January 13, 2005 at 3:19 PM

On Practicing with a Tuner and an Alternative to "Twinkle, Twinkle"

Wow. Last night I practiced with the aid of my electronic tuner. At first I tuned my violin and just played some scales and such, listening to exactly how the exact notes sound on my violin, storing each sound for future reference. Then, I turned the tuner off and played through my homework enough that I at least knew what notes I was supposed to be playing. Then I listened to myself play, guessed at where I was flat and sharp, turned on the tuner and fixed the problem areas. It was great! By the end of the two hours I *knew* that I'd gotten more done (in terms of intonation anyway) in that time than I had in any 5-hour stretch in the past. Boy, was I tired, though! I read a little bit more of Mozart until I realized I wasn't paying attention anymore and then I went to sleep.

I think it was Paul who mentioned in passing on his blog that he is getting, ah, how shall we say, a little tired of "Twinkle, Twinkle". Myself, "Twinkle" was one of my favorite songs when I was a Tiny, and I was happy when someone told me that I could use the song to help me tune my violin approximately (this was in August, around the 1/2 month mark), but even before "Twinkle", my favorite 5th-interval song was the vocal part of something called "Rusty the Skatemaker" by Rasputina. I transcribed it myself after my second lesson and was very proud of having done it. It can use exactly the same notes as "Twinkle", although in a different order and in different duration. Mayhaps it's sort of advanced Twinkle... Anyway, I just thought I'd share that.

There was something else... Oh, yes, when I bought my violin the restorer polished it using God-knows-what which gave a fantastic glassy shine to the back and belly, but in the course of one of my "cuddle with the violin while listening to Paganini's Op.6" I seem to have made an impression on this stuff. At the present moment there seems to be a sort of T-shirt seam impression on one area. And ideas on how to get it smooth again? I'm a bit embarrassed to take it back to my restorer as I'm loathe to admit face-to-face that I cuddle with my violin.

Admittedly, I wonder if she displays the t-shirt mark like some women would a hicky. I guess that would make me dubiously proud of her willingness to proclaim that she's mine. Such a wonderful violin...

The other day my teacher was alternating between his present violin and a new possibility. Quite honestly, I couldn't tell which was better except that new one seemed to give out more "hey, look, someone's bowing!" raspy under-sound. Pardon me if I don't know the proper terminology for it. Anyway, his violins are always very pretty, but I have to agree with Mr. Mozart that it's awfully silly to judge a violin by the ornamentation that has *nothing* to do with the sound. The first thing I've always done to any instrument that Mr. Mata gives to me for "megnézni" is tap on it's belly. My appreciation of violin construction is wholly intuitive at this point (I don't know what's art, but I know what I like!), but the tapping can either give me warm fuzzies or a sense of having been deceived.

Returning to the tuner... I was wrong when I said that nothing exterior (save a mirror) could help me with my bowing. Nay, the tuner helps because I can "experiment" with L. Mozart's long, slow strokes and pay attention with both ear and eye as to how steady the tone really is during the stroke. The tuner catches what my untrained ear does not, so I'm learning to listen as well. This makes me so very happy!

Right, time to go home. I have such an obscene amount of work this semester. How did I get myself into this mess?

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January 13, 2005 at 3:19 PM

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