The Oboe BBoard

The Oboe BBoard The C4 standard

New Topic | Go to Top | Go to Topic | Search | Help/Rules | Smileys/Notes | Log In

Okay, so it's only at 60--but I couldn't play it at all yesterday (for JohnT)

Author: Dutchy
Date: 2008-05-13 23:03

...who said this in the "Teach an old dog new tricks" thread:

Quote:

Isolate the hard parts, then slow the metronome (if you don't have one, get one post haste & make sure the click is loud enough to hear well) down to its slowest beat. Then play the difficult selection repetitively at that slowest speed until it is dead on. As Martin Schuring says, Never play anything wrong. Then bump the gnome up a notch. When you reach the point where you are unable to play the part perfectly, stop. You are done with that part for the day. Make a note of the speed at which you could play it perfectly. Then the following day, click the gnome back three clicks slower & work your way up. Keep doing this until you achieve the tempo required. This may take weeks or it may take a day or so. This is the how.

Like the saying goes, "When the student is ready, the teacher will appear." Just this last month I started working on "hard" pieces, that is, stuff that isn't just the Hal Leonard pop tune playalongs. Currently I'm working on "Stars and Stripes Forever", and several Robert W. Smith Concert Band selections: "Gathering of the Yeomen", "In the Bleak Midwinter", and "Africa".

Now, that probably seems like baby stuff to the rest of y'all, but they've been stumping me for a month now. Man! they've got sixteenth notes! and not just ordinary sixteenth notes, but those ugly sixteenth-note things that have the little number "6" under them, egad.

So I was struggling along, "try to play it faster, try to play it faster", and failing utterly, nothing but random smears of sound. I kept telling myself, "Look, my daughter's high school band could play this [Africa]", which they did, last year, and, "There are ninth-graders all over Youtube who can play In the Bleak Midwinter, it can't be *that* hard."

But it was. Woe.

So, I was just about to resign myself to a lifetime of Hal Leonard when JohnT steps up with his timely advice, so I rolled up my sleeves and went to work with my teensy Qwik-Time beeper, and lo! progress was made. It may still be only at 60, but hey, I couldn't play it at all yesterday.

So, thanks. [grin]