Low Register Speed Challenge: Final Week!

Hi everyone! 

You made it to the final week of the challenge, congratulations!

This last week the job is to go back and work on all six of the exercises, and see if you can increase the speed a bit further on each one! 

When you post your video, be sure to share with us your maximum speed in Weeks 1, 2, or 3, and how fast your metronome is set to now! 

11 replies

null
    • Katherine_Carleton
    • 2 wk ago
    • Reported - view

    I’ll start the festivities with a grand return to numbers 1 and 2: this time, it was relatively easy to get to 104 to the quarter on #1 and 116 to the quarter on #2  

    Track 128 Track 131
      • Katherine_Carleton
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

      should’ve added: my fastest versions a couple of weeks ago were 72 (vs 104 this week, WHAT) and 84 (vs 116, also WHAT). Whee!

      • Head of Clarinet
      • Heather
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       Wowwww Katherine this is absolutely incredible!!! How inspiring :) 

    • Katherine_Carleton
    • 2 wk ago
    • Reported - view

    I’m realizing that my A clarinet and I just haven’t spent much time together, and ooh it shows. (Also, it needs some de-clunking: I think there’s a bit of teflon or whatever missing somewhere in the low F# zone, and it’s noisy.) So progress on 3 and 4 was less spectacular: I think I went from a max of 76 to 88, partly because of key click distractions and partly because I want the sound to be smooth and consistent and that is eluding me in #3. The 6ths and 7ths are a good challenge…!

    Track 147 Track 144
      • Head of Clarinet
      • Heather
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       Hi Katherine - nice work, my A clarinet also needs some work on it so I felt this. 

      Something to try might be at least temporarily memorising #3 and then working through it with your eyes closed, it might help you to just "feel" it a little better?

      But your sound is as ever just great! 

      • Katherine_Carleton
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       love this suggestion! My brain is definitely getting in the way. 

    • Alison_Saunders
    • 2 wk ago
    • Reported - view

    HI Heather,

    This has been a great challenge, and although I am not a video person I am pleased to have been able to record increases in speed in all exercises over the month. I am now incorporating them all in every warm up session, interleaving them between scale blocks and Rose & Kell studies and etudes. Some days I turn the MM off and just concentrate on tone, evenness of fingers and perfecting the side to side changes that catch hold me up sometimes. 

    Thanks for the encouragement, I've enjoyed this new material very much. 

    Is the book you sourced it from primarily a low register etude book? Do you think it is worth the investment? I am currently working my way through the Kell and Rose etudes books, would these books be enough to cover similar attributes of improving technique. Thanks for your help.

    I'm really keen to move to the finger dexterity challenge as well, I'll keep an eye out for it.

    Hope you are feeling better x

      • Head of Clarinet
      • Heather
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       Hi Alison,

      Thank you so much for writing about your experience, it's great to read. I particularly love to read that the exercises are being integrated into your warm up :)

      All of the exercises are part of Avrahm Galper's Tone, Technique and Staccato - I discovered this book relatively recently when another colleague told me about it, but it has a lot of great stuff, I've been wanting to get some of his other books for integration into our challenge programme here. It does reprint some things that already exist elsewhere (like the Kroepsch studies, which we did some of in the July challenge), and I think if you're going to get one book I would go for the Jean Jean Vade Mecum (I'm going to use parts of it for the next challenge!) but this is definitely a good one!

      Feeling much better thank you :) 

    • Katherine_Carleton
    • 2 wk ago
    • Reported - view

    Okay, here are 5 and 6, with some increase in tempo: 5 has gone from 112–>126 and 6 has gone from 100–>112. Great warmups: I learn something every time. 

    Track 157 Track 158
      • Head of Clarinet
      • Heather
      • 2 wk ago
      • Reported - view

       The SPEED! This is great, I also love how close your fingers stay to the instrument, it all just looks very efficient (not the most musical description but for this exercise it's a five star review). 

      What I can't tell from a video (or without being you really) is how relaxed it feels to do this - we don't want to introduce any unnecessary tension into the movement so you know, give your shoulders and hands a little shake out and remind them they can move just as fast with no tension :)

      • Katherine_Carleton
      • 10 days ago
      • Reported - view

       I just re-watched a couple of my videos from the final “speed” week, and I definitely observe that I’ve got a bit of a terminator vibe going: ordinarily I move a LOT when I play, and in these, I’m stock still (by my standards) and very fierce of face! It’s not exactly tension but there’s certainly something machine-like happening… 

Login to reply

Content aside

  • 10 days agoLast active
  • 11Replies
  • 24Views
  • 3 Following