Almost Time for the Big Trip

Here's the itinerary for my 25 day trip to Southern Peru. I leave Monday evening.
Unfortunately, I will be abandoning my hubby. He has fallen ill and won't be going.
Happily, another friend is coming along so I'll still have company.

Recital and Sightreading Critique

Received this e-critique from Chamber Music Teacher today...

I thought your intonation was fairly decent. I wish that I had recorded the performance. It seemed that we both played softer, which helped overall. It also seemed that you played with generally more staccato articulation. I think that helped too.

I noticed that my doubling your part has a huge influence on your playing. The next step is to work toward independence, feeling secure when you’re the only one on the part. You can get the rhythm and tempo from the other instruments while being aware of the fact that they are playing something completely different. When we were sight-reading, the difference in your playing when I dropped out was pretty obvious. But I still stand by my statement that you’ve come a long way in your sight-reading and, as Earl mentioned, in your rhythmic security.

Quick Recital

Our group went first. Nothing horrible happened. Hubby said my rhythm was solid. Afterwards, we did some sight reading for fun. Teacher says my counting has gotten better. So much for tonight's excitement.

More Suzuki

Made a trip up to SMA yesterday and practiced the bass accompaniment for the 3 Minuets with the kids. Still shaky playing Minuet 3 from memory but it's starting to gel. Hope to get those polished plus "O Come Little Children" before the holiday concerts. R asked if I'd like to play the Lully for the concert but I passed -- cluck, cluck, cluck.

Thou Shalt Not Panic

I'm a firm believer in not worrying as it usually doesn't do any good.

However, hubby and I have developed a new hobby this month -- it's getting checked by doctors for all sorts of stuff. Needless to say, the lab reports have generated more tests for both of us and lots of concern. Hubby has six months of skin therapy coming up and we were resigned to that. However CT scans have come back with more worrying stuff for hubby. Some nastiness maybe with his lungs, gallbladder and kidneys. Huh? All this from a CT Scan that the doc just said he'd do for the heck of it. There's a 66% chance that there's no need for alarm but more tests are needed.

Then my ENT doc says I have some hearing loss on my right ear and wants to do an MRI, but says not to worry as it's probably not a brain tumor. Geez, I wasn't worried until he said that!!!

Oh well, this too shall pass. We've been lucky so far.

Practice ....Practice....Practice

I'm back to the up and down method of practicing. Do exercises until tired (approx 15 minutes). Put cello down, play on the internet, go back and some more exercises until tired, repeat.

I understand from the Pimsleur language method of graduated interval recall that when one learns a phrase, it goes into short term memory and fades. If repeated at the proper interval it can swiftly move from short-term to long-term memory. Let's hope it works for cello as well.

Called Out

Well, I got slammed yesterday for not practicing all week. Teacher threatened to remove me from the recital. Anyway, I promised to practice everyday until the recital next Tuesday and to use extensions rather than shifts to get the B flat (A string), E flat (D string) and A flat (D string). Thanks Emily for that timely video.

Scandal

I scandalized the teacher today by showing up without practicing the Quantz this week. Irregardless, we'll play the first movement for concert next week.
Maybe you can hear the quiet muted cello in the background :)
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