Hakim

Technical Exercises – Continue practice on D Major scale – 1 octave stepping hands separately and together

  • Focusing on stepping down our scale, especially in the left hand
  • Still practicing as solid blocked hand positions hands separately, so your left hand is feeling confident hands together!

Bartok – Practicing fully hands together, making sure you are able to confidently play through both #7 and 8

  • #7 – Noticing changes in our rhythmic pattern (measures 1-4 different from 8-11)
  • #8 -Watching out for F# in our key signature. Changing hand positions at measure 9 – shifting our hand from an E minor position down a step, to a D Major position (F# shifting from RH finger 2, to RH finger 3)

The Calico Cat

  • Practicing hands separately all the way to the end! Focusing on RH measures 9 to the end.
  • Practicing hands together up to measure 9.
  • When practicing hands together, watch out for when our hands are playing together (measure 1 beat 1) versus when they are responding to each other (measure 1 beat 4 LH responds to our RH eighth notes). Counting out loud will help understand exactly how they fit together.

Clara

Technical Exercises – Continue practicing our C Major scale hands separately and together

  • Practicing with a legato, staccato, and detached articulation so we are feeling comfortable and ready to jump into a new scale next week!
  • Try using a metronome to see what your most comfortable speed is, then challenge yourself to increase our speed while staying comfortable and relaxed in our hands.

 

Lesson Book – Allegro in C Major 

  • Similar to our scale, checking our most comfortable speed with our metronome at home, then seeing if we can increase our overall speed.
  • Goal speed: 80-85 BPM all the way through
  • Break things into smaller groups of measures – focusing on tricky spots where our left hand is holding our speed back, practicing hands separately until the left hand is as comfortable as our right hand.
  • Make sure we are noticing our right hand legato markings!

 

Melody in G Major – Hands separate practice only, focusing on our left hand more than right

  • Our pattern is constantly changing, going back and forth between changing lower notes and our D in finger 1. If you need to write in any finger numbers or note names that is totally fine!
  • For our left hand, practicing very slowly while saying note names out loud in small chunks. Make sure you are able to confidently play through measures 1-4 (at least!) while saying note names out loud.
  • Our left hand is quite busy in this piece, so make sure we are feeling loose and relaxed as we play. Turning our hand like we are turning a door knob as we rotate back and forth is a good way to stay relaxed!