33

I was contacted today by Martin Zimny from tonebase to tell me that I was selected to be one of the four participants in the mentorship program by Giora Schmidt. To be honest, I was entirely unprepared for that, and I applied "just in case" but did not think I would be selected. Now I am curious about the level of the other three people in the program, and I hope they are not professionals:)).

Today I was working on my pieces. But also made quite a few discoveries about how to make my violin sound better. I knew some of them already, but they make a significant difference in combination. Again I was led to these ideas by the course of Adam Han Gorski that you need to know the way around the weakness of your violin to make it sound better. And three crucial components are:

1. My violin does not like too much rosin

2. It sounds better over the f-hole.

3. It likes a "soft" bow with very low tension.

One of my problems is that I tend to gravitate toward the bridge. For some players, this is good, but for me, it creates unevenness in the sound and is difficult to control.

For my pieces, I worked mostly on my second violin part for "Sanseneon." I worry that this piece could be too difficult for me. It has pizzicato, spiccato, and a rhythmically complicated solo part for the second violin. It is also relatively long, and I have only one week before the next rehearsal. But I really like it and am excited to play it!