Extracurricular group workout 12

A Tuning the Air Journal

Wednesday, November 30, 2011 – Extracurricular group workout 12

A quintet this afternoon: Chris, Mary Beth, Carl, Jaxie and Curt.

We began with “five-five-FIVE”. For me, this is one that needs regular rehearsal, as I am still working on my command of the part. We ramped up from a modest tempo, eventually getting up to our blazing target 198bpm. Interestingly, we found some of the interim tempos more difficult than the faster target.

As it is the opener on Thursday, Jaxie suggested we run “Slow Burn”. With missing parts, this was particularly challenging, especially the cascade arpeggios in the middle. We returned to that middle part several times to clear up some details.

“Connecticut Yankee” was up next. Tempo has been an issue with this one; we generally play it on the slow side. We ran it a number of times, also ramping up the metronome. After a number of passes, we determined that the target tempo we set some time ago is a bit too frantic, and so notched that back a bit. As I bring this in, it will be up to me to do some personal practice with the metronome, to ensure that I introduce the bass line at the right tempo.

A 5/9 version of the Bach “B Minor Prelude”. Always interesting and entertaining to rehearse circulated pieces with parts missing – in this case, almost half of the parts missing. We have sufficient command of the piece now that even these loping renditions are doable, coherent and even musical. We joked that we should perform it like this some day.

Ended with some detail work on “Larks’ Tongues”, looking at the parts the Tony had added when he was performing with us. These parts fall to Carl. Tony had showed them to him, in a rush at the end of our last rehearsal together, so we needed to do some reconstruction. We even tried to get Tony on skype, but he was unavailable. In the end we worked it out. A number of passes through the affected sections was necessary to get it right.

Chris had to leave. The remaining 4 of us ran a 4/9 version of the B Minor Fugue. Carl and Jaxie carry the heaviest load on this piece, and wanted as many opportunities to play through it as possible. For Mary Beth and myself, it is all about counting, to ensure that we make our entrances at the right place. We are going to meet again on Friday to continue this. Saturday’s rehearsal will be focused on this piece for the entire group.