Discovering Secrets

I learned 4 very important things in the last 2 days of cello playing

1. I needed to "let go" of the bow & stop using so much downward pressure/trying to force the bow & use my upper arm muscles to increase the bow speed instead. I had had this pointed out to me before & had lessened the pressure from what it was then, but I didn't really understand it until now.
2. Which leades me to my next point - Cello is a physical task & no matter how important the mental side of things is, the body has to learn & feel how things should be. The cello and bow are really just extensions of your body while you're playing them.
3. Which leads me to my next point - "practice makes permanent". Countless repetition (until consistent perfection) is the essence of what it means to prepare something on cello. Learning cello is like any other creative process - it's a tension & release cycle & in order to get the most out of it, one must put in as much effort/analysis/repetition as possible & then let go & take a break and then come back to it & repeat the process
4. Which leads me to my next point - Every single motion is linked to and is a preparation for the following motion. I learned this from watching Julia Lichten play at Purchase tonight. There literally is no excess in her playing, every single motion was connected to the next one with such meticulous detail. Instead of hindering or subtracting from the music, this in fact added to it substantially. It's this level of preparation that allows someone to actually express themselves/the music's intent fully.

Ultimately, this all could be boiled down to this: "Your cello practice is a temple. What you put into it is what you get out of it."

It's all about how many hours you put in all the time & how much more you ask of yourself in your focus & persistence. I finally feel like I'm beginning to grow into being a real player, as a result of these realizations & all my recent experiences. The Journey is just beginning.

A lot of these realizations came as the indirect result of the interviews I was reading with Howard Shore & Douglas Adams - for any who discover this post: It is so important to have interests outside of your main discipline. There is so much to learn & so much that can be applied to cello...

Thoughts & Observations

So practice lately has been incredibly productive (though I still need to do more) ... I've been working a lot on faster tempos (140 & up) doing chord patterns in the LH w/ different rhythms in the RH. I've also been working on the pentatonic scale, and mapping that out, b/c I'm trying to work on figuring out rock/metal tunes, and knowing the scale will help immensely, since most of it is blues based.

On top of that, I've discovered some physical/kinesthetic things about playing:

Breathing! More Important than anything (well this isn't exactly a new discovery, but I'm progressing w/ it more & more)
Maintaining a C shape with both hands at (almost) all times ... This came into play first w/ the LH from practicing scales & really gripping the string w/ my fingerpads for once (in part from playing on fingertips) ... I noticed that the C shape is just there ... it's the natural progression for it (which I've of course had pointed out to me before) ... I also used to have that/my LH is starting to look feel like it once did, in terms of callouses/relaxedness. Then, w/ my RH, I was trying to work on bowing in the middle of the bow, because I realized that it's a tremendous weak point of mine, and that I always practice bowing at the frog. From there, I started to actually really feel my 3rd and fourth fingers and their connection to the bow and it occurred to me that by maintaining what I'm now calling a C shape, that the bowing was much more fluid & free and could come from the elbow - instead of me arguing w/ my hand. It's nice to be getting to this point...

In general, I need to practice with more intensity (in my sound) & focus at all times, and also with a greater level of precision (I'm just finally starting to get to a point where I'm really focusing on eliminating extraneous noise & being extremely precise w/ articulation & timing & then eventually w/ tonal qualities)

So in general, I need to practice more ... I practiced some quartet stuff & jammed w/ a few people earlier ... it was embarassing how poorly I was playing ... so time to step things up ... I'm making my students keep practice logs, and I'm going to start doing the same, so I can really get on top of myself w/ this...

Parallels

alright... so now that I haven't practiced in about a week and a half, I'm back into the swing of things!

First thing I've noticed: I'm less out of shape than I expected, which means that routine I was working on is gold, because that's about the only thing I've worked on in the last few weeks & it's kept me where I am ... which has led me to a revelation that my technique is sorely lacking in the fundamentals and that this is holding me back tremendously...

but anyway, I called the post parallels, and there's 2 reasons for this:

1. Technique first, expression afterwards - I came across this in Emily Wright's blog (Stark Raving Cello):

They are both adult beginners, and have trusted me with my policy of Technique First, Sound Second. Of course, a week into this new bow grip, their sound caught up with them, and is more radiant and polished than it ever was before. Just like mine was when Ron Leonard unceremoniously dumped my bow grip and gave me a new one...on our first lesson. It took me about 2 months to regain my sound, but he is directly responsible for my current approach, and my faith in technique uber alles.

