Technique polishing day

February 28, 2010 at 12:38 AM

Today is a bowing day. It's also D major day so everything I'm playing is in the key of D. I decided I'd work on my riccochet and saltalto bowings. I'm using Paganini Concerto no.1 for the riccochet passages, which really gets you in the zone in that b minor section. Instead of doing the lazy violinist way of breaking those sixteenths up 4/6 at the second half of the section I'm playing 10 to a bow, which is really testing the limits of my ability, I can usually get about 16-20 in a bow if I try really hard but it starts to sound nasty. So The 10 is good, the other ones are fine, except I realized that I've done a bowing wrong the whole time. One set of the sixteenth notes I'm doing an upbow instead of down, but it sounds just as good. I'm doing them both ways anyways for the sake of completeness.

On a nice note. I got Dylana Jensons new Cd, I like what I'm hearing! I really love the Shostakovich! The Second movement of the Barber was impressive. Can you imagine I haven't played the Barber, and it's lower in technique than what I usually play. I'm trying to get in all the really technical pieces before I get too old and start to struggle with facility. I'll go back to those pieces though, because I need to, and I love them.

* Note to self: Work on Sulla Tastiera it's kind of messy. And keep practicing Lipinski at 80 for now and listen to the intonation check against other strings and don't forget to breathe! You always forget to breathe!

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