Back at it again!

It's been a few weeks but I am officially out of 'I hate cello week'. I guess it wasn't a week...it was almost a month.

I've had some good lessons during this time though. Here's some notes on the breakthroughs:

1) I picked up Popper #2 again a few weeks ago to see if I made any progress since working on it 2 years ago. Not a hard piece but the etude has long bows. During the lesson, D noticed that I was pushing and pulling throughout the entire draw of the bow creating excess junk in the sound. He told me that once the bow is drawn, I need to let go and not keep drawing throughout the phrase. The action is at the beginning of the down bow or up bow but after I start the initial draw..I need to let the bow move without forcing it. This worked wonders for me! (I'm not sure that I'm explaining it very well)

2) Still working on Bach 3 Prelude and had a major breakthrough here too. This month...I focused on not clunking down on the string when I changed bows..to get as even of a legato sound as I could. At the last lesson, I played the whole thing for him and he said that I was torqued the entire time I was playing it. I needed to find places to release tension. I am still having bow issues and working too hard at it. D had me pick out certain spots in various phrases where there was an increase of tension with the bow and then we picked out where I would release that tension in the phrase. This increase/decrease in tension sets up my phrase. He used the visualization of a top spinning. I would draw the bow (similar to pulling a string to get a top spinning) and once the bow moved, let it spin on its own (decrease of tension) for the rest of the phrase. I tried it with a few phrases and the change was astonishing. It's funny how visualizing something like this can help. Not only was my tone better, I felt so FREE. I haven't been able to get that feeling back this week in practice but I feel like I'm really close. I understand it much better now. I see how the breathing plays into it. The breath in is really the increase in tension and the breath out is the release of that tension.

Geez...I hope one day I don't have to think about it so much. The visualization helped a lot! I asked D if he had think about it like this all this time. He said he used to but he doesn't have to anymore..it's second nature now. So..there's hope for me yet! I hope some of this is helping somebody else out there. I felt so good when I nailed it in the lesson that I threw my arms up in the air and exclaimed, "Yay!!!!"

Down on practice

The last few weeks have been low on practice for me. Teacher says that if you practice through those times when you don't feel like practicing, those are usually the times when you will grow the most musically.

Ok...I'm ready for that growth now...and for me to want to practice again.

Last week

Had my lesson this past weekend. I told D that I was having an "I hate cello" week. He said he doesn't ever have those. I corrected myself and said that I was having an "I hate ME on the cello" week. I think this bug must be going around - I seem to remember reading a few "down in the dumps" posts last week. To those who had that kind of week - you'll be happy to hear that my teacher (cello player extraordinaire) said that he has had plenty of those weeks. Nice to know that it happens to accomplished cellists as well.

I'm still kind of in it actually. Rising pollen level is making me sick and allergy pills make me a bit nauseous. I opened up an old etude, Popper #2, to procrastinate on practice. I discovered that this is not a good piece to play when you are feeling nauseous.

I hope "I hate me on the cello" week ends soon. I really need to get the Bach Prelude ready for public consumption. Right now..it is not even ready for self consumption.

Happy Friday

Another performance

In an effort to not fall into a lull after spending months preparing the Haydn for a master class, I volunteered to play solo for a church service sometime in April or May. The people were really laid back and let me decide what I wanted to play. So I reached into my bag of "pieces I've been working on forever but still haven't gotten right" and decided on the Prelude to the Bach Cello Suite 3.

I remember when I first started it over 2 years ago. Learning the notes to the piece was never hard for me...in fact, I think I had it memorized within a month. The hard part for me was getting through the piece without pain. Yes, pain was what I had to overcome and here's some things I did to get the pain out of my playing.

First, my bow grip was seriously flawed. I was gripping the life out of the bow with my thumb. To keep the bow even and balanced while doing this, I had to engage my pinky to help keep the bow balanced. These two things made my right hand really sore halfway through the piece. Until recently, the bow has never been comfortable in my hand. One etude that has really helped with this is Popper etude #1. It's really a wrist etude but you can't really pull it off without having a good bow hold. My bow grip is not perfect but it's come a long way in the past two years. The proof? No more hand pain! So..if you're struggling with getting a comfortable bow grip, Popper #1 helped me a lot.

My body was tense. I was using muscles that really shouldn't be used when playing. Like - the jaw muscle? I clenched my jaw and my shoulders were tense while I played so I had to use other muscles to force the sound out. No wonder I was tired halfway through the Prelude! I realized that playing with tension is something a lot of cellists struggle with. I've had many teachers in the past but my current teacher is the only person to make this my primary focus when playing. This is such an important part of cello playing that I'm baffled that it took 6 years before someone mentioned tension to me. This is not to say that I now play with no tension. Unfortunately, 2 years of correction doesn't quite purge out 6 years of playing with tension but I'm much more aware of it now and can try to stop it when it happens. I've come a long way with it. The proof? I can play through the Prelude many times in practice with no pain. Feels nice!

Of course...being able to get through the entire piece without pain is only a baby step forward. The things I now have to overcome are much more elusive...phrasing, evenness and giving each note the full value of importance. Oh...the Bach Cello Suites...it's such a mountain to climb! You know a piece of music is complex when you can work on it for a few years and still be engaged.

Happy happy happy

I'm so insanely happy today. I feel so grateful for so many things. Since this is a cello blog - I'd like to give a shout out to my cello. How lucky am I to have found something that can instantly shut out the noise of emails, text messages, TV, internet, Facebook, blogs, news, etc.

A few hours on the cello makes my world peaceful again.

It's beautiful but I can't enjoy it

I've been working on the Prelude to the Bach Suite 3 on and off for a couple of years now. The Bach suites are so beautiful but when I start to really work on them...the beauty of the pieces become secondary. What I mean by that is that while I am playing it, I am so focused on playing it beautifully that my enjoyment of the piece gets put on the shelf.

I used to dream about the day when I can really play something beautiful and how great that would feel to create such beautiful music. I guess I envisioned an emotional enjoyment very much like being a listener in the audience but that it would be even better because I would be the one creating that beauty. As I think about this further...it isn't like that at all. My teacher has talked a lot about not becoming emotionally tied to the music...that the enjoyment of the music belongs to the audience. As a player, you have to be somewhat detached from the piece so that you can deliver it with the correct intention.

As a listener, I used to enjoy the major change in the color halfway through the prelude of the 3rd suite. As a player, that same enjoyment isn't there anymore. I told D during the last lesson..."...this part this soooo beautiful but I can't enjoy it because I'm too focused on trying to keep it all even. Arghhh!" He said...."It'll be a few years before you enjoy that section..."

What I've realized is that my consumption of the music I play is different than being a listener...It isn't satisfying in the way I thought it would be. The enjoyment has shifted to an enjoyment that comes from being able to play the way I want it to sound....rather than enjoying the music produced by me. Maybe it'll change as I get better but it's so much less romantic this way!