My Musical Resolutions Saanvi Kunisetty

 My Musical Resolutions

Saanvi Kunisetty

Goal #1: Improving Left-Hand Technique- Recently, I participated in a Solo Adjudication Festival for members of the YOCJ (Youth Orchestra of Central Jersey), and one of the suggestions I received from both judges was to work on my left-hand technique, which would improve my playing overall. So, my private lessons teacher and I got to work thinking of ways to do so. The first thing that came to our mind was exercises and drills- while left hand technique is present in pieces and songs, the best way to improve the technique so that it will sound good in pieces is to first practice it in exercises and drills. The first book where we could find these exercises was in the Wohlfahrt book, which I already had. The other was one that my teacher decided we would try out first, see if it worked out for me, and then purchase it. He said he would send scans of the Schradieck Finger Exercises book so that we could try it out in the upcoming class, and then decide if I wanted to purchase it and continuously work on it in and out of class.

Goal #2: Vibrato- While vibrato is technically considered part of left-hand technique, I want to consider it a separate goal, because it’s approach is very different compared to my approach for improving technical abilities with exercises and drills. While I do attempt to do vibrato consistently while I am playing, I know that it is not at the technical level that I want it to be at. So, I need to go back and start from the basics. I can start by playing a simple scale and vibrating my hand slowly back and forth (very VERY VERY slowly) for a full bow while holding each note in the scale. Doing this multiple times a practice session will help me improve. Each session, I can slowly pick up the tempo as comfortable if I feel that I have mastered the previous tempo. Soon, I will be able to vibrato at all tempos. Aside from this, my private lessons teacher said that I have a relatively stiff wrist, so I need to loosen it up by moving my left hand back and forth from the wrist (almost like I am saying Hi in a weird way) 20-30 times a day, just to loosen up. By improving my vibrato, I can improve my musicality in pieces that I am playing.