I was really super mad about that... seriously...my accident prone tech self at it again!! Ack, if it wasn't for the laptops, PCs, iphone, ipad, etc.I have, I'd be a complete luddite!! Although my husband already calls me one since I seem to break just about everything I can get my hands on (not on purpose though).
So here's what I could recall from my deleted draft....only about half of what was originally there. *sigh*
____________________________________________________
Worked on D Major scale for most of the lesson, which was fine because this is what I was working on for the past week.
1) First Finger
- I trained my first finger well! Even when my other fingers were off, my first finger always seemed to get to the right spot. Adam thought it was "interesting" because normally if the other fingers are off, the other fingers will drift off too.
2) Fourth Finger - My Weak Pinky
- I have a bad habit of squeezing my hand when I use my pinky because I always feel like my pinky will collapse since it feels weaker compared to the other fingers.
- So my teacher asked me to collapse my pinky and guess what? It wasn't so bad! Surprisingly, it didn't completely ruin my hand, it did feel less stable once it collapsed but I was able to correct it easily and it wasn't the end of the world. Plus, I can just learn to correct it more easily when it does collapse and eventually get to the correct hand position. Now I just have to train myself to relax when I feel like I want to squeeze.
- He also said that what I see and feel is most often not what the audience sees and that it may look worse to me since I'm sitting behind my cello. He said it didn't look so bad to him even when my hand did collapse.
- How to get a stronger pinky immediately
- When using my pinky, I need to use my third finger. I seem to recall that he said this during my second lesson which I had completely forgotten about! I'll have to train my third finger to drop when my pinky goes down too.
3) Third Finger - Helpful Little Bugger!
- Use this finger to help out the pinky and make it stronger. Apparently in vibrato this helpful ring finger helps out too - can't wait to start doing vibrato!
- Use the third finger to align the other fingers! If I can make a nice tunnel with the third finger, than the other fingers should fall more naturally into place.
- On another Lindy Hop crossover to learning cello - when I learned partner connection I pay attention to the ringer finger because it creates a stronger "hold" or "hook" than any of the other fingers.
- A dancer had mentioned that there's a muscle that runs down the third finger down the forearm (I don't remember what muscle it is), which makes it quite a bit more stronger and efficient than the other fingers.
- Adam also told a quick story about a pianist who tried to make his fingers independent from one another and ended up not being able to play any more. I think he strained his finger muscles or something so they wouldn't work properly any more.
- Moral of the story: use my other fingers if they're available, they're there to help!
- Quick article: If I bend my pinky, why does my ring finger move?
4) Need more volume!
- I'm still having issues with my volume - I'm still way too quiet! I have a feeling that I will be working on this for a while...this is just not clicking for me.
- I think its got to be related to my tenseness issue - same as I used to have with my dancing: if I'm not 100% relaxed than I'm unable to make my body "sink" into my triple steps or whatever move I'm doing.
- I think this lack of being relaxed has to do with my elbow, arm or something, i.e. dropping my elbow and "sinking" my weight into the strings - I'll have to experiment with this.
5) Violinist story
- Another story - I think he was on a roll of telling stories or something! :). There was a cellist that was in an orchestra for a famous violinist.The violinist would get rave reviews but the cellist couldn't understand why. From where he was sitting, what he heard was a very harsh and scratchy sound from the violinist, but the audience always seemed to love the sound. One day, he some how got the day off and attended the violinist's concert to see what all the fuss was about. To his amazement the violinist sounded amazing - from the back of the concert hall no less! Apparently, the harsh, scratchy sound the cellist heard while he was in the orchestra for the violist only carries a few feet and drops away, while the rest of the rich sound carries forward into the audience.
- I guess the moral of the story is, I need to be louder (still), and for now, don't worry about the scratchy sound that I really dislike hearing. Actually, I don't like playing loud, which Adam noticed, and recommended that I stop using my mute!
6) Exercise for louder sound:
- Try bowing close to the bridge with short bow strokes.
- He went down the hall and did some short loud strokes while I stayed in the practice room and it sounded good, but when he tried it in the practice room with me it sounded harsh and loud.
7) For next lesson, I need to work on:
- Bowing
- 2 notes for bow
- Smoother transition
- Don't bow faster or louder at the end of each bow stroke, the change of bow direction will create the same effect and will be less obvious
- Louder, louder, louder... bow close to the bridge
