of note
As the blogsophere continues to change under the fickle and shifting sands of internet cachet, one thing remains: good stuff is good stuff. The advent of Blogger, WordPress and Tumblr has made it easy for anyone with access to…
Emily Wright
The Swan: a practice guide.
It lives! First off, thanks to the people who bought the first guide. Here’s the second one, dedicated to a piece that means so much to so many. Next up, some Bach!
introducing practice guides!
Designed to be affordable mini manuals for pieces commonly studied, practice guides are packed with miniature exercises, technical reminders, and tips on approach. The first one, La Cinquantaine, is available now for $3.50 here. Stay tuned for more, and…
what do you play for?
…and by play, I mean “do your thing”. I know this blog is read by all kinds of people who have nothing to do with cello: members of the military, lindy hoppers, business owners, retired folks (whose schedules are now…
be smart.
Fact: I had to counsel a 9-year-old to lay off for a few weeks because she was developing tendinitis as a result of tension and misuse of her 4th finger. Fact: I began dealing with tension-induced injuries…
on cold-calling, swashbuckling, and sleep.
I think the reason I’m “self made” is because I’m impatient. While everything I do is long-term process oriented (developing a studio, creating a brand as a teacher, improving as a cellist, publishing, learning to work on bows) and…
DVD project!
I wrote AMCM to try and fill some of the gaps in the “how-to” canon. Mostly, I thought we needed a text featuring a bunch of pictures and the occasional justification/explanation for certain bits of technique. There’s another volume…
letting go
Lindy hop as metaphor: my instructor constantly has to remind me to wait for a lead and then follow it to the end of the momentum, as I’m awfully clever at guessing what I think will happen… …and even…
new adventures in music geekery
Perhaps it was growing up around a dad who seemed to know how everything worked (right down to the subatomic level) or maybe I’m just a junkie for the pedagogical process, but I’ve always wanted to learn how to…
adding it up
Now and again I go for a jog without music. After the crunchy/clear headed/isn’t this moment grand thing passes (and it does, without fail), I return to the usual fragmented contemplation that running is supposed to help alleviate. Cresting a…