Five ways to practice "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" variation

Five (+) ways to practice "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star". You can warmup with this song for any technical aspect you're working on and make up your own variation.

 1. Yummy yummy cup cakes rhythm 

2. Play on only E & G strings 

3. Long bow with vibrato 

4. Double-stops 

5. Improvise with the chord tones. 

 

 

How to practice scales efficiently | for Beginner Violinists

 

 

[written version]

 

At every stage of violin practice, we practice scales.

Because scales are the fundamental of all the melodies and extremely beneficial.

This is a tip for the very beginning of the violin study.

Just because it’s written in your book, 

I don’t recommend  jump into playing one octave scale immediately. 

If you are still new to move the bow down and up, 

changing notes at every bow change can be challenging 

and also because the notes pass fairly quickly that 

you might not recognize when you are not playing in tune. 

This ends you up practicing the wrong intonation. 

So, here’s my suggestion.

I use this App, Cleartune.

Click the right side button and you will be able to hear a note of your choice continuously.

Ideally, put your phone connected to a speaker so that you can hear it well.

Let’s play D major scale for example.

Set the note to D. Adjust the octave.

Repeat each note, let’s say, 4 times, and move on to the next note. 

You can do it at your comfortable tempo.

When you are done with 4 times cycle up and down, 

Move on to 3 times per note.

Then, 2 times.

Then, finally, once per note.

During this set, you’re also working on your bow. Make sure the bow is parallel to the bridge.

And the bow is placed in the middle of the bridge and the edge of the fingerboard. Aim to get a beautiful tone.

 

When you complete this, you’re nicely warmed up and ready to dive into whatever you’re working on.

Happy practicing!

The magic of playing the music you love.

Today, one of my student played the piece she wanted to play for long time. In the past, we practiced the scale she needed to know beforehand to play the piece, but it had been long time passed since she mentioned about the piece. Today, I gave her the transcription that I made for her and we finally started to learn the piece. With a big smile, she said, "I can't believe I'm playing this song now. I'd listened to it so much for long time, but never played.". I love watching my students having the sparkles in their eyes and they just can't wait to learn more. Yes, that's passion.


It is challenging to pickup the violin to practice when you are busy in general. How much time do you really have? If you're kids, you have school to attend, homework to do and playing with friends are also important. If you're adult, you have bills to pay, laundry to do, endless things to take care of. On top of that, on your free time, you have so many other pleasurable things available with one click. Especially, nowadays, YouTube, Amazon, Netflix, Facebook or any other social media, online shopping, HBO Go, etc... And they would easily take away all of your free time that you were originally planning to practice the violin.


I think the key to successfully keep playing the violin is a lot to do with one's mental discipline.
But when we say "mental discipline", somehow it feels torturous. It doesn't sound fun. But it doesn't have to be.

The first step is to keep the positive attitude towards violin. Yes, you have to have passion.

As a teacher, I cannot give students passion. I can be passionate myself and that can be inspiring to students, but students have to have their own passion.

To own this passion is actually an important part of practice. You have to have a positive feeling and have almost like a burning desire when you think about violin playing. And if you don't have the feeling right now, you can still have it, but have to make an effort and "practice" for it.

How?

We all have the music we love.
It doesn't have to be the music played on the violin. Anything you like.

Think about the music you love.

Feel the music.

Sing it with passion. (If you don't want to sing, you can do it in your head.)

Imagine yourself playing that on the violin.

And now, play it on the violin.

If you don't know how to play it yet, decide that you will someday and,

Stick with the desire.

If you can, find the easier version of it for now.
Nowadays, it's very easy to find sheet music for anything.

And while you work on the easy version, you work on the technique that you need to own to play the music.

But don't forget about the music you love during the process.

Generate the good feeling and keep the feeling.


Here is my story...
As a kid, I had a bad attitude towards violin, hated practicing. My mother was yelling at me (she was my teacher), I was not playing well and I was thinking myself as a failure of being disciplined and not talented enough and it was emotionally painful. And I was playing the music I was given and didn't really love at that time. I had a passive attitude. And I didn't even try to play the music I loved that moment. It didn't occur to my mind to do it because I was dealing with stressful feeling and also, I didn't know if it was an option. Simply, unmotivated and uninspired. I was not playing as much and almost quit.

And one day, I decided to play jazz on it. I discovered jazz a few years before and fell in love. And all of sudden, I had so much excitement and inspiration and playing the violin more than ever. It took no efforts to pick up the violin. And the inspiration never went away. I am happier than ever. I found the music I truly love.


If you haven't, you have to find the music you really love.

It can be a song, a simple melody or a fragment of a riff that you heard from a  movie that's stuck in your mind.

You can play any music on violin. And it is you who can decide to do it and make a move. Be active. Be passionate. Make practicing the violin as pleasurable as possible. You don't have to play the music you don't really like. Play the music you love.


To me, that is the key to success.