Had my first Viola lesson today, am so pleased, enjoyed it so much

Breakdow of my lesson!
First of all I learnt how to hold the instrument and bow properly after my teacher had tuned the dreadfully out of tune Viola that.
Then we did some open strings bowing and a little pizzicato.
G Major scale
Then we did some pieces (Abracadbra).

Apprantely I have took to it really well, I actually felt totally comfortable with it and really enoyed playing she was pleased with my pitching of the notes (1st, 2nd and 3rd finger), up bow, down bow and we started a bit of slurring too at the end of one of my pieces there is a "chord" (not sure if it is called this as I forgot to ask) playing both the D and A string at the same time surprised how will that went too

I also had the opportunity to play my teachers instrument which is a beautiful mellow Viola quite a bit bigger than mine though, I adored it, unfortunately mine is OK for a rental instrument but she doesn't recommend I buy it when the time comes, she recommends an older instrument for when I do buy, which I certainly will. She thinks about 3 months for Grade 1 standard, not sure if I will take the exam or not at this moment in time!

Homework is for me to keep practising! Checking my posture, bowing practise, G Major Scale, Pieces in Abracadabra pages 1-24 plus any extra new ones depending on how I go.

As she also plays Violin I got to have a little go on that too, was very happy with my lesson

Next lesson April 7th - can't wait

Sounds like you're doing really well - I only did pizzicato in my first few lessons

Wow! That sounds like loads of progress in the first lesson! You're a viola natural.

Keep us posted.

Allan

Thankyou I was really quite surprised how much we covered (was a 1 hour lesson though!)

Think I may have to cut the nails down a bit for pizzicato and I was REALLY scared I was going to break the string so you couldn't hardly even hear the pizzicato The Viola is not as delicate as I thought!

Sounds great Nicia!

Three months to Grade 1 sounds like she expects you make pretty fast progress! I, like Babybird, also only did pizzicato my first few lessons (can't believe I still remember that...!)

Abracadabra is awesome! I still have my copy, I got it out a couple of weeks ago and played through it, just for kicks. It's good because it is arranged in a such a way as to clearly show progression, rather than just an arbitrarily arranged collection of music. The duets at the start are repeated later in the book - except the second time around you play the teacher's part.

You will definitely need to keep your nails short though - not just for pizzicato. Nails get in the way when putting fingers down on strings! This is not so good when you are at work and trying to remove staples from documents: as you have no nails to clamp around the end of the staple!

I hope so, absolutely loved it, felt really connected to the instrument, I can't really describe it from actually making the note rather than just pressing keys. Which also makes the challenge and I like a challenge!

The strange this is I've always been worried that I have a really bad ear (for music) but I knew straight away if the note was wrong (so easy to do) so really surprised myself there.

In a way I did think I'd like to play Viola to get a place in my local orchestra in a few years time but I've totally fell in love with it really enjoyed my little play on the Violin too ... can see this becoming a slippery slope, started flute because I wanted to have a play about on a second instrument ended up a Gd. 8 .... Just love learning new instruments once I start though I can't stop!

Posture is hard to keep and I have been told to play for 10 minutes then take a rest then play again for practise and I should build up this gradually.



Really impressed with Abra, it is now my main tutor book for Clarinet also, I learnt with A Tune A Day, much prefer Abra!

Yes on the nails, they aren't dreadfully long but any longer and I would have struggled with putting my fingers down on the strings, so they are to be filed a little.