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Weekend Piano Goals (April 5-7)

Is it already time to think about goals again?

Recap of the Past Week

Last week was a mess, pianistically speaking! I was out of town and had only my 61-key keyboard for practice, so you may remember that I decided to take a big break from both Chopin and Maple Leaf (and, it turned out, Bare Necessities). Virtually all of my keyboard practice was devoted to the blues shuffle and scale exercises. It was time well-spent, but it was also a big interruption to my usual routine. It also didn't help that we had a volleyball tournament that lasted most of the weekend. That was lots of fun, but, again, not great for piano practice!

 A few days ago, I looked at the number of hours I'd spent on each piece/project in March, and I was a little surprised to see how erratic my work has been with both Chopin and Maple Leaf Rag. I've had some productive practice sessions, but they haven't been super-consistent. So I've started keeping a spreadsheet to make sure I'm more consistent in April.

This Weekend's Agenda

This weekend will be unusual as well in that I'm going to have a lot of practice time available both days. I'll have to divide practicing up with yard work and spring-cleaning around the house, but I should be able to get a good three or four (or more) hours in both Saturday and Sunday. I'll also be able to get one or two hours in tonight as well. So life is good!

Here are the goals for the weekend. I'm going to try to make them SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound).

SCALES: Majors at 88, Minors at 76. I will need to spend a little extra time on E-flat minor and (surprisingly) D Major.

MINOR SEVENTHS: Watch Lesson 2 of Minor Seventh Theory & Application, and work on improvising on the sample tune. By the end of the day Sunday, be ready to move on to Lesson 3. Complete Lesson 2 of Minor Seventh Exercises Course and be able to move on to Lesson 3 in that as well.

BLUES: I am almost ready to move on to Lesson 4 (improvisation) of PWJ's Blues Challenge. I want to spend another day or two working on the three-note and six-note patterns, as well as playing the eighth notes and triplets starting at different notes in the blues scale. I also need to make sure I practice both the easy and the medium shuffle because I want to be able to play both with ease. That's the main focus of all these exercises (besides fluency in the blues scale) - just being able to play the shuffle automatically, without having to think about getting the rhythms right or changing the chord at the right time.

MAPLE LEAF: Do some serious work on relaxing my arm after each octave and jump. Work on making it more of a habit to have mini-rests so that my left forearm isn't burning by the time I get halfway through Section C. Also, spend some extra time on Section B, particularly the transitions. As a playing goal, I would love to be able to play the entire piece at somewhere between 80 and 90 by the end of the weekend.

BARE NECESSITIES: Finish memorizing the stride section, and be able to play the whole thing at [metronome tempo TBA] by the end of the weekend. I also want to (1) sight-read the rest of the piece, which I've (stupidly) never done, and (2) be ready to start learning/memorizing the ragtime section.

CHOPIN: I saved this for last! I've memorized it, and now it's just a matter of polishing and working on my interpretation--phrasing, dynamics, etc. I also need to work on muscle memory with lots of repetition. As I'm doing that, I'll be thinking deeply about how to wrench every bit of beauty I can out of every single note. I love this piece so much and so looking forward to spending a lot of time with it this weekend. My goal for the end of the weekend is to make a video of myself playing it, where the piece is relatively error-free and I'm able to successfully execute the phrasing, dynamics, etc., as intended.

SMART Goals Recap 

So, to recap my SMART goals:

  • SCALES: Majors at 88, Minors at 76.
  • MINOR SEVENTHS: Complete lesson 2 of both Theory & Application and Exercises courses. Improvise on chords using minor pentatonic, natural minor, and blues scales.
  • BLUES: Easy and medium shuffles with 3- and 6- note patterns and improv on eighth notes and triplets with both easy and medium shuffles.
  • MAPLE LEAF: Whole piece by memory, with no pausing at transitions and minimal forearm fatigue, at 84.
  • BARE NECESSITIES: Stride section by memory; sight-read rest of piece.
  • CHOPIN: End-of-weekend progress video for YouTube/PWJ community page. Video should be relatively error-free and include intended interpretive effects.
It's going to be a good weekend!

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