I totally agree that Mao finally did Rach's prelude in c sharp minor justice. Not sure if this is TT's choice or Mao's choice. But this is a very tough piece of music to skate to. This piece of music kind of has a tortured history. At Rachmaninoff's time, it was sooooo popular with audience that he was asked to play this piece in every concert, At one point Rachmaninoff hated the piece, and regreted that he composed the piece. TT may know about this aspect of the piece, why did she chose that for Mao??? The music is very unforgiving to skater, and difficult to intrpret, unlike Gershwin. It reminds me of Michelle's 2000-01 LP music song of the black swan. All season I was wondering why on earth did Lori choose such an almost unskateable piece for MK? But when Michelle finally conqueored the piece at worlds (and she had to put up with the airline losing her costume, and a broken heel on her skate), it made her win so much more special. Same for Mao here, ppl may say that she is not interpreting this to full potential, but I think she skated this as good as any skater can. I don't think even Michelle can interpret this piece better. I think TT intended to challenge Mao artistically just like Lori tried to challange MK with song of black swan. Mao lived up to this challenge, that does not mean her intepretation is the best or she intrepret the piece to full potential. But until some skater in the future who can do prelude to c sharp minor better justice and win a world gold, dare I say this piece is kinda Mao's signature piece, or at least prelude in c sharp minor is a memorablel milestone in her development as an artist .
Didn't know about the background story about prelude to c sharp minor. Thank you that was very interesting.