[No.4] ErHu Practice Log | 二胡練習日誌

So today before I recorded this weeks video and really got to hear myself play, I was going to write an angry post. But, since it went well, I’m going to definitely talk about the little victories this week instead of being an aggy PUNK ASS BITCH  pessimist.

[The Lesson]

I’m so damn ready to join the other group.  In my last post I pretty much already told y’all how much I loathe the inefficiency of group classes. For the most part, this week was a repeat of last week. I came in with the impression that this week we’d be at least learning SOMETHING new. But maybe I just expect too much, lmao. I bought a new book this week, it’s supposed to be a textbook, but then again, I don’t really think so LOL. I definitely don’t think it’s a textbook that’s useful to someone who is trying to teach themselves. It doesn’t include much of an explanation for any of the techniques that it contains practices for. But anyway, I bought the book to supplement the lesson material if I learn it too quickly and feel like I need something more challenging to work on. Trying to play shit from the book humbled the fuck out of me though, I’ll tell you that. I couldn’t get through any of the exercises. Which brings me back to my agginess about this damn class.

The teacher gave us a bunch of copies of songs and exercises when we started the semester, it’s pretty much a makeshift textbook. The next thing new to learn in the little textbook was how to play notes with our pinky finger. So, this week when I went to the class, that’s what the fuck I expected to learn. This man literally walked in the class this week, talm bout, “Alright class so we’re going to review the material from last week first”. …Alright, so he set up his little speaker and microphone in front of the class and we played through the shit we did last week. Then as usual he gathers his shit and goes to the other room. He comes back, and we go through the same cycle. But this time, he let us hear him play a new song. It’s like he’s in, then his ass is out. So the last 30 minutes of the class roll around and he pops in again. At that point I was a little excited because I’m like YASSSS BIHHHH, we finally boutta be hit with some knowledge on today. But instead this man really hit me with the okie doke. He came back, re-played two songs and packed his shit up for the last time, and was like, “Okay, that’s it, have a nice week”. You gottttttta be fucking kidding me. But yeah, whatever, hopefully we actually learn something useful next week.

[The Practice]

In general, I’m pretty damn pleased with myself I really feel like I’m making some improvement. Although my bowing is still somewhat scratchy, I don’t think it is as bad as it was before. So there’s that. It seems like my pitches are starting to be a little more accurate as well. Last week, I thought it was really hard to be in tune when I play the third scale degree. But it seems like now it’s not so bad. But I’m not sure if it’s because my musical ear is getting better, or if my muscle memory is finally setting in. Either way it doesn’t matter, as long as the final product is on point, I don’t mind. Also, I’ve been thinking if just keeping a practice log would be helpful for people learning. I’m wondering If I should go into detail to explain the books I’m using and how I chose my Erhu and things like that. I’ll probably end up posting things like that in the future anyway, so I guess I should focus my energy on keeping a consistent practice log.

[The Video]

1. Scales

2. Legato Etude

3. Jingle Bells

4. 音階歌 (Scale Song)

5. 春神來了