SERIOUSLY have you ever seen someone skate like her? Ever? I’ve been enchanted by skating ever since I was a kid, practicing taking off from different edges of my feet on the patio whenever the Olympic coverage would go to…
This November, I’m going to be streaming an hour of my practice on Zoom one night a week! This will be my real, actual practice, with no commentary (with the exception of my own mutterings) and no interaction with viewers,…
Originally published 5 Jan 2008. I really wish I had somehow been able to wrangle the bow in the picture into my life. While the current Sasano bow (I’ve had since my second year at CSUN) is wonderful, I can…
Originally published 11 Dec 2007. I still haul these pieces out now and again, and they continue to surprise me! Maybe I’ll spring them on some of my more advanced students who are working on the elusive perfectly tapered “long,…
A short medium sized video about the importance of visualization and the difference between it and simple imagining.
Even if you can hear the music in your head when you look at a piece, it’s never a bad idea to listen to several recordings and study the score as part of your general practice curriculum. To experience mastery,…
Originally posted 9 January, 2008. This, and the next one, are two of the most popular posts on SRCB, according to the Google-mo-tron. Another darling of our community, CelloGirl has stress when it comes to her pinky joint. A portion…
Post originally published 12 June, 2007 I wish I could send my adult students to music school, if only just for a week. Not to be inspired by the hours and hours of practice or the tide of talent that…
In the third installment of this series, I’m going to encourage you to do something fairly radical: pay much MUCH more attention to your bow during your practice. Favor it. Examine it. Look to it as the cause of 80%…
If we think about the relationship between you and your instrument as a romance, practice can be seen as courtship. You’re getting to know about the cello, finding out about yourself, and making your intentions known. You want this…most ardently. …
The goal of this series is to provide you with several small changes in approach, presented one at a time, that will streamline and improve your practice process, while also reminding you that MXC* was perhaps the only worthwhile programming…
I promised the participants at Lone Star SCOR some kind of run-down on topics we covered during the two workshops I gave. In the spirit of “better late than never”, I’m posting a PDF with the basics from the…
I need your advice. I have a teenage student who has not responded positively to any approach, though he is progressing as well as anyone who has a pulse and thrashes away at the instrument a few times…
Practice is good. Common sense tells us it’s necessary for progress and essential to maintain our skill. In my lessons, I rarely teach people how to play- it’s mostly about diagnosing what makes something difficult and then developing strategies and…
It’s been busy times in the stark raving life of your friendly neighborhood cellist. I suspect this will be one of the last blogs at this address: the whole shebang is going to move over to my big site. But…
I was practicing yesterday and encountered, for the first time in a long while, the temptation to stop after the first 20 minutes. I’ve set about going through the Popper études and plowing roughshod through the repertoire to prime myself…
It happens more than it should: I walk into a lesson and the student is jaw-droppingly unprepared and the excuse offered is, “I didn’t have enough to practice.” It was a frequent occurrence in my own early lessons. I would…
….in which she begins to develop a neurosis about her hair as it appears from the side. Sigh. I really should just flat iron my hair every day to avoid these calamities. God help me if Nathan or Frankie at…
Let’s do this.
Here I am, risking a little bit of my pride to show you the practice process behind what will become a very good Mendelssohn excerpt at some point. I figure that part of the strength of this blog is a…
In the baseball game of Audition vs Emily, the pitcher is kicking the dirt on the mound, leaning forward to consult the catcher’s sign, and has risen up: coiled and ready to pounce. Less than a week till the audition,…
There are many ways in which practice, especially as a rumored professional, evokes the oniony images. First off, it makes you cry. ha. What I’m after today are the peeling layers, ever-emergent, even at this stage. With a few weeks…
I’m taking some auditions around town in a month or two, so that means more than ever, routine and repetition rule my life. I love it: the sense of purpose and direction, the hours that seem to disappear, the wondering…
Back for more, are you? Last year’s 12 days of Cellomas focused on practice habits, and looking back on them, they’re pretty good! This year, I’ve collected some stories and will share some of my own complete and utter, wish-you-could-turn-back-time,…
While we’re waiting for some more upgrades, I wanted to share two things: 1) This video. I am pretty sure it’s a joke, but it is not dissimilar to people I have witnessed at the college level! You gotta laugh.…
Try this: it’s like interval training for cello, and it got me over the hump when I was crashing on Rococo Variations. 1) Play a scale really slowly. As many octaves as you’re up to. Slur 2 to a bow,…
I got a letter from your pinky the other day. I’m used to whole cellists writing to me asking for technical advice, but this was…a little awkward. What a conflict of interest! But I have decided to address the issues…
You have étude books. And in those books are certain pages that make your guts churn and your eyes sizzle. I know because I, too have Popper’s High School of Cello Studies. But you don’t need to bust out Popper…
Anyone who knows me knows that I love sports. In fact, with the exception of golf, I have a hard time walking past any television with some sort of sport on it without sitting down and talking trash. It follows…
My teacher told to me: 7) Take the thing you hate the most and make it your favorite. You know that measure that twists your fingers into a knot, befuddles your bow or just sounds plain awful? Well meet your…