odd gliss technique

I'm not sure whether it's a peculiarity of the shape of my fingers, but over the years I have developed a technique for loud orchestral glisses when you just don't have time in the music to grab and use a felt pick. I can only do it with my 2nd finger (in both hands) so it only applies to upward glisses.

Its using the whole side of the 2nd finger

instead of the normal playing part of the finger tip.

So the main part in contact with the string is the boney part just below the first finger joint.

I find I can get a very loud sound - not as loud as using picks but louder than the normal way of playing them, and most importantly I have complete control over the tone and dynamic.

The down side though is that as well getting blisters on the finger in the normal playing position you also can end up with blisters on the side of your finger as well - so double the blisters on your 2nd fingers!

I was playing Elgar's Dream of Gerontious on Saturday (with only 1 harp instead of 2) so by time I got to doing a childrens concert at the Phil the next morning my fingers were really sore. I didn't think there was going to be much for me to do in the childrens concert, but there was the usual thing of not getting the music until the day and finding a surprise harp cadenza right at the end of the concert!

It was just a sort of extended flourish using glissandi but it was really useful using my odd gliss technique as my fingers were so sore.

I really need to find a name for this technique!

pruning

Went for run this morning and still finding it very hard work, but it's so nice to run and feel/see the sun after our sporadic winter running. Hopefully this bodes well for getting back into regular runs in the morning.

Just off for a quick tidy up and prune in the garden and then going to get ready for work later today at the Phil. It's a Stephen Sondheim birthday concert with Carl Davies. As per usual with these gigs the harp parts are disproportionally tricky and are not the nicest to sightread!

I'm in more or less everything except Gershwin's "An American in Paris" which is being played WITHOUT the three saxophone parts. I didn't know there was a version without the saxes? There are three sax parts in the original score.

routine

I'm finding it hard to get back into a routine after having the worst cold I've had in YEARS.

It's been 3 weeks now and I'm still not back to full strength.

Managed to go running this morning - more of a slow jog really, so at least thats an improvement. There is definitely a connection between whether I can get any physical exercise done and my productivity for the rest of the day. So here's hoping I manage to get a bit more done today then I have of late.

I've just finished teaching, and must go and do some harp practice now. I think I will plough through the Salzedo Conditioning Exercises today as a technical work out.