Recently I was asked if I could provide some example how to practice fast ascending passages. Well, sure I can.
Today we’ll have a look at some measures in Bruch’s Violin Concerto in g-Minor:
A few bars later we find a corresponding passage which we’ll have to deal with today:
A rather difficult part of the piece. The practicing is made even more difficult because of the septuplet. It doesn’t fit in our 4 our 8 note pattern and, additionally, it is too short to play it in a 7 note pattern.
Personally, I would play those passages “the other way round”. I would start at the end and proceed to the beginning.
The advantage: I have already practiced the most difficult part, the higher positions, before I get on to the fast notes. So the shift shouldn’t be that difficult any more.
We start at the end:
Be careful to use the original fingering and bowing. Otherwise you would practice something you won’t need at all if you put the passage together. If intonation is good we should try to play the notes in the original tempo.
Let’s go on:
I didn’t write any fingering here because that’s mostly a matter of taste. But many violinists play the “d” in the third position and shift to the eighth position on the “g”.
This way we also practice the shift upward. If any problems occur we have to play the shift seperately, consisting merely of “d” and “g”.
If we are happy with this we add two notes:
That looks easy, but keep in mind: It’s precision that counts.
The few notes before this we practice isolated as well:
And we put together what we have done so far:
Now comes the most interesting part. As I mentioned above the septuplet is harder to play, also because of rhythmical reasons. It’s simply more difficult to imagine the correct sound of a septuplet than a group of eight notes. Often it’s easier to break it up in two parts we are used to play. In our case we could play it as a triplet and an ordinary group of four:
Of course, we don’t actually play the septuplet like this. We just imagine it and we practice it accordingly. Our work on this septuplet would start with:
Again we begin at the end of the passage and proceed to the start. If there are any problems we’ll have to break up the four notes further. When we are able to play the notes in the original tempo we practice the first notes of our septuplet:
As you can see we never limit to the group to be practiced. We always append at least one note of the subsequent group to make possible gaps between both undetectable.
As this part is very uncomfortable to play we attach another note:
And another one:
Please remember: It is essential to repeat the passages correctly. We learn by repetition of the correct notes. When you can play one of the examples flawlessly, repeat it a few times to save it to your “brain hard disk”. Proceed only if you are able to play the previous example.
If you succeeded put the whole thing together:
If you stick to the examples above chances are good that you can play the entire passage.
Good luck!
