Test recording:
Tambourin is definitely not a piece to start with when performing, it requires warm up.  Also sounds a little better fast. Ok slow, but not as interesting. Still need to work on 1st measure trills. And 2nd page turnarounds.

Rigaudon definitely sounds ok slower than indicated. It's a fun piece.

I wasn't playing Giga as fast as I thought, which could be due to recorder.  REALLY like the variations.

Fuga is going to require a lot of work not to sound boring.

Pavane Ok not muffling bass notes. Also boring.

Not surprisingly, I messed up more with the recorder on.

Fuga and Rigaudon are ready for test recording.

Rigaudon is ready for polishing at 80. I seem to have this memorized, too!

And upon further reflection, I need to learn how not to do the same thing with my mouth while playing the harp that my lovely grandmother did while she was knitting.

Video recorded myself playing last night. Not as bad as I thought, but very boooorrrrring. I got a recommendation for a performance coach, so I'm definitely keeping that in mind for later down the road.

I keep forgetting about Giga. I think maybe I need to focus on less pieces. However, worked on a couple measures today.

I am putting together the two tracks of my recording sessions and realizing I really need to clean up my playing - very buzzy.  I don't know if that means I'll need to re-record.  My chair is also very creaky and poppy. Ditto on the re-recording.

Finished one page and almost another page of Rigaudon.

Learned the remaining page of Fuga.

Tried to work on pg 2 of Tambourin, but no headway. The other two went very easily. Almost too easily.

Worked on Italian Pavane and felt I didn't really make any headway. But I probably did.

Why playing the harp is hard

I maybe should not have taken up the fiddle.

Yesterday, when I was "practicing" the fiddle¹, and thinking about how incredibly hard it was, I had an "Oh yeah? Well I used to walk 2 miles to school barefoot in the snow uphill both ways" moment.

Playing violin/fiddle is really difficult. However, the harp is way harder.

I present the following arguments:

The harp is really heavy. Like, ridiculously heavy.  Sure, pianos are heavy, but they're everywhere. Chances are if you're playing piano, you don't bring your own.

And speaking of pianos, violins are so lightweight if you start to drop it, it's pretty easy to catch. If you start to drop a harp, it will take you with it, conceivably falling on said piano, which you would then have to explain away by saying you "meant to do that".

The harp has approximately a metric crap ton of strings.  The violin is set up with an economical four strings. They are also set up in 5ths making scales and transposing a snap.  The harp has pedals for that. And they require a little bit of strength to move. And you have to move them fast. Sometimes so fast you can give yourself shin splints. Or so I've heard. From my shins.

The harp requires a significant amount of finger, arm, and back strength just to pluck the strings, not to mention the foot dexterity that I mentioned above and am mentioning again.  The violin does not require any force of any kind. At all. Even though I'm trying to make it that way.

You can fudge notes on a violin. If you don't land exactly, you can move your finger slightly and achieve noteness. On the harp, the targets are anywhere from 2 mm to less than 1 mm, and you have to land that sometimes after flinging your arms over a span of two feet.

Oh, and don't even get me started on tuning. Or rather do. I certainly need a head start because harp tuning = 10 minutes, and that's IF everything's already relatively in tune. Fiddle? 2 minutes tops.

Rebuttal:
As opposed (really, reeeally opposed) to the fiddle, it takes no effort to make a good sound on the harp. You can literally sneeze on it and it makes a better sound.²

And the harp is so pretty. Kind of like this if unicorn = harp and fluffy = pretty.



If I had started on the violin, I'm not sure I would have stuck with it.

Soooo.... in conclusion: fiddle = hard, and possibly worth it. Harp = harder, but definitely worth it.

QED?


<sup>1. some might say "torturing" the fiddle
2. probably not the best way to get the aeolian effect.</sup>

I had forgotten about Giga. Got a few more lines done. I think the combo of giving myself breaks in between sessions of at least one day, chaining and creeping up to speed is the best. Things just fell into place with the measures and lines I was working on today.

