Practice 9/3/11. Visualisation

I noticed today that while warming up I don’t use written music so I sort of visualise the notes in my head. They seem very clear, though I don’t think I could draw them (maybe I will try...). Well, good warm up, feeling good, able to bend all those out-of-tune baroque horn notes quite well.

Then I started playing from music (Handel Solomon for next week) and I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t bend the notes, atall. What’s happened? Ah. Because I’m reading, I’m not visualising the notes.

Can I do both? Yes! Though I need to concentrate (this is a good thing). And everything falls into place. Bending, pitching, sound, control.

I seem to need to translate the notes on the page into my own personal code for the notes. Maybe we all do. The code could be physical, visual or anything else (I have noticed I am not the only one who occasionally gets a pleasant sense of “tasting” the notes).

Maybe people who are good at sight-reading are particularly adept at this translation.

Practice 9/3/11. Visualisation

9th March 2011