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Well, that worked.
Oct. 9th, 2014 22:16I'm starting to think there might be something to this "with age comes wisdom" stuff. When I started teaching myself cello, I focused on the bare basics: learning to bow properly and learning fingering in first position. From experience, I figured that once I advanced beyond a certain point, the rest would fall into place.
Beyond warm-up exercises, I tend to practice on Bach sonatas and stuff like the Brandenburg Concertos. Bach wasn't writing for beginners, so (while most of his sonatas are in a reasonable range) he made melodic lines which require alternate fingering and, occasionally, notes up in 4th position. I'd attempt those, clumsily, and get on with practice. Notes are notes, and the more of them I play, the better I get.
Tonight I realized that a position shift (1st to 2nd) that had been seriously tripping me up a year ago sorta just happened. Not smoothly, not flawlessly, but pretty naturally as I went along. And I'm able to do phrasing with the bow, rather than just sawing away, even though I wasn't focusing on that skill. So I guess experience told me the truth, and I really didn't have to worry about working directly on the more advanced stuff... it just falls into place when you reach the right point.
Beyond warm-up exercises, I tend to practice on Bach sonatas and stuff like the Brandenburg Concertos. Bach wasn't writing for beginners, so (while most of his sonatas are in a reasonable range) he made melodic lines which require alternate fingering and, occasionally, notes up in 4th position. I'd attempt those, clumsily, and get on with practice. Notes are notes, and the more of them I play, the better I get.
Tonight I realized that a position shift (1st to 2nd) that had been seriously tripping me up a year ago sorta just happened. Not smoothly, not flawlessly, but pretty naturally as I went along. And I'm able to do phrasing with the bow, rather than just sawing away, even though I wasn't focusing on that skill. So I guess experience told me the truth, and I really didn't have to worry about working directly on the more advanced stuff... it just falls into place when you reach the right point.