I then came across the exact same sentiment/idea in the essays here (a must read for anyone in volved the arts by the way, amateur or pro...): http://www.artrenewal.org/articles/2003/Best_of_ARC/best1.asp?forumID=18

2. In an interview w/ JK Rowling (which I can't link to because mugglenet is down due to the release of the movie today), she mentions that when she writes she doesn't share it with anybody until it's finished because the energy dissipates, then I come across this interview with Jordan Rudess (http://www.tokafi.com/15questions/interview-with-jordan-rudess/view), where he says the following:

It is very important to be very involved personally. It is also very hard, I think, for many people these days to balance business and family and art. You know, it's the challenge of modern life. For me, it's hard, especially with email and all that, it's really tempting and interesting to go and look and see what the communications are - you can kind of get a lot of things going and a lot of relationships, and I enjoy that. For instance, what happens with me, when I was creating this solo album that has yet to come out, it's called "The Road Home", and I guess we'll talk about that a little later, you know I have to stop the world a bit.

Anyway, I think those are both amazing points & one of the things I've been doing lately, that parallels with this, is spending less time on the computer ... it's a great tool, but it takes up so much of my energy at the same time...


Now, back to the music stuff.... A few insights I gained while practicing today:

1. Intonation: When doing 5th double stops, always secure the root & then the 5th will follow
2. Bowing: Initiate the bow stroke w/ the middle 2 fingers - this seems to reduce gripping with the thumb
3. LH: Move as a unit. All motions come from the back
4. Slow is the foundation for good technique
5. Thumb Position: If you can play a good note with your thumb down, you can play a good harmonic. Not the other way around (In doing scales, I was leaving the thumb up whenever I got to the harmonic A on the A string... I feel like doing so is essentially handicapping myself)

I think I might make a small modification or two to the daily routine, but otherwise, I'm pretty set with it & working on actually getting through all of it cleanly. Also, I'm implementing it on keyboard... man is my keyboard technique a mess!!

Now, keeping in line with the 2nd principle up there, I'm gonna get off the internet now...

Systemizing the Scale

First, an interesting thread on scales, started by Weils Cunningham (the guy who has a video of the 24th caprice on cello on youtube!)

http://p078.ezboard.com/I-need-your-help/fcellofuncellochat.showMessage?topicID=17263.topic

He mentions something called the Galamian acceleration patterns... never heard of those before, but I'm going to check them out...

-----------

Alright, so I'm still in the process of trying to come up with some sort of routine & after playing for David Krieger a few days ago, I realized I really need to re-evaluate a lot of my technique & exercises (Also, I think I'm gonna ask my teacher to dedicate half our lesson to technique and the other half to rep. when I get back to school... I've got quite a few things to talka bout with him...)

But anyway, here's what I'm coming up with so far:

Using a metronome, progressing by intervals of 10 bpm, going from 60-200, all seperate bows & counting out-loud

1. Barred Whole Note Scale (5ths)
2. Quarter Note Scale
3. 8th Note Scale
4. 16th Note Scale
5. Quarter Note Arpeggios
6. 8th Note Arpeggios
7. 16th Note Arpeggios

This is giving me quite a bit to work with, and I'm thinking I might add in one string double stops to the mix or else find a way to add in the modes (that is, starting and stopping on each degree).

I find counting out-loud can be challenging, but I think it's completely necessary and I've already made a lot of progress from it. It increases my concentration and ability to multi-task & eventually the rhythm becomes like a pattern. I also find it's best to move with the hand as a unit & to lead with the bow (I know a lot of people say lead with the left hand, but I think the left hand is more the preparation, where as the right hand is the leader ... I think I got the idea from the ICS interview with Victor Sazer a while back...)