[The Lesson]

[Overview]

I have to keep it real. I’ve been slacking when it comes to this instrument. I don’t have the same motivation to play guzheng like I do for erhu. For the past few weeks I haven’t been practicing at all. I would only show up at the lessons. Even in the lessons I wouldn’t be super interested. Maybe it’s because I’m still in the beginning stages and the songs are still boring? I guess I just haven’t found any songs that really stick out to me to keep me interested? Anyways, I decided I’m going to try to push through and at least learn enough to get to grade 4 or 5 for this instrument and then call it quits. This lesson was actually pretty productive in my opinion. My teacher pointed out that my finger technique is getting sloppy and that my tone isn’t coming out as clear as it should. So we focused on fixing my hand shape and my plucking technique.

[Technique]

We focused on hand shape in this lesson. According to my teacher, my fingers end up being too straight. Because my fingers were too straight, my tone was off. Also, if I make a habit of keeping my fingers straight, when it comes time to play fast songs, it’ll be impossible for me. It’s the same concept as piano, guitar, and even erhu. You have to make sure your movements are efficient. If they aren’t, it’ll be impossible to play at quick speeds. To work on my hand shape, she told me to practice my 勾(gou), 托 (tuo), as well as 抹 on strings that are adjacent to each other. I think this will probably help me a lot.

[Repertoire]

挤牛奶，西厢词

[The Practice]

[Practice Breakdown]

Technique 

Hand shape exercise

勾抹托 

Vibrato

挤牛奶

Measure 17-20

Measure 24-28

Measure 29-32

西厢词

First Phrase

Second Phrase