Boot Camp Week 3 - Five Weeks to Better

If you have been playing along at home, you have probably already started seeing differences in your practice and your playing. I hope this encourages you to keep at it.  Consistency may be the most important practice element of all, and it is certainly one of the most underrated!

As before, you can focus on this week’s activities or you can add this on top of the previous weeks – whatever works well for you.*

Stretch – Bow, no, b-o-w!  Because so many of us are dedicated (or foolish) we may sit at the harp for long stretches of time.  Many do not realize how much work this can be for the hips, back, legs, and core.  One soothing, relaxing stretch is to bow.  You can do this from the bench or while standing.  From the bench, sit away from the harp and with both feet flat on the floor and knees apart (wider than if you were playing), hands resting on your thighs, hinge forward from the hip with your back flat (this is easiest if you keep your head up).  Move slowly and deliberately into the stretch.  Keep your core strong.  Go as deeply into the stretch as you are able.  Breathe.  Now, slowly lower your head, round your back and let your arms dangle.  Breathe!  You can stay here as long as you like (and as long as you continue to breathe).  When you’re ready, s-l-o-w-l-y roll up to your starting position.  If you prefer to stand, start with your feet shoulder width apart, weight balanced, knees soft, and hinge forward as above.  Be sure to monitor and maintain your balance.

Technique – Ornaments.  Sorry, this is not the fun of decorating but the work of adding ornaments to tunes.  To practice ornamentation, you need control.  To get light, accurate, beautiful ornaments – you must control your fingers and the strings to control the weight and length of the notes.  As you know, ornaments are light, quick, and ahead of the beat.  To get them light and quick, practice them.  Today we are looking at cuts (you can, of course, extend this to other ornaments, but let’s focus here for now).  This is a variation of the intervals you did in Boot Camp Week 1.  Select your favorite key and scale and work your way, in intervals of a second, from root to octave and back again.  Play the first note (the cut) just ahead of the beat with the second note occurring on the beat (because I’m sure you are counting, even if playing scales!).  Be careful to work slowly and make the first note light and quick; the second will be heavier and have all the weight of a proper note. Quicklight/HEAVYFULL.  When you have it in the right hand (where you are going to use it most) do it in the left hand.  While you might not ever make an ornament in the left hand, practicing that level of control will only serve you well. Once you have that down, move to different intervals (use the 3^rd, the 4^th, the 5^th, etc.) and learn which ones you like best.  If some are more challenging than others – well, now you know where you need to direct more work!

Practice Element – Dynamics.  Since we’re already working on control – let’s extend that to dynamics.  Being in control of the harp gives you a better firmament from which to build more musicality and presentation.  Dynamics often get short shrift or just forgotten.  Now this might be forgivable (m-i-g-h-t) in a set of dance tunes, it is unforgiveable in songs and airs or any classical music.  The dynamics are one of the easiest things you can do to help you sell the story, so they are definitely an important part of playing.  The point of injecting dynamics is to enhance the inflection of the tune.  Dynamics don’t always have to be dramatic – even small changes really make an impact to your listeners.  To start practicing dynamics, first think about the markings for crescendo/decrescendo – a very long arrow – that’s how you want to play.  Let’s stick to a major scale and play it with those arrows – start very small and build the sound as you go up to the octave. Each note should be just noticeably louder than the note before.  On the way down, do the opposite with each note just noticeably softer than the previous.  This week there’s a twofer – after you’ve done those scales, follow it with a three-scale – place your fingers for the scale and play each note three times – p, mf, f (always with the same finger) up the octave and f, mf, p on the way back down.  When you’ve mastered one hand, move on to the other, and then do both together – always careful to assure you have the volume you intended.  Too easy? This time do the same scale but as you go up play f, mf, p (and when it’s too easy go to four fff, mf, mp, ppp) and come down at p, mf, f (or ppp, mp, mf, fff).  Bored? Now play the scales with two hands – play the left hand p and the right hand f, then switch.  Be careful but gentle – and do the work you need to do.  Soon you’ll have the skill to be as dynamic and dramatic as you wish – for each tune – exactly as you mean to deliver it!

Hang in there - you're more than half the way there and you're building a solid practice habit! 

*Remember that I’m not that kind of doctor, so please be careful, work within your own abilities (which isn’t to say don’t stretch yourself but also, don’t hurt yourself!). Be careful and only do what you can do. This blog pro­vides gen­eral infor­ma­tion about trying to stay health and other sub­jects related to playing the harp. All the con­tent pro­vided in this blog, and in any linked mate­ri­als, is not intended to be, and should not be con­strued to be, med­ical advice. If you have a med­ical con­cern, con­sult with an appropriately-licensed physi­cian or other health care worker. Never dis­re­gard pro­fes­sional med­ical advice or delay seek­ing it because of some­thing you have read on this blog or in any linked materials. If you think you may have a med­ical emer­gency, call your doc­tor or 911 immediately. The views expressed on this blog and web­site have no rela­tion to those of any academic, hospital, practice or other insti­tu­tion with which the author is affiliated. Don’t be thick – these are just suggestions – take care of you!