Week 4: Etude Extravaganza!
Welcome to the Main Thread for the forth week of "Etude Extravaganza" practice challenge!
- Choose an etude from a composer that captures your interest. It could be a soothing Sor etude, a technical Giuliani masterpiece, a Carcassi finger exercise, a harmonically rich Brouwer composition, or a rhythmically challenging Villa-Lobos piece. You're encouraged to experiment with pieces from composers you're not accustomed to or push your boundaries with a technically demanding work.
- Commit to regular practice and share your journey with the community. Aim to practice daily and upload at least two videos per week to showcase your progress. This will not only aid in keeping you dedicated and motivated but also enables you to share your musical journey with our tonebase family.
- Share your favorite etude or recording that epitomizes the concept of "Etude Extravaganza." Your submission will serve as inspiration for others and construct a vibrant repertoire of potential pieces for fellow members to explore.
↓ Happy Sharing! ↓
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Eric Phillips
Steve Pederson
Wai
Dale Needles
don
Marilyn Blodget
I just came back from 4 days babysitting our grandchild and took the time tonight to watch all your postings during that period. Great performance and beautiful music; Thanks to all for sharing your work.
I just could not believe the number of different pieces Eric posted during this challenge. I took the time to review the posting of the 4 weeks and came up to 20 different pieces.
martin Martin could use all of them and this will fill up nicely the Watch Party.
Wow thanks Eric for this incredible work.
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Andre Bernier Thank you Andre!
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Here are my last postings for this challenge:
1- Adantino in Cmajor - Matteo Carcassi
I can now play at normal speed (80 bpm) and working to improve the fluidity reduce the buzzing and just makes everything more musical.
2- Fernando Sor - Op 60 no 1
Improved the speed and the sound but still much work to be able to make everything sound nice.
3- Fernando Sor - Op 60 no 2
First recording at fairly slow speed. Now That I memorized it, I will be able to concentrate on improving the playing and the speed.
All work in progress
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Andre Bernier Good work, Andre. All three are sounding good.
If you don’t mind, I’d like to point out a couple things about your right hand:
It doesn’t look to me like your wrist is high enough to engage the strings correctly. It looks low, at times like it may even be touching the top of the guitar. To get the correct angle to the strings with the fingers, I’d suggest raising your wrist. The picture below shows my wrist position. This will help you to strike the string with a fuller motion of the whole finger toward the palm, instead of plucking upward by bending the fingers.
Also, at times I notice you repeat right hand fingers instead of strictly alternating i and m. I will confess that I do this myself, far too often. But since you are in the earlier stages of technique development, I suggest that you be quite strict about alternation. If you’d like, I could maybe make a quick video of one of these pieces, focused on my right hand, to give you a clearer understanding of what I mean.
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Andre Bernier great progress especially the Carcassi piece! Very fluid.
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Eric Phillips
Thanks Eric, I really appreciate your suggestions.
As I am coming from the acoustic guitar world, I adopted some habits I have to fight when playing classical guitar. Both hands need working.
When playing acoustic guitar, I use the pinky finger as a support which helps keep the hand at a proper distance from the strings and free up the thumb for more work on the low pitch strings (Travis picking). I should use my thumb as a support like in your picture but I am not good at it yet. I will try to focus more on this point.
Alternating i and m is another issue from acoustic guitar playing where the right hand fingers have kind of dedicated strings. When starting learning a new piece, I try to stick to alternating the fingers but sometimes it feels awkward. In these cases I keep the same finger if I can sustain the speed. I am doing an exercise to improve this point; I am getting better but still need a lot of work
Thanks a lot for your comments; they are very helpful
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Andre Bernier The Carcassi study is sounding really good. Very smooth and relaxed playing. If you like Carcassi, I would suggest looking at his 25 Progessive Studies. The first three are at beginning to intermediate level.
