Tag Archives: running

Day 162 – March 11th – Spring Air

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A more positive day today, helped along by the fact that it’s almost warm outside! I went running in a T-shirt for the first time since September, and also had my window open all day. I ran past fields of lambs (must take some photos) and daffodils ready to break into flower.

As for practice…I didn’t start out in a terribly good frame of mind this morning, but that improved with the day. I’ve noticed lately that my finger movements are becoming a lot smaller and more precise, both in technical exercises and studies. Trevor’s Practice Book 6 exercises really show up the finger movements that are hard – I’ll be going along at crotchet =126 no problem, and then all of a sudden one set comes up that really throws me off. Today I did E, F, G and H, and there were fewer surprises that I was anticipating, though still more than I want. Anything involving both an F# and a Bb is a disaster!

I spent quite a bit of time working on sight-reading, which is much better these days. I still tend to play unrhythmically when faced with a slow movement with lots of turns and grace notes, as the ornaments throw off my sense of the beat. I think I need not to focus on the little notes so much, but it’s hard when they’re small and I don’t know what they are.

This afternoon, Trevor emailed to say he has a cold and there’s no class tomorrow. I have to confess I did a little happy dance – the thought of playing the Hue Fantasie on one day’s practice was not enticing! Instead, I spent the last hour of my practice working on Andersen and Altès studies. I’m adamant I’ll finish the Altès book next week – while there’s a section of no. 25 that’s tricky with lots of quick trills, no. 26 is easy. Getting through the whole book will be a nice sense of accomplishment.

Day 154 – March 3rd – Playing Slowly

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I can’t admit to having done terribly much practice today, only about three hours. After a gloomy, wet morning, the spring sun can out and was beckoning me outside. I went for a run after lunch, and did the whole loop round to the church, up into Hastingleigh and back to Elmsted. For weeks now I’ve been on the lookout for daffodils, and up in Hastingleigh one or two are just starting to flower. There are great banks of green stalks poised and ready, so very soon there will be a sea of little yellow trumpets. The sights of daffodils evokes really strong memories of my childhood here in England, and I’m excited to see them all flowering again. The others probably think my enthusiasm is a bit crazy!

Rather than play through all the technical exercises at speed, I decided to back off the pace today and work through fewer things really slowly. Trevor always advocates learning things quickly. His preferred method for the Andersen studies is learning small fragments at the correct tempo and then putting them together, rather than learning the notes slowly and then increasing the speed. I can see the logic in this – we’re working on sightreading and musicality at the same time as learning the notes, whereas slow note bashing can often sound rather wooden.

However, today I was playing through technical exercises that I know I can play much faster. I wanted to refocus a bit on sound, and on playing strong, clean notes rather than always sitting on the edge of what I can manage. I wanted to have time to notice things about my playing. The exercise worked; while I wasn’t thrilled by the idea of technical work, I really enjoyed the practice.

What did I notice?

I noticed that my sound, though rather varied of late, has become much bigger. Sometimes I’ve wondered whether it’s going backwards and becoming less focused, but now I think that might be part of the process of it opening out a bit more. I noticed that I’m still tending to cover the embouchure hole more that I should in the low register, particularly when I’m descending from something higher. I think this feels safe and produces something that sounds big from my perspective, but sounds weaker to a listener.

I also noticed that my fingers feel cleaner when I play slowly. I don’t lift them as high as six months ago, nor do I move them about nearly as much when they’re in the air. I noticed that my sensitivity to intonation had improved a lot, thought it’s still not where I’d like it to be. I still tend to think of out of tune notes as having a different colour rather than sharp or flat – which is probably why I often struggle with identifying them as either sharp or flat to correct! However, I also noticed that I’m intrinsically correcting them more, probably because the tendencies of certain notes have been drilled in so consistently!

It’s definitely a different sort of practice to what I’ve been doing lately, and one that I think needs to happen more often. If not here, then when I have some time after Trevor’s course. It’s also much more intensive in its own way, and I found that my concentration wavered after only fifteen or twenty minutes. Plenty to think on!

Day 151 – February 28th – Five out of Six!

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The last day of February makes it five months down and only one to go. I meant to write a slightly longer reflection on how the past five months have gone, but then got caught up with my ArtStart reflection, so might save that for another day. The next month is going to go quickly; we have a little concert at Bodsham primary school on March 18th, our second flute history project is due on the 25th, Julie Wright is coming to give us a class on teaching this Wednesday and there are two more masterclasses to attend up in London. Next weekend, a friend is down from London, and we’re going to do some proper hiking either on the Downs or along the coast at Dover.

Trevor dropped off our parts for the Bodsham concert this afternoon, and there are a few notes to be learned there. I’d already spent two hours on studies by the time the parts came, so didn’t manage more than a quick read-through this evening, but will dive into them tomorrow morning.

Following yesterday’s class I was feeling a little flat again this morning. A long run (before the heavy rain started) helped, but I have found over the past week that I’m increasingly feeling the need for some flute-free time. Friends are wonderful, and several have reminded me that my time here is both a unique experience and a unique learning opportunity. Yes, it’s full-on, and certainly not easy, but I need to make sure I get the most out of the month I have left.

Day 147 – February 24th – Flute-free time

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I decided pretty early on today that I was going to have a break from actually playing the flute. Part of me was pushed on by yesterday’s positive feedback, but another (slightly bigger) part realised that I needed a little respite.

Despite that, or maybe because of it, I ended up getting an awful lot done. I went for a morning before our Tesco trip this morning, and really enjoyed being out early again despite the cold. For the rest of the day, I wrote a focused to-do list (I have a longer one on my iPad, but it can be a bit overwhelming) and worked by way through it with plenty of cups of tea. Along with flute-related jobs, it included things like vacuuming and applying for some jobs, which I’ve been putting off for a few days now. Most of them are done, though I’ve still got some emails to reply to.

I did spend time on the Copland Duo in preparation for Friday’s class, just not with the flute. I listened to some recordings, but then spent about an hour and a half with the piano score conducting and singing through sections. As I’ve said before, the notes aren’t particularly hard, but the challenge in fitting it together with piano is the changes of tempo and meter. I need to know the piano score inside-out, and that was today’s goal. There are still some corners that I need to return to, but overall I’m much more confident with it now. With all the scramble to prepare studies, excerpts and pieces for class each week, it is this sort of clear, focused practice that I think I’m not doing enough of at the moment.

Day 137 – February 14th – Fish, Chips and Mrs Brown

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I got a bit more done today than yesterday, and enjoyed my practice more, which was a relief. This coming week of classes is thankfully going to be a bit of a break for me. Trevor heard so little of what I’d prepared (not brilliantly) last week that I’ve been able to sit back and consolidate on the same studies over the last few days. Andersen No. 14 is now sounding quite good, which is exciting!

After a short run in the afternoon, I headed over to the Hastingleigh village hall again for fish and chips, and a film. The fish and chips were yummy and top notch, though with not one but two pieces of fish I’m still feeling rather full! Then they showed the film Mrs Brown with Judy Dench and Billy Connolly, which I rather enjoyed. It was lovely to get out, do something a little different, and take a bit of a break from my flute.