In yesterday’s lesson we made it through the rest of the Seitz movement – challenges abound, and I’ll be working on it for a good while – there’s a section of double stops that’s my longest yet by far, and some chords at the end that are exceedingly tough to nail, including one that I’m supposed to do on three strings all at once.  The bowing and rhythm throughout are complicated.  And to my delight there’s one section of the piece that’s nice and airy – a slower section. I’ve been anticipating such an interlude for a while in my playing – though technical complexity is fun, so is playing something pretty and slow.  It brings its own challenges with tonalization and smooth bowing, but it’s delicious to play and will let me practice my vibrato.

Teacher also gave me a pass on my latest Wohlfahrt etude – today when I play I’ll be moving onto number four in the book.  The new one is in G Major too – I have no idea what it sounds like yet – so far they have tended to be melodic and pretty.  They’re all about patterns and getting the feel for the keys.  This new etude breaks the rhythmic pattern of the prior exercises – up until now I’ve been working with a series of 8 different bowings I can apply to any of them (to get through all 8 bowing patterns with the first exercise in the book took well over a year!). But this new one breaks the mold; the old bowing patterns can’t apply to it.  I see that the next one – number five – introduces several new bowing patterns and also a new rhythm, so it does not build on the rhythm of this new one at all – number four seems to stand alone as an interlude of sorts, just like the slower section of the concerto.

Thanks for reading.

Ryan