Toy room at St. Timothy's

The secretary at St. Timothy's church has asked me to remind everyone who comes in for group classes, fiddle, and recitals to be sure to put things away in the children's room upstairs if their kids go and play in there. They've had a few Sundays now where the toys have been left out after we've been there.

Let's keep things nice and neat so the church will continue to enjoy having us use their faciltiy. Thanks!

Fiddle Rehearsal Saturday

Hi Everyone,

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

We'll be meeting for our dress rehearsal this Saturday, December 5th at 2:30pm. We are anticipating that the rehearsal will be approximately one hour. We'll be at St. Timothy's as usual. Since this is our last rehearsal and we have a lot to do to get ready for the recital, we need to have everyone there. Thanks everyone for making such a commitment to fiddling!

A few notes for practice speeds this week:

Sally Gardens - practice with metronome at around 70=quarter note

Back Up and Push - practice second half (cross shuffle) with metronome set at around 104=quarter note

Johnny's Gone to France - Slow tempo practice with metronome at around 92= quarter note. The second time through will be twice as fast for everyone who can play it really fast, so the tempo will be 92=half note. (You'll fit 4 eighth notes into each beat instead of two.) For those of you who still would like to count quarter notes, the metronome marking will be 184=quarternote.

Other notes on practicing this week:

King of the Faeries - please look over your notes and bowings this week. There are a few memory lapses and intonation issues happening that hopefully will be mostly sorted out before we meet on Saturday. We'll get the ending worked out Saturday too so be sure to practice that!

Sally Gardens - please be sure to count on all half and dotted half notes. We're still not quite all together sometimes. In the group, if you are not sure, just watch Maggie's bow and don't change before she does.

Back Up and Push - besides metronome practice to keep our speed steady, please check bowings this week and watch that Fs and Cs are not too flat.

Orientalische - Great job off beat people!! Melody guys, let's check bowings and make sure we're playing the second half in tune; there are some sour notes in there at times.

Thanks guys and happy practicing!!

Thanksgiving Break

Next week we'll have Thanksgiving break from Monday (23nd) through Saturday (28th), so there will not be any lessons. Some of us may be doing make up lessons during that time, so check with your teacher to see if she is planning to see you for a make up during the break. Otherwise, have a great break! Don't forget to do lots of practicing. Our last set of recitals is coming up really soon!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Group and Fiddle this Saturday (Nov 21)

Hi Everyone,
We'll have our last fiddle class this Saturday at 2:30pm at St. Timothy's again. Students who will be performing Back Up and Push need to arrive at 2:15.

We'll be working on all the tunes. After this class, we just have our dress rehearsal on December 5th, so we need everyone there this Saturday to get it all pulled together for the concert.

Suzuki groups 3 and 4 will be meeting this Saturday from 3:30 to 4:15pm at St. Timothy's. We'll have treats/snacks available after class. This will be the last group class till February. Hope to see you all there!

Fiddle Assignment

First of all,
Thanks to everyone in Suzuki group 1 for being so flexible this past week. The church had a mixup with their scheduling so we didn't have the (much larger) room we were supposed to have. Thanks for being patient and good sports about being in such a small room!

Fiddlers, here's your assignment for this week:

• Fire on the Mountain: Soloists, please practice with a metronome so we can keep the tempos steady as we switch from solo to solo. Your target tempo is between 140 and 150 for a quarter note beat. Don't forget to play out. We want to hear how good you sound!
• Orientalische Melody: Those of you playing the melody, please work on your intonation. Those low ones are still a bit icky. Continue to practice shifting too. Let's plan to play it a bit faster as long as the offbeat part can be played fast enough.
• Offbeats!!! Practice them in your lessons!!!! We need to get them much more steady. Try them at home too. Parents you can clap the downbeat while kids play the offbeat.
• Johnny's Gone to France: Sounding great! Let's get it just a bit faster for our final tempo. Remember we decided we'll play it 2 times through for the performance
• Sally Gardens: Practice line 3 for good counting on the half notes and dotted half notes.
• The King of the Faeries: Practice the second half for memorization. Be sure to be playing all the right notes and slurs! We will work on getting it more in tune at the next class too. Those of you doing the ending, please practice this in lessons this week to get the timing right.
• Back Up and Push: We didn't get to this Saturday, so please do lots of intonation practice on the second half as well as rhythm practice in the first half. (Subdivide if needed for rhythm.) For intonation, watch the Fs and Cs. (The low 2s.) Most of the time for most people they are extremely flat.

Students playing Back up and Push, could you come 15 minutes early to the next fiddle class? We will start at 2:15 on Back Up and Push.

Thanks!

Fiddle and Group Classes this Saturday

Hi All!

First of all, a big congratulations to all of our performers on the Halloween Recitals. I thought it was our best set of recitals yet! You all were so well prepared and poised on stage. I really enjoyed each performance and all the costumes! Good job!

This Saturday, November 7th we'll be having group classes again.

Fiddle will meet in the Chapel/Choir Room from 2:30 to 3:15. We'll have the whole group together. Please be prepared to work on all the fiddle tunes, especially Orientalische Melody.
Please keep in mind that we just have two more classes and one rehearsal left, so we really need everyone to make it to these last few classes so we can be ready for our performance in December.

Suzuki group classes 1 and 2 will meet from 3:30 to 4:15. Group 1 will not be divided into two groups this time.

Join us for snacks afterwards!