[No.7] ErHu Practice Log | 二胡練習日誌

[The Lesson]

Lord hammercy, the time has finally come. It’s been about a whole damn month since I learned something new in this class.

This week’s class started off as normal. I came late on purpose because I honestly lost the motivation I had to go to class each week. It was becoming frustrating. I had the drive to get better, but the pace of the class was too slow. We were playing the same songs every week, and the teacher wouldn’t give me any suggestions on my playing, so I felt my progress was stagnating. What would be the point of spending my time and money to go to the class, if I could do the same thing from the comfort of my room? Last week, I was really tired, and usually I could muster up the motivation to go, but I just didn’t have it in me. When I came in this week, nothing changed. The class started with the open string bowing, then scales, and then splitting beginners from the veterans. After getting into the beginner room, I found that we were still working on the song that we did the week before I skipped. So, of course I was very disappointed. I felt like I wasted another night of my life.

Surprise, surprise, surprise. At the end of this weeks lesson, the teacher admitted that he thought that the class’s progress was too slow, and we weren’t getting through the repertoire as fast as he had planned. He decided that the things we were practicing in the class were something we should have been practicing at home, and he’ll just go forward. I don’t know why he didn’t think of that like two months ago, but, what’re you gunna do right? Anyway, this week we learned how to play the G-Major scale.

It is pretty much the same thing as the D-major scale in terms of fingering. There’s just one change. In the D-major scale the gap between the first and second finger when playing the 6th and 7th scale degrees is wide; the second finger is positioned close to the third. But, when playing the G-major scale, the second finger is positioned close to the first finger. The basic scale usingWhen playing the G-major scale, we are to assume that

[Breakdown of The Lesson]

1. Open String Bowing:  Whole Note, Half Note, Quarter Note.
2. D major scale: Half Note, Quarter Note, Legato, Short Bow
3. Etudes: Legato, Fourth Finger Dexterity
4. Repertoire: 太湖船

[The Video]

1. 1. D major Scale: Half Note, Quarter Note, Short Bow, Legato
   2. G Major Scale: Quarter Note
   3. Etudes: D Major Dexterity
   4. Repertoire: 太湖船 [The Boat on Taihu Lake]