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Andre Bernier great work André, it looks like you really enjoy Carcassi! As Eric pointed out about alternating RH fingers, you could practice them with chromatic LH movements up and down at warmup, the idea is to have them work in a natural way and as your initial reflex.
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Andre Bernier you’re making good progress. Andre. Your playing feels pretty secure. Ok, as Eric and others just said, this RH alternation might be helpful to progress further, as soon as you have the feel of it. You play these pieces really well. I liked listening.
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Dale Needles Thanks Dale, I will add the Carcassi progressive studies to my to do list
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Blaise Laflamme Thanks Blaise for your comments and suggestion.
I am warming up using a scale exercise provided by Eduardo Inestal in the 2 week intensive on Spanish music. This help a lot but will take time before this become fully natural
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joosje Thank you very much for your comments. Work in progress but slowly improving
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Andre Bernier ok perfect, you're right it takes time for technic to become natural.
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Andre Bernier Thanks for sharing these pieces. Very good choices for the etude challenge. Eric made some very good points about alternating i and m. It’s like walking your fingers—much easier than hopping on the same foot, and randomly changing feet. We all work on that. Over time it becomes as easy as walking.
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Andre Bernier Really solid work here Andre! Kudos for the work you’ve done. I agree with what the folks are saying about the importance of the alternate fingerings. I can relate. Right hand fingering was not something I focused on towards the beginning of my classical guitar journey - also coming from playing modern popular styles, and now i am having to unlearn some bad habits. It's tough, but I am finally starting to see the benefits of focusing very intently on developing better technique. You got this!
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Andre Bernier Great work, especially on the Carcassi, Andre. It seems you are more comfortable with its style as it is more closely related to your finger style background. The Sor pieces are good ones for you to become comfortable with RH finger independence and correct technique as mentioned by Eric Phillips and Blaise Laflamme . Keep it up, you are doing great.
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Marilyn Blodget Steve Pederson Jack Stewart
Thanks all for your comments.
I like the image of walking instead of hopping on one leg. Very nice analogy
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Sor Op 6 no 11
Manage to put some time to work on this piece. Though I've learned it before, I still struggled to play them fluidly especially the Major section. Realized the RH fingering choices I put down were really weird, probably because I have improved since then. Will take some time to work them out.
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don
Update 2.
Wasn't too happy with the previous take so did another. Tried not looking at the music to play and try to inject some dynamics to the parts where I can remember. It a really fun piece to play and will need much more work that I thought to get it ready especially correcting all RH fingerings.
Sor Op 6 no 11 - take 2
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don Well done Don, this one feel so much more musical. When you let your emotions sink into the music it just allows the piece to come alive.
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don Very nice, Don. I like your dolce tone on this study as well as your musicality.
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don your progress on this piece is impressive, bravo Don!
At the level you're now at I would say that while you're still working on the general fluidity of the music, don't forget that the middle voice «the accompaniment» is still very important; it should also be as legato as the other parts and especially on moving voices, and ensure they're sounding right even after shifts. -
don Bravo Don. Very nice playing. If I were you I would put more emphasis on phrasing than on speed. As Blaise Laflamme mentioned, at some places the middle voices are very important,, they’re not just filling. Fernando Sor is such a clever composer!
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Andre Bernier Dale Needles Thank you!
Blaise Laflamme joosje thank you for the advice! This just made realized why I like some versions better than others. My favorite is the one played by Maestro Alvaro Pieri and I think what sets it apart is not just the middle voices but there is a tremolo consistency to it that makes it so pleasant to the ear.
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don I'm not sure about what you mean for the «tremolo» but for sure Pierri's playing has a legato consistency across all voices that makes everything so clear and fluid and creates a unique sound that serves very well the music.
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don Nice job bringing out the melody. The inner voices of the arpeggios are sometimes not audible. I recommend slowing down and listening for evenness of inner voices and making sure you can hear the last note of each arpeggio group. This is one of my favorite Sor studies. It is so beautiful!
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End of the Year Challenge: Finish Strong!
