Month: August 2024

Gold Star

Last week I got my first “gold star” after successfully perfecting (to my teacher’s liking) Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. It wasn’t actually gold, instead it was a star that my teacher drew in my book, It wasn’t any ordinary star, either, he drew a ballerina star, with “ballerina hands”, a tutu, and a bun. Absolutely delightful.

In yesterday’s lesson, he taught me the beginnings of understanding how to conduct an orchestra. I find these little details and nuances absolutely fascinating, wanting to know every little thing about this instrument I can manage. He told me his goal is to teach me everything he knows. Bring it.

We also started working on the next song in the book, Lightly Row, which I’m trying to be diligent about actually learning how to read the music rather than just memorizing which notes come when. That can work at these beginning stages, but as I progress it will only become a disadvantage. I guess I was doing well enough on this song, making it more difficult for myself by insisting on using the A string for the E note, rather than using an open E string, but I have been struggling with the A string E note and wanted to take this opportunity to work on it. Apparently, I was getting the E note perfectly, then struggling to get the C#, which usually is opposite for people. Learning and remembering the hand shape and placement for each string and set of notes is something I’m still working on, as is setting my thumb position to have my fingers be where I need them to be, the most difficult being that E note on the A string. Staring the song with it skews the hand shape, which is another reason I wanted to work on it — figuring out all the ins and outs here at the beginning so I have a better foundation to build upon.

From there, my teacher decided to throw me a curve ball. He told me to play the open G string, open D string, then B, A, B, A, B on the A string, back to D, then G. Then he transcribed Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 in G for the cello to the violin and had me muddle through it. He showed me what it’s supposed to sound like when you get it down perfectly, which of course I don’t have the timing or inflection yet, but when he handed me back Beulah (my violin) I was able to at least hit each of the notes properly and from there can build to the proper inflection. It blew his mind. He commented to the fact that if I see him do it, I’m able to copy it really well. I’ve always assumed I was a visual learner, as I took to American Sign Language really well (and had circumstances allowed, would have been a deaf interpreter) even using the language to study for tests as I was better able to remember the signs and interpret them than I was to remember words on a page. Having that translate to violin certainly is interesting.

He explained that if I sing the notes to myself, do, re, mi, fa, so, la, ti, do, that I’ll have better success in finding the note on the violin, knowing what it’s supposed to sound like. “Good singers make good violinists, and you’re a good singer.” This blew my mind. I’m definitely not the singer in the family, my sister has always had a natural talent for that. I remember being told I wasn’t a good singer, even having friends laugh at me when I would go flat and have no clue that I had. I became extremely embarrassed to even try, having no clue what I was supposed to sound like or afraid I’d go flat and not know it again. However, I was able to run a sound board by ear with no training, so there was a spark of hope that maybe I just needed to be shown or have things explained to me. I’ve been too timid to seek this out yet, though my violin instructor also teaches voice, so we’re sort of addressing it inadvertently. Having him say, so nonchalantly, “you’re a good singer” healed something in me.

I’m already still shocked, and sort of expecting that surely any day now he’s gonna take it back, being told I’m a natural at violin. I’ve watched shows and movies and seen the protagonist be naturally good at something and all these doors casually open for her and always thought that was completely unrealistic. However, now I find myself in a situation where it actually is real and it just still seems so fake to me. There’s no way that I have found something I’m actually a natural at. There’s no way.

Even so, this doesn’t mean I have an excuse not to work hard.

Of course, I’ll have less time to work on violin as much as I want with Nutcracker season starting up, but any little bit I can do is better than nothing through this season, and will fuel the fire of the love I have for this instrument. Progress is progress, no matter how small, and I’m grateful to have found this creative endeavor and am hoping I’m able to continue in it for years to come.

Highs and lows.

In light of keeping things real here, today was a rough day. I’ve been having some health stuff going on that’s making me nervous, seeing new doctors, could be nothing or could be big somethings and all of this is veiled in a healthy dose of past medical trauma (literally someone did a magazine write up on one of my “horror stories” a couple years back) which just sets me on edge.

With violin, i’ve had a bit of an underlying fear that i’d eventually get to a point where something doesn’t quite click and I form a mental block I can’t get past like I did with math in fourth grade. I have a brain for math, but there’s a few things that had a disconnect that I couldn’t quite communicate well enough to find a way past. (Queue the stereotype of “some of yall didn’t have your dad yelling, “WHATS SEVEN TIMES EIGHT” at the kitchen table while helping you with your math homework and it show” in all its glory, multiply it by most math teachers, it’s a good time.) So far, though, we’ve been able to work through any little hiccups we have come across and i’ve been able to carry on in my learning of this beautiful instrument. Today we got down to more theory nitty-gritty and approached another disconnect.

At first I felt it — that knot in your throat and the weight in your chest where you can feel panic on the brink. If i’m not careful, it’ll make my brain completely shut down, which is where I find I struggle to explain any disconnect in a way that helps us find a way past it. But today I was determined to not let it get the best of me. I was able to recognize it was there, take a moment to gather my thoughts in how to express what my brain was processing and where I wasn’t connecting the dots, and David was able to perfectly interpret everything into something I could understand.

Crisis averted.

What’s more, the knowledge that came out of it on the other side is what I feel to be a huge step in my growth as a violinist. Big things that are essentially stepping stones in your progress with this instrument were laid today and the possibilities from here were opened up for me like a dog going through a door that was opened and running full pelt through a meadow of wildflowers to its hearts content.

We worked more on the Interstellar main theme that we have been playing around with since the beginning, but now we’ve gone to the next step where things get faster and include more strings. It’s a huge challenge, one that is definitely above my current skill set, but one that I feel I can begin attempting. I told David, “once I get this i’m going to feel like such a badass” and I know it to be fact.

Safe to say i’m riding a violin high — one I am extremely grateful to be able to experience, especially with so many challenges in life currently. Violin has given me something even ballet wasn’t fully able to offer. Ballet filled so many holes I had in my life, and effectively losing that was a huge blow, but violin is giving me the fulfillment I have so deeply craved and then some as it’s a whole other world experiencing something to which you are naturally inclined. It’s a beautiful thing when what you’re good at and what you love doing collide, and i’m going to chase this high for the rest of my life.