Fuga - Tried to work on the whole page by creeping up on the speed instead of chaining and it seemed to work better.  Is that a better way to cement lines I've already learned?  126 - 126.

Tambourin - Still really uneven - I can play a line once, then not, then again. ???

And my 2nd octave E broke. I had just replace it this past July. >:(

Things went a little better today. I still don't know how I'm going to start Rigaudon as the pages other than the first one seem to be a little easier to play. Trying to play faster seems to be the ticket to playing in time.

Violin hilarity rating on a scale of one to ten, ten being funniest: 32470830127

At least I'm amusing myself. My neighbors, probably not so much.



Rigaudon - 1st measure chaining clicked, then unclicked. I tried to play faster than the metronome and that's when it clicked. Then lost focus?  Could feel the muscle strand in my bicep I was using. Wleuagh!

Spent another inordinate amount of time on one line. This time in Italian Pavane. The 3rd and 4th finger rt hand trill is difficult on the larger gauge strings, but only if I think about that. If I think about them as one octave up, I can play it. Didn't quite get it good enough to my satisfaction.

The fiddle is still excruciating, but not as much so.

It took me and HOUR to convince my brain to focus on one line. I basically had to tell it we weren't going anywhere until I could play it 5 times perfectly. The subsequent two lines went much more quickly.

Dear Brain,

See, Brain? We do things MY WAY.

Sincerely,
Brain

I think I need to do chaining on Rigaudon note-by-note again. Either that or my muscles just get really soggy really fast in relation to this piece.  I was thinking about how I would record this and Tambourin. I think I'd have to do them in two separate sessions as they are physically demanding.

This past week was one of disappointment: I wasn't able to check off any measures. Everything had a block for me in it.

The fiddle is still going excruciatingly.

I put the marking tape on my violin and got the strap configured so I can have hands-free.

Finally got that one line in Fuga. I was having problems with just two chords right next to each other, which would make me blow the rest of the line. Usually, I would practice the connection between the two chords, but this time I practiced from the second chord to the end, and from the beginning to the first chord. Then when I put it all together, it just magically happened.

Italian Pavane - another line learned. SO EASY.

And this is all despite taking a huge chunk out of my fingernail with a cutting knife last night. It grew enough today it didn't hurt too much this afternoon. It will probably be ok by tomorrow afternoon, but it will take probably a week before it gets back past past the quick.

Tried to get more lines in Tambourin finished, but this is maybe a piece I should work on on the days I don't work out in the morning.

Same for Rigaudon.

Giga - I got 3 or 4 more lines done, as well as a couple measures of my alternate version.

Played a little of Fuga and Italian Pavane, but those still need to stew for a day.

Somewhere between yesterday and today, I cemented 2 lines of Giga.  I need to write out my variations in Finale.

Today, I got 1 line of Fuga learned that was challenging before but not now (?) and worked on another line that is really challenging, and is still challenging, and I didn't finish it.

Italian Pavane - 3 lines learned and the were fun and easy to play! Quite the surprise based on my initial impression of the piece. I need to figure out when I started this piece by looking at when I made my practice chart.

Holy crap! I started IP on 9/19. That means I learned it in a week and a half?!? A FIVE page piece?!? Da fuh?

Oh, and my fiddle class went well. I still need to get a decent strap, but I finally know how to hold it so it doesn't hurt my right shoulder, and I learned how to tighten the bow, hold the bow, and how to practice bowing with a loose wrist.

Yesterday, had a very productive practice session. I produced an almost-blister with Tambourin. And I worked on Rigaudon. I'm working line-by-line with these pieces now.

Tonight I have my first fiddle class so no practicing harp today.

Woohoo! I'm calling Italian Pavane learned for all intents and purposes.  There are some measures that I just cannot figure out how I'm going to play, and I skipped those on the checklist and will come back to them later, but that's how I've been learning all my other pieces, and they seem to be turning out ok.  So... modified goal achieved! It's going to take a few more months to get everything recordable, possibly 6 months?  I need to go back through my previous charts and see if I can estimate that.