Logging My Practice Time

Recently I decided to throw away my concerns about privacy and joined Facebook. One of my friends is my cello teacher. Last year he logged an average of almost 4 hours a day of practice time, a really impressive number, which I found out about in one of his wall posts. I say almost 4 hours because he was so close...but missed it by 20 seconds a day....he was bummed. What got me thinking about tracking how much I practice was listening to him talk about how he logs his practice time, what counts as practice time, and how he finds the time to practice.

For nearly 20 years I've kept a training log of my workouts, which now that I'm not training for any sort of competition, seems rather useless. But then again, I can see when I miss a day, or 2, and the log screams at me when there is an empty spot or an notation of "rest day - no time" (hopefully because it was a travel day...really no way to make the time).

So I've started tracking my cello practice time, noting the time in my training log. My goal is to average an hour a day over the year. That seems to be a realistic amount of time that I can spend, balancing work, family, exercise, and other life demands.

I've read other cello-related blogs and seen that many of you also log what you're doing as well as how long. I can't figure out why I have that discipline for my exercise log but don't really want to track what I'm doing during my practice time. I guess that I feel that the proof of how well I'm spending my practice time is measured by what my playing sounds like. How do you measure "producing a better quality sound"? So while I figure that out I'll just track how much time I spend practicing...all the while wishing that I could figure out how to allocate more time to playing the cello.

chamber music!

my saturday group finally met, after more than a month off. The holidays, the weather, travel, all conspired against us. We had 5 of us today! We started with violin/cello - a Telemann piece, very nice. When our violist showed up we started a Mozart Divertmento. Then our other cellist showed up and she and I doubled on the Mozart. When our 2nd violinist showed up we switched to string quintets. I got another shot at the Schubert...one of my all-time favorite pieces...it's so much fun to play. We finished with a Taneev string quintet (2 violins, viola, 2 cellos...there is Taneev string quintet with 2 violas...but we never seem to have 2 violas) That one was deemed worthy of another time reading though it.

very fun and sure nice to play with everyone again!

and really good news ... I got pictures of my new cello ... hope I will get it in a month or so....

Fun at the Last Gig

We celebrated the new year with a gig at our other cellist's house. It was fun - people listening, drinking, eating, and having a good time. We had a good time playing. You can see me in the back but it's hard to see our other cellist.





We played a number of celtic tunes, our leader the fearless violinist/violist/cellist switched to cello so that we could play a Beethoven piece (op87) arranged for 3 cellos. I was really happy with the way I played - since I was playing first cello for it I spent the entire time (4 movements) in tenor...and even managed to figure out how to play the thumb position parts that were written in tenor. We had been practicing for a while...and this was the best we'd ever played the whole piece (good timing!) We played a Vivaldi violin and cello concerto but I got to take it easy with the cello part while our other cellist (we were at her house) did the solo. The big piece we did was 3 movements from the Schubert quintet - wow! We had our moments good and not so good, but it was so much fun to play it since it is one of my all-time favorite pieces of music.

After the gig was over we drove home in a snowstorm! It was the last bit of snow for us, now that it's warmed up. Poor Washington state, first hit by an unusual amount of snow and now it's warmed up, raining and it's flooding everywhere.

One Thing After Another

It's been a busy month since I last posted...Thanksgiving, travel, concerts, an unusual amount of snow for Seattle, and getting sick (while on a trip, ugh). I had a nasty bug -- sore throat and coughing (still coughing after 2 weeks) and haven't felt so sick in a long time. I managed to keep from coughing during the last concert (I managed to hold the coughing except during the loud parts from the brass...holding it in during some of the solo parts was really hard)

Where has practicing fit into all of this? It's been tough, especially having to stop to cough and drink hot liquids. But at my last lesson (we had to cancel this week because of snow and the previous week because I was sick) my teacher asked me to think about the weight of my bow hand/arm and to keep applying pressure while staying flexible. So among all of the other things I've been working on I've been thinking about that...and it is helping. I can hear more consistency in tone up and down the stick, and I am starting to feel the string as I move the bow across it. It sounds funny describing this feeling, but it is a good one!

It's Not a Good Idea to Wash the Phone

A few weeks ago my husband and I went for a walk. He has recovered from surgery so quickly that at 6-weeks post surgery, he is able to walk our normal 4-mile walk after a 6-month hiatus! Hooray!

It was raining when we went for our walk, normal weather for the rainy Pacific Northwest. When we got home, he stripped off his wet clothes and left them on the washing machine. Later that day, I just threw his pants into the wash along with the rest of the load of laundry.

When I started the dryer, there was a loud clanking noise. "What is that noise?" says my husband, who proceeds to open the dryer to find the source of the noise. Lo and behold, he pulls out a wet phone from his pants pocket. Oops.

I took the phone out of its carrying case, took off the cover, and took out the battery, and let the phone dry. Later that day, I put the battery back in. The phone actually turned on. But, it started making a hideous vibrating noise, and wouldn't stop. I took the battery out and let it sit overnight. The next day, the phone turned on and could actually make and receive calls....but continued to make the same hideous vibrating noise. I tried another battery (I have the same model of phone). Same hideous vibrating.

So, we took the phone to the local wireless carrier store. "I need a new phone," my husband announced. "I put it in the wash," I said. The salesman replied, "It makes a horrible vibrating noise, right?" "Apparently this isn't the first time you've seen this problem."

My husband likes his new phone.

It's clearly not a good idea to wash a mobile phone.

Infinite Loops

First, my husband is recovering quickly from surgery. He is able to walk without using a cane for miles without pain in his hip. He said that he had actually forgotten what a 'normal' stride felt like. He still can't bend past 90 degrees, so if he can't pick it up with his grabber device, it stays on the floor until I can get it. So he's in his own loop, learning to walk again.

My infinite loop is going back to the beginning days of playing cello. My teacher told me in one of my lessons that he could still see a scoop in my bowing when I changed directions. So I went back and isolated the problem. It was that I couldn't stop my bow on an upbow. I noticed that I couldn't stop the bow movement at the frog without the bow wiggling around a little. Now doesn't that sound basic? Starting and stopping the bow?

So, I started the very tedious process of fixing the problem. For a while every time my bow went near the frog, I stopped the bow. If it wobbled, I played whatever it was I was playing again and stopped it. I even did Emily's scale challenge stopping the bow at the frog every single dang time the bow went near the frog. And guess what, it got better (not quickly, though!). I can now hear the string still ringing when I stop the bow. I still stop and have a 'do-over' if the bow wobbles at the change of direction. One of these days I'll get past lesson 1!

Also, my teacher had me go back and play grade 1, then grade 2, and now grade 3 repetoire again. This time he demanded that I control the tone, the volume, my bowing, and to play even the 'easy' stuff musically. It's quite hard to do, but my husband has noticed a change in my playing...guess returning to the beginning is useful in its own way...

where is the time going?

It's been crazy here the past few weeks.

Get home from Singapore. Try to adjust rapidly back to local time (-15 hours difference)

Following week. Take husband to hospital. Spend days in hospital while he recovers from hip replacement surgery.

Take husband home. He is doing very well but can't bend more than 90 degrees, and is fogged up by pain medication the first days at home. Take his walker up and down the stairs. Freak out the cats because he can't bend down to feed them. All of the chores he normally does around the house are mostly impossible for him to do..

Travel again. Fly out early one morning and arrive home very late the following day. Wake up the next morning in a fog for the 7am conference call. Worry about husband left alone at home (with neighbor on call to help and check up on him).

Oh yes, what about practicing the cello? Ha. Hoping that I get some time to play soon.