Play It Again An Amateur Against The Impossible

"An absorbing and technically detailed book… Rusbridger is a vivid writer who is able to make the physical experience of playing the piano…very gripping."

In this dazzling, dizzying memoir, one of the world's leading newspaper editors tells of learning to play Chopin's formidable Ballade in G Minor against a backdrop of phone hacking and Wikileaks espionage. The day-to-day counterpoint of piano practice and breaking news is a compositional feat in itself: you have the impression of a wide-awake, fearless mind. -- Alex Ross In his page-turning diary, Chopin has to make room for Julian Assange, Leveson and the hacking scandal. This charming, nimble, book argues that a life cannot be too rounded nor a day too full. Daily Telegraph Extraordinary... Simply looked at as a repository of information on how to perform Chopin, the book is invaluable... Much the most interesting aspect of the book, however is in the main intellectual investigation and defence of the amateur...prepare to be inspired. -- Igor Toronyi-Lalic Sunday Telegraph Play It Again is based on Rusbridger's diaries and in pianistic terms is a two-handed one, one part being an account of the travails of learning the Ballade, the other chronicling a feverish journalistic year... The point of the exercise was never to play like a professional but to relish being an amateur. In this sense his book is affirmatory... 4 stars -- Michael Prodger Mail on Sunday Play It Again turns out to be surprisingly pleasing, not only to the mind's ear but to the heart and even, at a pinch, to the soul...it is about determination - determination to do something fiendishly hard and almost entirely pointless, and having the courage to stare down failure every day... His obsession is both charming and infectious. -- Lucy Kellaway Financial Times