April 27, 1989. This was my favorite piece from my junior recital at HPU........actually, one of my all time favorite pieces. For me, it was probably the most difficult piece I played......at least most difficult for me. But my awesome piano teacher at the time, Dr. Bettsy Dunn-Curtis, taught me some cool practice techniques for the arpeggios that helped tremendously. I was literally using that practice technique on those arpeggios a few hours before my recital.......they were just a bear for me. This song took a lot of endurance. That semester I used to warm up for a good 30 minutes before even starting to work on any of my pieces. I would do all my scales 4 octaves.......connected, going down a third (C major, a minor, F major, d minor, B flat major, etc.) non-stop. I would do the major scale, then the harmonic minor, then the melodic minor, then move onto the next scale. I actually learned to LOVE practicing scales with that exercise. Then I had a Bach Prelude I had played my freshman or sophomore year that was just 16th notes so it was very "fingery" and a great workout.........then I would do a few Hannon exercises. I loved my warm-up time........if you had told me as a kid that I would someday enjoy practicing scales, I would have thought you were crazy! But that was Dr. Dunn......she made it interesting and I learned so much from her.
No comments:
Post a Comment