Is that the one about the alternative violin strings?

Arachnaphobes are advised NOT to follow that link.

Just found a fantastic way to practice scales and arpeggios. Pick a scale and say aloud the name and details of that scale, for example 'Eb Major Scale Both Hands' or 'G Minor Arpeggio Left Hand' and then play it. I am finding my concentration actually improves doing this as I feel like it might be an ABRSM examiner saying what I'm saying and so I feel like its better preparation and I'll know what to play in the exam room. I've spent an entire morning doing scales and arpeggios this way (with intermittent tea breaks) and you know what......I'm 99.8% perfect on my scales and arpeggios at Grade 3 level (plus I've managed to squeeze in a Paul Harris Sightread test at g2)

That's something positive for a change, eh???

Not going well for Worcester College, Oxford on University Challenge...

They got a few points in the end

I think I will ask my piano teacher if I can play at a concert she's organising after all....as the ladies at keep fit likes my playing, and so does my next door neighbour!!!

Sounds like a good idea - never turn down an opportunity to perform! Don't expect to play perfectly, but try to enjoy your performance; it's all good expereince.

I've found out a new way to practice scales and pieces - do them with the radio on (not Radio 3 or Classic FM but Capital or any other downmarket manic chavvy rubbish) For maximum distraction that will test your concentration to the max!

I've found out a new way to practice scales and pieces - do them with the radio on (not Radio 3 or Classic FM but Capital or any other downmarket manic chavvy rubbish) For maximum distraction that will test your concentration to the max!

A couple of months ago I had an oboe solo in an orchestral piece and I was finding it very hard to play the first note properly (even though technically it was an easy note). My teacher told me to put the radio on and practise counting a bar in my head and then playing my note. Surprisingly enough, this worked

Big candidate for this year's Best Username award : 'Badly-Tempered Clavier'

I actually took the wrong part (a cello part - I play viola) onstage during an orchestra concert this evening Luckily other people noticed and I and the cellists whose part I had swiped got the correct parts before we started playing, but otherwise I wouldn't have noticed until the performance started

You could have "read" the bass as alto clef and created your very own parallel organum at the 5th with the rest of the celli!

Very chic, c.1300 Very retro

Has anybody ever tried a Graze box?

If you are talking about http://www.graze.com/ --

I have not. However I have seen my colleagues eating from them and have noted that it feels to me like a lot of money to pay for stuff which I could assemble myself. I don't tend to eat the stuff in them, but if I did, I would buy in bulk and make up my own. I cannot speak for other people's concept of value - it could be that my colleagues feel that 3.79 is worth the convenience. I'm not saying this in a judgemental way; it's just not worth it in my own personal value system.

Yes, that's what I mean.
It's not stuff i would assemble myself. Most of it I probably wouldn't think of and buying in bulk wouldn't work for me as things would go off before I ate them. The snack size variety is the sort of thing that would suit me and it looks like you get a surprise mix from the items you tell them you like.

I am about to go food shopping.. (I have an exciting life - what a thing to do on a saturday night!) and my teenage children want to come with me..... it's gonna be expensive.....

Has anybody ever tried a Graze box?

I am about to go food shopping.. (I have an exciting life - what a thing to do on a saturday night!) and my teenage children want to come with me..... it's gonna be expensive.....

....teenage children want to go shopping? With a parent? Must tell my brother - he must be training my nephews wrongly

Perhaps you could ask your brother how he trained his nephews. As ClariNicki says, it's cheaper without them (and usually quicker too ).

...yeah my husband decided to come too...He's the worst of the lot! it cost about ?40 more than usual! They love food shopping! So much cheaper without them!

Veni, Vidi, Visa - I came, I saw, I shopped!

I've just been on Dave's website (the TV channel, not just some random guy called Dave!) and at the bottom of one page they had an advert for bow hold buddies! Do they regard Dave viewers as being really keen on the violin or could it be because of my browsing history?

The latter

OK, apology accepted. There are more people than you in Birmingham/the West Midlands who'd be interested, by the way. But please be careful how you word things like that in the future : it was not your most shining moment on the forum!

The Birmingham event a couple of years ago was well attended.

I still have my comment slips from then, and there are ten of them, so plus me that is at least eleven attendees. This is presuming that everyone wrote me a comment, which they might not have done. I seem to remember people coming from London and Cornwall, amongst other places attending the event, as well as those closer to Brum.

This just gets more interesting........You're not talking about Birmingham, Alabama here, are you????

ok, I am convinced, but who is this Lois from Walsall then? I thought that I was (just like Dafydd from Little Britain) 'the only Midlander on the forum!

I am from the Midlands

But in Lee King speak (without of course revealing your location), you're not a local...

Was a good day. I took all the application forms in for this, and there appeared to be 22 participants, of whom over half were Midland based, but only five or six were what you might call 'local to Lee King', judging by your previous posts, Lee.

That's still five or six more than what I expected in this region!

There are no doubt more, and there are others from the area whom I know cover those counties (without revealing names). It is, as katyjay puts so much more eloquently than I do, about getting out there and finding them!

The West Midlands region, sometimes called the Heart of Britain includes Warwickshire, Worcestershire, Herefordshire, Shropshire, Staffordshire the Black Country and the Second City.

I am East Midlands, but still Midlands!