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Many Strings - One Journey My own violin learning path
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Preface |
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My lessons in Holland ended well before we emigrated to the United States when I was nine. They would begin again after we arrived in our new home. From that time on, I saved my study materials. Unraveling the threads of my musical journey turned out to be a bit more complicated than anticipated. Not all my early teachers dated the material. Some put dates but no years. I studied with a number of teachers between early adolescence and the end of my college years, and revisiting this music, I find their handwriting confusingly similar. There was some overlap in the materials I studied, especially the Kreutzer Etudes. But I can reconstruct some of the repertory I studied with each teacher, which might help to unravel the mystery. As an adult, I studied for almost three more years with a wonderful teacher and kept diligent practice diaries. This page will thus evolve as part memoir, part blog, part attempt to make sense of my own pedagogical path-- illuminating in itself and possibly helpful if I decide one day to open a studio. I have also added links to some of the music available at Sheet Music Plus, one of my own sources for obtaining new sheet music.
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Chapter 1: Heartland Strings - Early Lessons in America |
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Our new home in the U.S. was in Lawrence, Kansas. Through the generosity of a violin professor at Kansas University, I received the gift of my first violin lessons in the U.S. His name was Karel Blaas, and he was himself of Dutch ancestry. When I began taking lessons with him, I had already joined the Junior High School orchestra. For my lessons, I would walk "up the hill" from our three-story rental home, which had once been a sorority house and which we rented for $90 per month, to the beautiful KU campus. My studies with Professor Blaas ended when our family of eight moved to California. Professor Blaas was a caring teacher and even wrote me a letter after I had moved, encouraging me to also consider studying viola, which he believed would open up greater opportunities in the future. I was too young to ever properly express my gratitude to this kind violinist. |
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I likely began Wohlfahrt
Sixty Sudies, Book 1 (Nos. 1-30) with Professor Blaas, or perhaps
it was my next teacher
that started me on it. Unlike later books, few markings appear in it except
for the first etude, where I am encouraged to use lots of bow and which
delineates the order in which I am to practice the variations. Later, checkmarks and crosses
appear for assigned etudes. It looks as if I skipped
around in this book quite a bit, perhaps studying ten of the etudes. |
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| These studies are now available at Sheet Music Plus as part of an amazing, huge library of violin studies on CD: Violin Methods & Studies: The Ultimate Collection (Version 2.0). You print them yourself, but considering how one skips around in method books, this is not a bad idea! It is an incredible bargain considering the vastness of the library! | ||||||||||||||
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I also studied two books by Harvey S. Whistler during this time, entitled Introducing the Positions. Volume I covered the third and fifth position.Volume II covered the second, fourth, sixth, and seventh positions. My edition was by Rubank, Inc. Looking at it now, these volumes seem attractive with their mix of preparatory studies, etudes by various composers such as Wohlfahrt, Mazas, Sitt, Rode, and DeBeriot, and appealing performance pieces, including some duos. Various keys are presented in these volumes, but "extreme" keys are avoided. Pages in my edition were laid out so that the studies are quite readable--not too densely packed on the page (this actually makes a difference as far as intimidation factors go!). |
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My clearest recollection is studying two student concerti with Professor Blaas, both in A minor: the Accola˙ and Vivaldi. My Accola˙ Concerto was the Schirmer edition. Either there were fewer editions to choose from then, or Schirmer was the least expensive. My copy says $1.00! My old Schirmer copy of the Accola˙ has suggestions by my teacher for up and down shifting--I must have been in process of becoming familiar with the higher positions. On a melodic passage on the second page it tells me to sing and to practice the passage an octave lower. Subsequent pages bear fewer markings, although I remember finishing the piece. |
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TO BE CONTINUED IN CHAPTER 2 |
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These pages were created between January 21 and January 27, 2008. Key words: learning violin, violin learning path, violin learning journey, Many Strings, One Journey, Dorothy Barth, traditional violin study, violin performance, violin pedagogy, violin teachers |
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