Category Archives: Technique

When you've had some time away from the cello, coming back throws into sharp relief all the things you were good at and the issues you glossed over. This is something I know well – my fourth finger extensions are not magically better after having a baby, even if my allergies have miraculously disappeared (knock on wood). My F-sharp on the C string is just as dodgy and crap as it ever was. 

What is rapidly becoming apparent is whatever bad habits you have a musician visit you no matter what instrument you're playing at the moment. For me, it's swallowing notes mid-phrase/run and rushing off before finishing notes properly. I have it written all through my flute music from when I was 12 and ran up against it (again) in my cello lesson yesterday. Hilarious! 

The swallowing notes mid-phrase is fairly easy to sort, and I don't do it as often as I abandon the ends of notes. That's a bit harder to rectify as I've never managed to consistently sort it out. I suppose as a lover of ensemble playing in orchestras, you don't tend to hear the ends of your own notes much – and if you do you've screwed it up and likely have the baleful eye of your section leader on you and WILL NEVER DO IT AGAIN I PROMISE. 

At the moment I'm not playing in any ensembles, so don't have the time pressure of learning orchestral music on top of anything solo I'm doing in my lessons – nowhere to hide, in a different way. 

Emily had me play a single note to represent the three note slur, so I could concentrate on ending it properly. I'm finding I have to take phrases out of context entirely so I'm not tempted to read ahead and lose concentration. Mindfulness, you could call it. 

Take this as a reminder to go practice something you hate for awhile, just so it doesn't come back and get you later. 

So. Remember THREE YEARS AGO when I was lamenting relearning my bow hold? I told you the story of having to relearn my flute embouchure a few times due to braces messing with my mouth. 

Guess what? I'm at it again. Not an entire relearning episode, more of a refinement. I think I'm finally understanding what tutors, private teachers, chamber music coaches etc have been trying to explain. No, that's not right either, I understood, but getting the meat to do what my brain was thinking took some doing. Maybe I needed to be forced into 10 minute practice segments by a well-meaning but bored small person. Who knows. 

Pivoting at the thumb was the starting point. Watching the pros, you can see that beautiful snap of the wrist as they change bow direction. Watch the man-of-the-featherweight-bow-arm Steven Isserlis for a minute or two:

See the way he leans into his index finger on the upbows? Emily kindly phrased it: 'You don't much like upbows do you?' Ha. Downbows I get, they are like notes you blow into a woodwind. Upbows are this weird other character of note I've never totally got onboard with. As usual, the cello Knows when I don't feel comfortable with something and telegraphs it to the rest of the world.

Thanks for that.

But, by the same token, as soon as I got my hand and wrist moving a bit more, pivoting around my thumb, the sound improved loads. I suddenly had much more to work with, there's more richness and depth. 

This is one small step, but such a palpable one. 

I am feeling a bit despondent about cello playing at the moment. I had originally thought I'd be able to return to orchestra in January, but with the lack of practice and reality of the little monkey – there's no way. I love playing in orchestra, it's the reason I took up this instrument and came back to playing. Chamber music is fun sometimes, and being able to sit down and play music on my own is enjoyable – but it's the incredible thrill of creating a huge sweeping sound with 30 people (or more) that gives me goosebumps. 

Elliot is all unsettled in his schedule, and at the moment is very clingy and wants to be sitting on me all day. I can barely make my own lunch without six interruptions for cuddles, waving toys around and singing silly songs – washing my hair regularly is a challenge. Unfortunately cello playing comes a bit down the list from hair washing. I love spending all this time with him, and my frustration over lack of cello practice, I admit, only features in my thoughts for about 2 minutes a day. I'm still struggling to find a time to make it work. I may have to realise that once a week is all I can manage for awhile. Of course, this is all coming from the land of sleep deprivation, and I need to keep in mind that things will seem much more possible when I've slept for more than three hours at a stretch. 

Speaking of orchestra, I brought Elliot to rehearsal to meet everyone a couple weeks ago. It was hilarious to stand at the front with him to greet everyone. I played a concert when I was pregnant, and everyone had seen my scan pictures, so they all knew Elliot was on his way. He was fascinated by the instruments. Elliot got up close and personal with a violin, and our conductor who is a pro cellist played for him at tea break. Gorgeous. What a lucky little boy!

