Week Twelve: The Long Lesson

     Since it is the beginning of Christmas Break, I normally wouldn't have a lesson this week, but because I missed two of my lessons earlier this year, I had the privilege of a makeup lesson. They squished both of mine together, so I had one on one time with Piotr for an hour and a half! This was the highlight of my week.

     I played my violin about five times this week. In my lesson, Piotr decided to take me back to the beginning for review. We spent the first fifteen minutes of my lesson bowing on just open strings. By doing this, I was able to see the different ways that I could improve my posture and sound, and Pitor gave me a lot of helpful tricks. We talked about keeping the weight of the bow even, being able to apply force to the bow without squeezing, as well as the importance of letting the violin rest on you. Now that I am becoming more comfortable with the instrument, everything that he had been telling me from the beginning was much easier to understand and apply to my playing.

     After a long warm up filled with scales and bowing techniques, we went back into some of the old songs that I had learned. By playing these again, I was able to see how I had improved. I was very pleased with myself in this sense. When we got to the page with my Christmas songs, he asked me which one I wanted to play, so I chose Silent Night. To my surprise, this is what we spent the rest of the lesson on.

     He took me through the whole song and got very excited as my playing progressed within the ninety minutes. He told me the best ways to begin the song and how to guide the bow so that it was softer and more delicate. Even after I was content with the sound, he continued to get me to play, and then he accompanied me on both the piano and violin until he was satisfied. When I left he told me I had no choice; I had to perform the song for my friends and family.
So that is what I did.

    I have had no real struggle this week, other than not being able to work on Turkey in the Straw or St. Anne's Reel, but Piotr promised that we would work on them more in the new year. As well as this, he told me that we would work on vibrato as well. I am very excited and look forward to this. For now, I have left you with a recording of Silent Night from today. 

     Moving into next week, even though I do not have a lesson, I will try to work on my fiddle tunes and scales as much as I can, remembering all of the little tips and tricks I learned this week!