3/19 Repertoire and Choreography

Location: Dojo South Boston
Attendees: David, Glen, Martin, Mary Beth and Victor

For most of the meeting we worked on repertoire for upcoming performance. Started with an embroidery, then (not in order) Askesis, BTA, Larks Thrak. Moving Force, Hommage, Asturias, EotN and circulation. EotN seemed much better. Older repertoire was rusty. Worked on Third Relation. We then took a break and MB showed us some parts of the choreography. Quite fun. After the break Victor, Glen, David and MB worked on the Bach Invention #1. A honorable effort with a fairly complete run through. David left on time while the rest worked on Third Relation. A nice chat after before we left for the evening.

3/5 trio and 3/12 quartet

Last sunday, 3/5, the attendees at Victor's were Victor, Martin, and MB. This meeting was enhance with some tea and a short viewing of the oscars. The rest of the time we worked well -- mostly on the parts of Third Relation and getting the fingering and focus on trouble spots. Victor emphasized that the fingers should hold their position moving up and down the fret so that they fall on a single fret when they land. We worked on that moving from place to place in Third Relation. Toward the end, Mary Beth asked a question about burbling. Victor had a good response. The key is to try to have the burbles not sound compartmentalized into groups of five notes. There was some discussion on playing loudly and tightly holding the pick.
This Sunday, 3/12, the quartet of Victor, Glenn, David, and MB worked on Invention No. 1. It felt like hard work. Prior to this, we did a circulation where each person played three notes in C maj and then in a follow up circulation each person played two notes. In each case, the person to the right played their notes beginning at the second note of the person to their left. It sounded odd. The two note circulation sounded better than the three note. Then, long work on Invention No. 1. Some targeted work on the second page. Some working backward from the final chord. We played it through (but far from perfectly) two or three times. Then, Mary Beth began work with the group on the Dance/GCNE project. There was a short warm up to musis by the Baobab Orchestra followed by teaching of the begining of a choreography to Holiday by Green Day. The choreography was a way to jump into learning combinations. Everyone picked up the steps quickly. The intro bits need revising, but the group was patient with
the piece as a work in progress. Next, week, slower targeted movement will be the focus. We finished up by talking about the Earth Day performance on April 24th (I think). We have only three circle meetings before Glenn and MB go to Argentina. We talked about the set list and Victor said he would send that around.