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Catching Up!

My new system is working! It's now very easy to see which pieces are furthest below their goal, so I can tell which pieces I need to work on next.

I entered my time regularly all weekend, and I managed to "catch up," or come close to being caught up, in all my projects. (See my weekend goals post to compare, if you're interested.)

I must admit that I didn't play any blues or "lagniappe" (Old Rugged Cross, etc.) this weekend. Instead, I focused on catching up on everything else. And I'm glad I did! I made progress I hadn't expected to make. For instance ...

Solace

I can now play all the way through Solace. I've memorized the "A" section, and when I played it this morning, it was (mostly) smooth and felt comfortable by memory. I can also play through the "B" section! I haven't started to memorize it yet; this morning I just worked on the fingering for the first part, as well as drilling a couple of the trickier passages and sight-reading the rest. Tonight or tomorrow I'll work on the second part, and then I'll focus on memorizing.

And after that? I'll have the whole thing by memory, and it will just be a matter of playing it a lot so that it feels natural and comfortable to play! I hadn't expected to graduate from this one by the end of September (particularly with needing to focus on the Chopin), but that is now looking very achievable!

Jingle Bells Rag

I'm making progress on the Jingle Bells rag. I don't know why, but I don't have a ton of enthusiasm for this one. Still, I worked on it diligently for 15 or 20 minutes each day, and I have the tricky final page worked out. It's still slow, but I can play it. I believe this is the most difficult section of the piece, so I'm glad I'm getting though it.

Loving My New System!

I got some good work done on the other pieces, but I'm highlighting these two, as I likely wouldn't have given them very much time this weekend if I hadn't been using my new spreadsheet system.

I'll have videos soon!

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