Let's talk Paganini.

 

I got a message from a young guy I know, and to whom I had given a copy of the music to Caprice 24. He said, "Those arpeggios are hard!"

I replied, "Just find fingerings you like and play them 1,000 times.

I started playing those arpeggios on March 31st. May was a bad month for me and my practice suffered a lot, but I really feel on top of those arpeggios now. The diminished arpeggio in bar 9 was a challenge but fortunately I know a little trick for playing diminished arpeggios. Over the last while I've been working on Variation 9 and I'm starting to look at Variation 5. I also play Variations 1, 2, 3 & 4 every day. It's funny how, if you practise the right things, and study the bits you find hard, they start to feel reasonably easy after a while. 

Variation 9 is the one with the left hand pizzicato. I've heard accounts of violinists getting bleeding fingers trying to perfect this technique. The trick is to practise the technique in small doses, but often. It pays to practise all the notes bowed at first.

As I practise, it is never far from my mind what Paganini said about there only being one scale and one position on the violin. It's almost like a riddle.

I don't know the answer to the above riddle (though I'm sure that the last letter is y) but I'm pretty sure I understand what Paganini was talking about. It certainly helps your playing, especially when playing Caprice 24. It helps with Jazz too.

Notice how I haven't given you any direct answers - it'll mean more to you if you're prepared to find the answers yourself.

The day  I perform Caprice 24 in its entirety is still a fairly long way off but, when I do perform it, I will know it so well that it'll just be like talking to someone.

Ciao tutti.

If you found this post much more interesting than reading about how an exercise machine was assembled or reading quotes from dead old white men who talked a lot of shit, please leave a comment.