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I haven't posted anything new in a while, so I thought I should share something.
As I mentioned elsewhere in the forum, I had a nasty car accident this summer (got rear-ended at a red light on a freeway offramp) and was unable to play for a while due to whiplash. While slowly easing back into playing, I'm actually mostly playing violin, which is physically easier but still feels a bit strange because it's a much less familiar instrument. I decided to learn Brahms's Violin Sonata No. 1 ("Rain") because it seemed appropriate for the season.
I'm now up to practicing 30-40 minutes, twice a week, and that's about my limit right now. I also haven't run through any movement yet, and won't until I can practice at least two or three hours a week, because right now playing through the first movement once would eat up about 15% of a week's practice time. I've only worked on short segments.
This week I started to string together longer stretches of music. Today I tried playing through the entire first two pages, and last weekend I played an entire page from the middle of the first movement. Even though I've been working on this for about a month, this is not anywhere near polished, because of how little I've been able to practice and because I'm still much more accustomed to the viola. (Also, I interrupted working on this for a week in order to record a virtual orchestra track on viola.)
Beginning of first movement:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/mMme.....PWFGWdjKKA
Excerpt from middle of first movement:
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WOW! My hat's off to you, Andrew.
You never tackle the easy stuff!
I usually don't care for piano with violin, but this particular piece makes more sense to me with it's piano counterpart.
I do feel references to rain, whether intended or not - otherwise, in my ignorance, it's pretty much a foreign language to me (mind-boggling how difficult this would be to practice).
Really appreciate you sharing what you've been working on - it's always nice to be reminded what a violin is capable of.
As always, I hope you feel better soon - so I get to see you smile while you're playing!
- Emily
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AndrewH
I'm glad your on the mend and able to start playing again,
Coming along nicely,
Thank you for posting..
Mark
Master the Frog and you have mastered the bow.
Albert Sammons
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great playing, if you are that good recovering from injury, Cant wait to hear you completely back on form, excellent stuff, looking forward to more vids.
Cant beat a sunny day
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Thanks, everyone. I'd like to record this with piano eventually. I've tried playing bits of it with piano accompaniment tracks I found on YouTube. But my laptop speakers aren't loud enough for me to hear the piano when I'm playing, and I haven't bothered to hook up the external speakers so far. Need more consistency first. With the violin, as you may have seen, I'm still doing beginner things like hitting other strings or squeaking on strings at the moment.
By the way, the choice of piece is also geared toward getting used to playing violin. Yes, there are a lot of accidentals and some difficult intervals to tune, but the first movement is mostly at a leisurely tempo, which is good for rebuilding technique.
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@andrew - Sorry to hear about your accident. How much do you suffer today from the Whiplash?
"The richest person is not the one who has the most,
but the one who needs the least."
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Fiddlerman said
@andrew - Sorry to hear about your accident. How much do you suffer today from the Whiplash?
Thanks for asking. Right now my neck is back to normal, and I can lift my arms for a short time without pain, but my left arm and shoulder (which had a prior injury) tire very quickly and I still have occasional random flare-ups of upper back pain. I'm now up to playing violin for up to 40-50 minutes, or viola for up to 30 minutes, three times a week.
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