solace in seeing people's before and after stories, as they serve as a reminder that life is malleable, that the future isn't set in stone, that people can endure and overcome.

@puffy817

Why did this trend heal a little bit in me while I wrote it IB: @Jennae Cecelia Poetry #coffeewithmyyoungerself #parati

Many resonate with the message that whatever struggles we're dealing with now we likely won't be in the future. And, of course, there will always be new struggles we're dealing with but with age and experience we hopefully learn about our own strength to endure. We also hopefully still have dreams to catch.

Cecelia says she is glad that her poem has inspired so many people to create their own versions of it, adding a rightful request to be credited for her work. She shares that the poem is part of a new collection of poetry that she describes as "a dream come true." Her previous poetry books have been self-published, but for this book she landed a deal with a publisher and is thrilled by the idea of having her book available in bookstores and not just online.

"This book is personal" Cecelia says. "It’s a reflection of love, loss, growth, and all the emotions we’re sometimes afraid to name. It’s a reminder that vulnerability isn’t just okay—it’s necessary. Inside, you’ll find poems that sit with you in life’s highs and lows, including the one about, 'meeting your younger self for coffee'—a favorite in the collection."

You can find "Deep in My Feels" for pre-order on Amazon and you can learn more about Cecelia and her work at jennaececelia.com.

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Joy

Dad recorded his baby’s sounds for a year, then used them to remake AC/DC’s ‘Thunderstruck’

You've been thunderstruck.

Representative photo credit: Canva

Ever seen a baby "sing" a rock song before they can talk?

Few things bring as much joy to a parent’s heart as the adorable sounds their babies make. But when a dad with a vision, a camera and a year's worth of footage uses those sounds to recreate one of the most iconic rock songs ever…let's just say joy alone doesn't quite cover it.

In one of the most epically adorable and adorably epic song renditions ever, dad and video editor Matt MacMillan spliced together tiny snippets of his baby's sounds to make AC/DC's "Thunderstruck." And it's one of those things you just have to see to believe.

Baby Ryan singing "Thunderstruck" is jaw-droppingly awesome

Nothing but awe and respect for a guy who takes a whole year to get just the right sounds at the right pitches and figures out to put them together to create this masterpiece:

- YouTubewww.youtube.com

Making a sneeze into a cymbal? Are you kidding me?

People have been understandably impressed, with the video getting over 6 million views.

"Ryan becomes the vocalist of AB/CD."

"I need a cover in 17 years whenever he is an adult singing over the instrumentals lol"

"'I recorded my son for a full year. I edited for the next 5'"

"The fact that he genuinely found clips that fit every note he need instead of just pitch shifting like most videos like this do really makes this stand out. Good job he’s adorable."

"This dude had a kid just so he could make this song. What a Legend."

"Other parents: 'I want my child to create masterpieces.' This guy: 'my child IS the masterpiece.'"

"I'm a residential plumber and I've had an absolutely horrible day on a work shift that's lasted 13 hours and even after crawling through human poop all day this made me smile laugh and giggle like a small baby."

Believe it or not, it's not autotuned or pitch-shifted. Those notes are all baby.

The question is: How did he do it? This isn't just some autotune trick. MacMillan really did it all manually, going through each video clip of Baby Ryan, organizing them by pitch and figuring out what notes they were.

Perhaps most impressively, he didn't even know the notes of "Thunderstruck" to begin with and doesn't really read music. He had to pluck the song out on the piano and then match those notes with his baby's sounds.

As he wrote, "It took forever." But he shared an inside look at how he did it here:

- YouTubewww.youtube.com

Seriously, doesn't seeing how he did it make it even more impressive? Pure human creativity and perseverance on display. What a delightful gift Ryan will have for the rest of his life. Much better than a standard baby book.

Baby Ryan's "Thunderstruck" was not MacMillan's first foray into baby covers, either. He previously created a rendition of "Carol of the Bells" using Baby Ella's sounds, and it is just as impressive (and adorable) as Baby Ryan's. Here's one to add to your holiday playlist:

- YouTubewww.youtube.com

Here's to the humans who wow us with their ambitious, innovative projects that exist purely to bring a smile to people's faces.

You can follow Matt MacMillan on YouTube.

This article originally appeared last year.

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