October 12 Lesson Notes

Gnossienne #3
– Left Hand:
— work on tone tone – sink wrist on the first note, slide from the bottom up to the chord and play inwards
— make sure to play the triads exactly together
– Right Hand
— let the notes overlap more (hyper legato)
– let the pedal smear the sound
— make sure to catch the bass notes on the pedal, but not really quick to exchange
— instead of clean pedal changes, try lifting your foot only a quarter or halfway up
— also try keeping the pedal down (not changing) and listen to how it sounds

Minuet in G major
– drill in two bars (Bar 1 & 2, Bar 3 & 4, etc)
example drilling – Bar 1 & 2
1. play 5 – 10 times
– only count the times where both the rhythm and notes are correct
– it doesn’t have to be in a row, but you can try for 10 in a row once you can consistently play the two bars cleanly
– troubleshooting – if it seems the bars aren’t improving quickly, some Hands Separate practice may be needed
2. play 10 times, increasing the speed
3. if you find a glitch, like the Left Hand note playing the quarter note on time
-drill only the first bar and the first beat of bar 2
4. try playing from bar 1 – 4

Continue to practice:
– Scales (circle of 5ths up to Db-major)
C-major triad
— practice in 2 beats
— Beat 1 – set fingers on the correct notes
— Beat 2 – play
– 12 bar blues