Somehow flared up my De Quervain's right before practicing.

Berceuse - still recording times to achieve goals. I have a wonky idea of how long things take, and what I can do in said times.  Still trying to play pages 1 & 2 x5 with no mistakes. Got page 1 done in the midst of that, in one hour.

LGR -page 1 x5 with no mistakes: I had to break it up into measures and play those x5 with no mistakes at varying tempos, then played page 1 faster than tempo, then at speed. Took one hour. And then I discovered I'd been reading 2 notes wrong. I think those are going to be tricky to fix since they are firmly cemented in my hands.

Short practice - too tired and fingers sore, but still managed to get everything done for today.

Started transcribing Street of Crocodiles by Leszek Jankowski.

Checking more things off my list. It's nice to know I'm accomplishing things and don't need to keep track of what I have to do next. And rotating what I learn seems to be beneficial for my hands as well as brain.

I've transcribed all the Chameleons stuff I wanted. I do not understand the key changes at all. I think if I played guitar it would make more sense.

Figured out how to play last line of LGR faster, but it makes my hand cramp after working on speeding it up for 20 minutes.
Continuing to check off cells from practice chart.

I did overuse my fingers yesterday, but it's ok because I had other things to work on today based on my schedule, and got them done.  I'm surprised with the discrepancy between what I thought I could do when scheduling and what I can actually do.  I'm going to start timing myself to see how long it takes me to accomplish the cells, because I'm getting everything done in about an hour, and when my fingers are working, I can do about 3 hours of practice.

I actually started View from a Hill yesterday, not Nathan's ... whatever.  It's another beautiful, yet easy, one.

Wow, planning out my practice sessions is so much more efficient. I could almost have done more today, were it not for both LGR and Berceuse being really hard on my left 2.   I will be curious to see how much time planning out my next piece saves me. Or if I can learn more than 2 pieces at a time.

Transcribed On the Beach and started Nathan's Phase. Ahead of schedule, thank you very much.

Marathon transcribing of songs to get back on schedule. I finished Monkeyland, started and finished Singing Rule Brittania, and started On the Beach. Monkeyland was such a difficult song for me to figure out. I think because I deviated from my usual method and tried to get help with guitar tabs. They were not helpful at all.  I'm also learning that the songs I like the best are, disappointingly, the simplest. I egotistically thought I had sophisticated taste. Apparently not. However, I liked the more complicated songs more after I transcribed them.

I went through my music and planned out the practice sessions I need to do before the end of the month. If all goes according to schedule, I'll be ready to record at the end of the month. So far, knock on wood, my calluses are getting more robust. Hopefully they won't peel off.

I managed to get all the cells I had scheduled for my session today done in the hour I had left for BOTH pieces. It's mostly going to be work on the dynamics and getting up to speed.

Yeah, need to work on dynamics. Will outline that tomorrow.

LGR needs to be slowed down. It wasn't ready to be sped up to 100.

Ok, next thing to do is record same stuff across the room and see if my hands are still imbalanced.

But after 2 hours, my arms are tired. 

Plan for Su, Mu (ha, Munday): Work only for 1/2 hour on last measures of LGR.

Make copy of Berceuse so I can highlight the @#($*&^ pedal changes!

Then after recording plan rest of campaign. Or at least list steps to finish these pieces.

Tomorrow will be a planning session including recording and listening to LGR and Berceuse to see how to plan the "Campaign".

Reading about how to set up practice goals and steps and levels and I need to digest it all now.

Rebuilding calluses... apparently.

I think I've got too much muscle-memory/cemented wrong things in my hands to get Prelude 3. Maybe someday I will see if Practiceopedia says anything about un-cementing things. I think I will put it away again.

Worked on speeding up trouble spots in Berceuse. I couldn't even play them at regular speed! So they will require more work.

Speeding up LGR will require work on the last two lines.  The dynamics don't quite make sense, either.

Warm-up with random excerpt from (Flight).

Prelude 3 - 3 more notes

LGR - time to speed up to 100.

Berceuse - tested at 50, most is easy-peasy, but ran into trouble in faster runs.

Berceuse - dynamics ok at 40 (still not sure in a few spots), few flaws to fix marked with Xs. Mostly pedal changes. Need to bring out melody more, or might be microphone placement.

LGR - sped up to 88 and it's slightly falling apart, so need to practice Xs.

Prelude 3 - 3 more notes, sort of. Very tired and I think that affected my ability to use my fingers.

Sped up LGR 4 clicks - seems ok, but run through again.

3 more notes in Prelude 3.

Field recording

LGR is up to a speed I can play it comfortably, the dynamics are close to being ready, and then I can start speeding it up.  I need to figure out how not to thunk the first notes in each measure in the ff section.

Berceuse still needs technical work at slow speed.

Prelude 3 - chaining seems to have worked. I now know why I couldn't play it before. It's going to be hard work to get it right, as I have to undo all the previous incorrect work I've cemented in my hands. Question is: do I want to?


I've been wanting to do field recordings and lamenting forgetting to take my microphone with me on walks and rides on several occasions.  And nowhere was that more apparent today than while stopped on my bicycle at a red light. The Greek Orthodox Church right next to me started chiming away.
So I need to find some way, pronto, to:
+ attach microphone to my bike
+ make it wind-proof
+ make it water-proof (especially today!)
+ record with small files that still sound good

Prelude 3 - 3 more notes learned in 20 minutes. It will take 20 more days.  However, gave myself a blister and De Quervain's acted up again, so I can't set a final goal yet. Just a goal to take 20 mintues of practice time to learn 3 notes per day when I can.

Worked a teensy bit on dynamics, of LGR, but didn't want to make blister worse. Need to set goals for LGR and Berceuse, as well.

Weird, now my right thumb tendons hurt and my left hand feels fine, however that was the one that hurt during practice.

Play it again, and again, and again...

After reading some tips from Practiceopedia, I was inspired to work on the problem spot in Prelude 3 again, this time using "chaining".  I learned 3 notes! It only took 20 minutes! /sarcasm. So it will take a very long time, and may not ever happen, but just doing it for sh*ts and g*ggles.

Worked on LGR dynamics.

Not enough hours in the day.

Berceuse - Worked on dynamics, breaths, caesuras, and tenuto on 3rd page. Oops, excuse me. Caesurae. I think I've got it how I want it, for the most part. I think muffling completely would be too jarring.

I moved a couple pedal changes because they are right in the middle of a quiet part. 

Need to work on the A♭ G♮ pedal change - it's really loud!