I'm still too big to play cello and it's starting to get to me. I took out my flute for the first time since I became pregnant and ran a few scales before pulling out an old Platti Sonata. My embouchure was a bit fuzzy in the high register and breath support was not incredible, but not as bad as I thought it would be considering I'm very VERY pregnant at this stage.

I had an email through from All Flutes Plus, the shop where I get my instrument serviced here in London, and tacked on the bottom there was this little list of technique pointers. Some of them were straightforward stuff, like keep your keys parallel to the ceiling (though how many pros do I see practically planting their instrument into their neighbour's lap). But the note about 'legato fingers' was an interesting one.

It was referring to not letting the keys spring up under your fingers in slower pieces, but it's such a simple idea, I think it could work well for cello playing as well. I man, I've spent time thinking of precision placement in my left hand, pressing into the fingerboard to get get good tone… but the idea of 'legato fingers' brings to mind fluid movement, this could be a good concept for approaching long runs where it's tempting to think about each note in turn, instead of the phrase and where it's going. Personally I find it difficult to think legato fingers and clench at the same time, so it could go a little way to unlocking some of that left hand tension.

Can't wait to give it a go.

There's a hilarious post over on the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment blog about the paperwork the staff need to complete to perform in the US. There's been some talk lately about how horrible the UK is to travelling musicians trying to get their visas to perform here – but I wonder if it's that much worse than anywhere else. I'm personally in the middle of getting Indefinite Leave to Remain status here in the UK with my husband, as well as figuring out how to register our as-yet-unborn son registered as a Canadian citizen and a settled UK resident. Strangely, my son can have a UK passport before he's allowed a Canadian one, despite both my husband and I being Canadian citizens – his paperwork will take 18 months to go through, apparently. 

I can only imagine the chaos of trying to get 38 musicians through this entire process as well, we're only dealing with three. I do remember, though, being on the receiving end of panicked phone calls from orchestra tour managers asking me to change the horn player and the harpist in the programme, because the visas didn't come through in time. I do not envy them, I tell you. 

As I was madly practising for our concert the other night, I noticed that my vibrato is better from imitating our section leader. It's not perfect by any means, but my movement is freer and bigger than it was before. I completely attribute it to sitting behind such a good cellist.

You know how when you've signed the lease on your new flat, but it's been awhile since you've seen it (I'm speaking from current experience here) so it shrinks in your head to the size of a shoebox?

Well maybe I got all worked up about how crap I was thinking my tone was, and maybe it wasn't as bad as I had thought. I mean, there's a whole lot of work to do, but not as grim as previously estimated.

So off to bed with me… and tomorrow I go to our new place and I'm going to measure it, so I can stop with the freaking out already.

I'm frustrated.

I feel like my fingers have progressed further than my bow arm. Does that make sense? Essentially, I can do all sorts of things with my left hand that just isn't being supported by the tone I can make.

And I'm not quite sure how to practise that bit.

It's funny how all the areas of cello playing that I find the hardest, are the ones that came to me relatively naturally in flute playing. I somehow managed to get a good full sound on flute, not that breathy horrible, spitty sounding thing I hear sometimes, even in professional orchestras.

But how do I transfer that clarity of sound to this giant wooden box with strings I've decided to learn?

Is it slow bow practise? Is it listening…? But what am I meant to be doing while listening? Or what?

I feel a bit stuck. I normally have an idea of how to fix something – I just happen to not quite do enough of it. But I really don't know. I've been practising like mad lately, so it's not that. Though I've been doing mad hyperventilation orchestral part practising, not necessarily the most tone-focussed practise I've ever done.

A small part of me is freaking in the back of my mind – can I ever make a nice noise?

Yesterday I had one of those rehearsals that makes you want to quit amateur music ensembles entirely.

Granted, I was the crankiest girl alive and through my own faffing getting out the door I didn't leave myself enough time to get coffee. And it was pissing down in sideways rain. So clearly I was feeling really patient with the world.

But we're playing this Haydn quartet in full string orchestra, and it feels like we have to discuss the same bloody things every week. I'm not kidding, we have discussed that the cellos are a) too loud, b) too heavy and c) too clunky every week for about a month and a half. I'm playing so quietly and lightly I can't even hear myself, but I can hear two desks behind me are sawing their instruments in half. IT DRIVES ME MAD.

I love that orchestra for its inclusive nature, and how friendly everyone is and all that – but sometimes everyone is a little too nice. Or maybe I'm too cranky. I don't know. I ended up just going home at tea break so I didn't say anything horrible to anyone.