Comments

Karen,

Very interesting and honest blog.

You mentioned: “But I still wonder, at times, if I'm missing something. Other people hear things that I don't. I still don't understand why that is, or really, how to address it.”

It is often easier for the listener to hear things more then the player. That is one of the jobs of the teacher — to awaken and make your hearing far keener.

On the right track with open stings and double-stops when changing strings, you are obviously with a good teacher and she has every confidence that your ear will catch up. This does happen for all of us — fine-tuning begets fine-tuning. To help hearing the E-flat, and all flats, it helps to alternate with the natural directly below — D in this case.
Conversely use the natural above to help with sharps. Sharps lead up and flats lead down.

One other aside regarding the dots in Bach — to the best of my knowledge he never used them. It is up to the player to determine the bow stoke style. Tend toward lyric dance-like pulses in the suites and, if doing a Spiccato, use the Spiccato Lirico. It is more elegant being done more on the side of the hair. It alternates beautifully with the Détaché Porté and the Détaché Pulsé.

The dots are really just the editor saying that the notes should have some distinction. You may want to invest in a really good urtext edition and/or one with facsimiles of the original manuscript — they are actually in Bach’s wife’s handwriting.

Spiccato lirico/Lyric Spiccato – Consists of a brushed and broadened lengthening of the bow-hair contact with the string, tilting toward the fingerboard to the side of the hair, thereby achieved with greater horizontal action and less vertical height. (Lower in the bow.)

Détaché Porté – No initial accent due to a slight swell or sneaking into the note at the beginning of the stroke followed by a lightening and relaxing of the tone to the end of the stroke.

Détaché Pulsé/Pulsed Détaché – Begin the stroke with additional weight and speed of bow followed by a release, retaining fluidity of motion and never stopping the bow. In certain instances the bow may minimally leave the string at the end of the stroke – make sure the return landing is of utmost elegance and refinement appropriate to the passage.

I hope I am not intruding and glad that “Jaws” might have helped a bit:-)
Drew

I think that you have found a very good teacher for you. Even when you were nervous and in the Twilight Zone, she could talk you out of it. She showed you which of a few million details to focus on. Best of all, she praised you and let you know that she believes that you have the ability to make the necessary changes. Now you just need to relax and trust in her. Then you can accomplish great things. I love the blog, love the comment by Drew. It's nice to be able to put on the glasses of the student from time to time to see their perspective. I learn so much. Thank you! Listening skills get better with practice and experience. Just stay away from headphones! It is good to hear that you have a teacher that you like, and can work with. Please don't be too shy to speak up if your teacher tells you something that puts you in The Twilight Zone.

Speaking of, I am having a really hard time imagining what 31,000 neuroscientists
look like! That's a lot of IQ...

Also, since you refrained from blurting out "It was better at home!", I hope you managed to squeeze in a "Sorry" or two (insert smiley face here).

Oh how well I can relate to jumping from technical work mode to music mode and suffering for it during lessons. I have found that starting lessons with a simple scale in the key of the piece I'm about to play helps ALOT!

Sounds like you are going to have alot of fun in lessons. I look forward to comparing Bach Suites for viola notes with you!

Mendy

Very interesting blog. Keep us posted of your progress with the new teacher.
On a very practical standpoint, why don't you get a violin/viola double case so you can bring both instruments to your lesson? Karen,

I share a lot similar experience with you, especially during the first a few lessons. Especially with the issue of intonation, even though I constantly checked with open strings and double stops, there are always chances for me to miss one or two in a piece. And it’s so easy for us to doubt our hearing when we don’t hear what others hear. I guess using a mirror is necessary and tape recording might help as well, but some of the stuff is a bit like the blind spots that is just very hard to recognise without being pointed out by our teachers. And with care and diligence, we will get better at avoiding them later on.

I also share with you the feeling of not getting something said during the lessons immediately. I find telling the teacher immediately that I didn’t get it and trying a few different ways to verify really save a lot of time and trouble. I used to take written notes but not any more. Have you thought about video taping your lessons?

Finally, no warm up before lesson is a given in most cases for me. I’m getting used to this now. One trick might help is when you warm up at home, pretend you are doing this under the eyes of your teacher. I do this in general when I’m practice so I don’t surprise myself too much during lessons when things do not turn out well.

Hello Karen,
I, in turn, want to thank you for your wonderful retelling of the details of your lesson and of your emotional reactions. This is immensely valuable to me as a teacher, helping me to understand the student's perspective better.
I think you have found a wonderful teacher who not only knows how to play the violin, but is sensitive, imaginative, and deals with a broad range of technical and musical issues even in the first lesson.

Many of the issues you are talking about are long term, lifetime issues. Even intonation. Keep at it. Your hearing and your mental image of what great intonation sounds like, and what it feels like in your fingers, will continue to evolve.
Likewise your concept of phrasing and of Baroque style. It's great that you like to experiment. Keep it up. And keep listening to a lot of Bach and other composers who are stylistically close to him. You might get some valuable ideas about bowing style, for example, by listening (watching a video would be even better) to a great performance of Handel's Messiah. In fact that might even show you how very appropriate it is to use a lot of spiccato in music of the German Baroque. Also listen to recordings of the great keyboardists such as Wanda Landowska, Igor Kipnis, and Glenn Gould.

I'm not quite sure what your teacher means by "find the clarity" but I often ask my students to play a phrase over and over again to "find the tone." I am hoping that they will find the ideal mix of ingredients (bow speed, pressure, sounding point, width and speed of vibrato) to make that particular phrase come to life. This is exactly what I do in my own practice.

Thank you again for your generosity and trust in sharing your thoughts with us.

Roy