Twenty Seven

I worked on the 3rd movement of Barber today. I practiced in lots of rhythms and worked some more on memory. My goal is to have it memorized before Spring Break starts next week.

I worked on the 4th movement of Brahms

Twenty Eight

My senior recital is twenty eight days away! It is definitely crunch time! Well, sort of. Here's the repertoire I will perform (get ready!):

Ciaccona from Partita No. 2 in d minor, BWV 1004 by Johann Sebastian Bach

Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 3 in d minor, Op. 108 by Johannes Brahms

Violin Concerto, Op. 14 by Samuel Barber

That's right, Bach, Brahms, and Barber-I actually did think of the alliteration when selecting rep. :) So from here on out, I'm going to try my hardest to write about what I do in the practice room each day until the big day!

Today I began with the 3rd movement of Brahms. Usually I don't practice it slowly, and I just run it through with Aaron. But today I practiced it slowly, and certain sections with running sixteenth notes I practiced in rhythms. I took time to figure out the chords in the sections where Aaron and I have alternating down beats. After about 20 minutes on the 3rd movement I went to the 4th. I am still learning the fingerings in this movement so I'm still practicing it pretty slowly. Then I went to the 2nd movement and ran through it. I need to think more about relaxing my left hand and planning out my shifts so it is more in-tune on the G string.

I have performed the Bach ciaccona 3 times as of now. The 1st time was in studio class in front of 3 students and Dr. Harvey Thurmer. During this performance it was obvious that I was simply trying to remember the notes. I did just that, and now I must concentrate on conveying the larger picture of the piece and what I want the audience to hear and feel when I play it. The 2nd time I performed it was for the Undergraduate Artist Competition. I thought this performance, though incomplete because of time limits, was quite successful. It was very musical and I was able to begin to think about the audience. Performing in Souers was a different acoustic environment than the studio classroom so I will have to play there more to get used to that. The 3rd performance was again Souers, but in front of my studio class again. During this performance, I couldn't seem to turn off my internal evaluator, and it physically showed, on my face and in my hesitating fingers. From this I gathered that I should think about the notes that are happening in the moment, and not on notes that have passed or notes that are yet to come.

Today when I practiced the Bach I was merely trying to get a more consistent tempo for the entire piece. I set a metronome to 45 and tried to play the entire piece at that speed. It was challenging and I realized that my tempos are often inconsistent. I will have to think about this more and decide which sections I intentionally want to push the tempo.

The 1st and 2nd movements are going well. I have performed the 1st several times and now should start performing the 2nd. I have memorized almost half of the 3rd movement but really have to get the rest learned as soon as possible! I think I'll go work on that now...