12 / 10 / 2011

Today, we were first given handout about music notation. We were given some time to read it and prepare questions that we wanted to ask. I asked a question, and now I already know the answer because the teacher explained it. After that, we wrote our first draft for the music composition for this semester on a sheet of paper and we submitted it to our music theory teacher, Mr. Herry. I think, the lesson today about notation was not very hard, but I will try to read the handout again at home to understand better. After this, I am going to check my composition with my instrument teacher and try to play it. I will also ask for some advices from my instrument teacher about my composition.

26 / 10 / 2011

Today, we first learned about scales. We were told that western music uses the diatonic scales, which are the major and minor scales. We also learned about the types of music, such as rondo, sonata, and also concerto. After that, we got homework. Our homework is to make the 16 bars composition of pop song with the pattern AA'BA'. We were also given our scores of the practical assessment. I was told that I got 9 out of 10. I am satisfied with my score, but I will have to learn to play harder songs because I am in grade 10. I think, the lesson today was not very hard, it's kind of simple and easy to understand.

Practice 7

This is my last practice before my term 1 practical assessment. Therefore, I did my practice alone without my friend. I think, my preparation so far is already good, I just need to do regular practices before my assessment so that I can do my best on the assessment and I will be able to get high score for my assessment later on. If I take a look at the previous practices, I think this one is already improved and it's quite good already.

Practice 6

This is my second video practicing alone without my friend. I think, I have improved a bit compared to the last practice. I didn't do any major mistakes this time, which will affect my score on my real practical assessment later on. I just need to practice again to make it more fluent and I will also have to practice with faster tempo because I will have to play faster on the assessment later on.

Practice 5

In this video, I tried to practice my assessment song again. But, this time I did it alone without my friend, and I asked my friend's feedback after I recorded this video as the input for me. I think it's quite good, but I still made mistakes. So, I will need to practice more.

Practice 4

In this video, my friend and I tried to play the song "Perpetual Motion" in faster tempo to practice our hands (bowing). However, I dont think we can play in this tempo in the mean time. We still need to practice a lot more so when we play with faster tempo, the notes will still be clear and sound good, unlike this time.

Practice 3

In this video, my friend and I were doing our third practice before our assessment as our preparations for it. I think, both of us have improved compared to before. But, there were still some off pitch sounds which were made by both of us. Therefore, we still need a lot more practices and we have to learn to play the song on pitch to avoid bad sounds.

Practice 2

This is my second practice with my friend as the preparation for our upcoming practical assessment. Compared to the last practices, I think this one is a bit better than the previous one. However, this is not good enough for our assessment. So, I will do more practices to prepare myself for the assessment later on.

Practice 1

In this video, I was practicing the song that I chose for my practical assessment. I did the practice together with my friend because we chose the same song for the assessment. Since this is our first practice, we were not good enough, so we will just do more practices to make our performance better later on.

Practice

In this video, I was practicing one of the songs from the violin book. I actually wanted this to be the song for my practical assessment. But then I changed my mind and my teacher also suggested my to play the other song instead of playing this song. So, I count this as just the warming up or the practice before I play my assessment song.

Warming up

In this video, I was playing one of the songs in Suzuki Violin Book Vol. 1 which is a good song for warming up. This song helped me to practice on the fingering because my fingers need to move fastly in this song. It helped me to play violin more fluently. I think there were some notes which were still off pitch in this video. So, I will need more practices to be better.

2 octaves scales practice

In this video, I was practicing A Major in 2 octaves with my friend. This is the continuation of the previous practices which I had before. I think, I still have to do a lot more practices so I can play better than this. I have to be good at this first because this is the basic of any songs that I'm going to play later on. Therefore, I have to be able to play this fluently first before I learn more songs later on.

Higher octave practice

In this video, me and my friend practice A Major scale (higher octave) as our warming up exercise. I think, I still did bad in this video. So, I will learn even more to play violin fluently so it will also sound better than this.

Scale lower octave practice

In this video, I was practicing A Major (lower octave) with my friend. We did this practice as the warming up before we played our assessment song which is the "Perpetual Motion in A Major".