Tuesday, February 16, 2010

What to work on

I'm starting to feel like I kinda know what I'm doing with the reeds... not that I'm done, but rather that I need to work on other things in order to progress. So I actually haven't touched the reeds in a week or so, other than just playing on the ones I have. In parallel, I feel like I've made some progress on intonation. Not that I can always play in tune, but rather that I have some level of confidence (however misplaced) that at least I can hear the pitches correctly in my head. With the knowledge there, the rest is execution. And, even if I'm not right, at least maybe I have the confidence to play anyway. Tone, well I don't know. Some of that is physical, muscle strength, some is reeds and horn, some is technique (eg appropriate vibrato). I've started to try a little vibrato occasionally, but it's not smooth and consistent. Anyway, I think the tone, if not there, is at least not changing quickly, so I'd better get used to it. This is all a little ahead of schedule. I'd budgeted a year for myself to learn reeds, and get my tone and intonation into shape so that I could stand to listen to myself play, before really trying to figure out what I want to do. I don't think I can put that off much longer. This morning I took out an actual book of music, the Milde etudes, and started reading them. They aren't too hard for me to work on, and would be a good exercise. It'd be a good project, to work one or some of them up properly, to play them cleanly and musically. At some point, though, I need to stop finding good exercises, and start working on music.

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