Category Lesson Notes
From Bach to The Boy Paganini
In this past week’s lesson, as we have for months, Teacher and I played the Bach Concerto for Two Violins, the final piece in Suzuki Book Four, together. Happily, I did better than ever, despite having a rather lackluster practice record the week before. When we finished, she said, “I know you’ll keep working on […]
Tall fingers. Vibrato.
In our lesson yesterday we worked on left hand positioning – it’s a common point of focus, but I worked specifically on keeping my fingers better facing the violin, which allows me to keep them tall. An ever-so-slight rotation of the forearm/wrist from my habitual position seems to be in order. Once my hand is […]
Equipment Testing
On Tuesday, Teacher brought a new violin to my lesson – a loaner she is trying out as she decides on a new one to buy. She wants a violin she feels comfortable trotting around with to bars, where she plays with others sometimes – she’s into Irish fiddling. She told me she’s trying out […]
The Last Note
Book Four is a long haul. In yesterday’s lesson, after we played through the final notes of the final bars of the final piece, Teacher rejoiced jubilantly – a slightly unexpected celebration for me, “You made it!” She wrote the date in the book in the margins next to the last measure. Sloughing through all […]
Bach, for Reals
As the pieces In the Suzuki Repertoire get longer and more complex, they take longer to work through. My most recent piece, Karl Bohm’s Perpetual Motion from Little Suite No. 6, was an exception. All the pieces that preceded it in Book Four took longer. Still, I began the Perpetual Motion at the beginning of […]
Breaking 100
Perpetual Motions are all about speed. My current Perpetual Motion, the second piece with this title that I’ve played, is the second to last piece in Suzuki Book 4. The first was in Book 1, a very basic piece that I haven’t gone back to in a while. My focus of the moment is bringing […]
Perpetual Motion
On Tuesday, Teacher and I worked through the rest of my newest song, Perpetual Motion. This timeline for getting through a new piece is the shortest I’ve managed in a long time, and certainly the quickest in all of Book Four. That’s not to say the piece is without complexity – it includes fourth position, […]
Progress Report
Vivaldi isn’t going anywhere, and I continue to play both the first and the third movement of the A Minor Concerto daily, but I’m now three weeks in to learning a new piece. Teacher started me on Karl Bohm’s Perpetual Motion prior to her heading out of town for a couple of weeks, then in […]
Another Week, Another Lesson
Teacher brought back the bow tool for yesterday’s lesson – as I did last week, I worked with it for about half the time, then we removed it and tried to maintain the improvements to my hold. I noticed after using it during last week’s lesson that I did maintain more of a focus on […]
Ryan Libel 