23 November 2015
A day of very little practicing. An ordinary Monday, true, but for attending MusicNow tonight. That meant that practicing was limited to a few minutes (I think three excerpts, it was a long time ago) in the morning before work, and once through each excerpt tonight, starting at about 9:30 pm.
That late start time meant working with a heavy mute on the entire time, and even with the mute, playing very quietly. There’s a family to be not-kept-up-late after all.
So not the best practice conditions. And I have learned from experience that I tend to take intonation very casually when playing really quietly like I was tonight. So it’s possible that I did myself more harm than good. Or maybe not. It is heartening that I could more or less play each excerpt without doing a dry run first. If I really thought I was doing myself harm, I guess I wouldn’t have done it.
But there’s no control group here, so we will never know with absolute surety.
About that third finger. Some years ago, after doing a week-long course with Dr. Mark Morton, I started using my third finger in place of the fourth finger from about the position of first finger on d on the G string and up. I do think that there are some advantages in terms of hand position. But I have never been diligent about making sure my intonation was up to snuff while doing that. Michael Hovnanian has called me on that a number of times. But this time I’m heeding his advice and I’m going back to a more Simandl-like use of the fourth finger. Habits die hard, but I think my intonation is better for it. When I’m paid to play, I’ll tackle the third finger again.
Time’s up! Off to bed … not that I’m going to get 10 hours, but better 8 than 7.
Tags: audition, Michael Hovnanian
I wonder if time spent on the blog contributes to improvement in performance technique?
In a way, yes it does. There are a few things I have written in the blog posts that remind me of techniques–or disciplines in practicing–that I need in my playing. Sometimes I’m thinking of the upcoming blog post while I’m practicing, and imagining my readers being proud of me for accomplishing something or other.
It’s a little like having an audience, and I’m usually pretty well motivated when I think there’s an audience.
Thanks for asking!
I am looking at it each day and imagine yesterday was a rough day? Or chose to practice and not blog? all of which is alright of course. Happy practicing
If you’re referring to audition daily blog #10, no, it happened … just very late!