Hi everyone!
Look below to find the review for your orchestra. Please be sure to practice at home!
Beginning Orchestra
This week, students completed their playing check-ins for The Salamander Samba. If you haven’t recorded a video yet, you can send it to me via email or you can upload it onto our Google Drive Drop Folder. All students are supposed to play between letter A and letter B in Salamander Samba.
I also taught the students where to find the practice videos and how to use them. Practice videos can be found in two places — on our website under the Updates tab, or on our YouTube channel under “Spring 2024 Practice Videos.” Use these resources to practice at home!
This week, we reviewed all of The Salamander Samba. We also finished learning On a Swing. You should be able to practice all of both of these songs! (especially with the practice videos!)
We also started learning our “patterns” for Royal Promenade. This week, students have an assignment to learn 4 measures of Royal Promenade, as follows:
- Cello and Bass: measures 5-9
- Viola and 2nd Violins (new violin students): measures 9-13
- 1st Violins (returning violin students): measures 13-17
If students can practice these sections at home, it will really help us, because each is a pattern that repeats several times in this piece.
Intermediate Orchestra
This week, I taught the students where to find the practice videos and how to use them. Practice videos can be found in two places — on our website under the Updates tab, or on our YouTube channel under “Spring 2024 Practice Videos.” Use these resources to practice at home!
Here is what we accomplished during rehearsal:
- Icicles — We now know the whole thing, but it is a little rough, especially in the middle. We worked on measures 25-33 quite a bit because it is an important part. Make sure that when you don’t have staccatos, you are using nice long bows!
- Guldfaxe — This week, we worked on Guldfaxe from the beginning until measure 27. I would like to learn the middle part next week, so please practice measures 27-43 at home.
- The Abandoned Funhouse — Overall, this is sounding great! We need to get more confident on each part and work on the balance. Violas did a great job of bringing out their melody from 41-53 — make sure you play nice and strong there!
- Momentous — We are no longer going to be playing Momentous, so you don’t need to bother practicing it. I want to make sure we have enough time to get the other songs down before our concert. I’m sorry if this comes as a disappointment to anyone!
Advanced Orchestra
This week, I taught the students where to find the practice videos and how to use them. Practice videos can be found in two places — on our website under the Updates tab, or on our YouTube channel under “Spring 2024 Practice Videos.” Use these resources to practice at home!
Here is what we accomplished during rehearsal:
- Turbulence — We can almost play this one through without stopping, but we often have a section or two where we fall apart. We especially worked on measure 56 until the end this week.
- Bones — This is sounding great! We went through some rhythms in measures 24-32 for 2nds, violas, and cellos. Everyone should practice the music between measures 47 and measure 55, as this will likely be the subject of our next playing check-in.
- Appalachian Sunrise — We are still a little shaky on this one — okay, maybe a lot shaky — but we did get through the whole thing. This song has a lot of complicated interacting parts, so please get comfortable on your notes so that we can work on those details together.
- Momentous — We are no longer going to be playing Momentous, so you don’t need to bother practicing it. I want to make sure we have enough time to get the other songs down before our concert. I’m sorry if this comes as a disappointment to anyone!