Any time your left-hand changes position. Working out the connection both physically and mentally and well as our cello geography helps to make shifts consistent and confident.
Teaching Notes for Popper Cello Étude No. 31 Apart from some tricky thumb position exploration, double-stops, and all our favourite high-end of the cello playing, we explore ways to keep concentration up when doing something repetitive… especially towards the end when there is a very tricky passage (Sneaky Popper!) Don’t waste time practising the repeated […]
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Teaching Notes for Popper Cello Étude No. 32 Popper 32 is a study that revisits up-bow staccato; however, it is quite different from the other big up-bow staccato study, No. 14. Namely because the tempo indicated by Popper is quite a bit slower, so the function of how the technique works is totally different and
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Teaching Notes for Popper Cello Étude No. 33 This étude has its challenges. It takes stamina and focuses heavily on the thumb. In this video, we break down lots of ways to approach the aspects that seem initially challenging. We also have a lot of good tidbits in this video that apply to other aspects
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Teaching Notes for Popper Cello Étude No. 34 Popper 34 is a slower, more melodic study. This étude explores double stops, and some slightly extended techniques of bowing and pizzicato with left hand simultaneously. We both agree that this one is a beautiful piece to listen to and one of our guests even likes to
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Teaching Notes for Popper Cello Étude No. 35 This is another study that focuses on distant key areas and strange enharmonic relationships (b natural to g-flat equals a perfect fifth, for example!) The étude challenges our brain in that there are aspects you have to figure out and organise in order to be consistently in
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Teaching Notes for Popper Cello Étude No. 37 Here’s a tricky study filled with LOTS of technical aspects… fast shifting, mordents, thumb position which also features on the lower two strings. Working out the mordents takes some attention. Coordinating the right hand and left hands is key – the bow must start before the beat
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Teaching Notes for Popper Cello Étude No. 38 This étude appears extra challenging with the ‘presto’ tempo marking and the octaves. Starting slowly is highly recommended. Take out the octaves and practice the bow stroke on open strings first. Practicing this in rhythms is very helpful to increase the speed once you can play this
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Practice Notes for Popper Cello Étude No. 39 We enjoyed exploring this beautifully lilting study that has a lot of variety and some beautiful double-stops in D-flat major. However, this one is not without it’s difficulties. Lots with thumb position, hand balance, intonation in triads and thirds and bow distribution planning. Hope this video will
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Practice Notes for Popper Cello Étude No. 40 Popper 40 – as the last in the set, this is surprisingly not the most difficult of Popper’s collection of études but rather a very specialized study in natural harmonics. We were delighted to approach this study as it gives our thumb chops some time off! We
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