Day 1

Hooray!
Today we launch into the FIELD Framework.
There’s a tiny bit of homework that is downloadable.
We’re intentionally starting off easy to build the daily habit of practice.

Here’s the first video, and there are a few things to download afterwards.
ALL the downloads will be available as a single booklet at the end of the course :)

Last, I’ll include a daily recommended listening and how much time it will take to listen.
When I listen, I practice. When I practice, I compose. When I compose, I listen. So if I want to immerse myself in practice, I need to immerse myself in listening outside of my practice.

Downloads:

Today’s Recommended Listening:

J.S. Bach (1685-1750)
Cello Suite #1: Prelude
Yo-Yo Ma [YouTube] - 3 minutes

Info about this piece and recording:

This is probably the most famous piece of music written for the cello. Bach wasn’t the first person to write for the solo cello, but he was a master of weaving together melody and harmony onto a single instrument. This is the first movement (think part of a TV episode before a commercial break) out of six Movements (so, there are six pauses). Bach wrote six Suites for solo cello, where each Suite is a collection of six Movements. So, all told, there are 36 Movements for solo cello by Bach.

Interestingly, the Fifth Suite was intended to be played with the A-String tuned down to a G (so you have G D G C). And the Sixth Suite was intended to be played on a 5-String cello (with an E-String above the A-String). We can modify and play both on a standard cello in standard tuning, but for those reasons we generally consider the Fifth and Sixth Suites to be more difficult than the first four Suites.

Last, these works were considered like technical studies until Pablo Casals started treating them as concert pieces in the early part of the 20th century. Some of the first recordings ever made of the cello were of Casals playing the six Bach Suites, which helped to popularize them.

If you want to deep dive, Alisa Weilerstein has a YouTube video, here, on what makes this first Movement so great :)

Yo-Yo Ma is probably the most famous cellist of all time, as well, and it’s easy to see why: the guy exudes charisma and is one of the most genuine human beings who’s ever walked the planet. His recordings of the Bach Suites are the most popular cello recordings of all time, and he is well known for performing this movement all over. If you’re looking for even more of a deep dive, compare his live recordings with the 3 or 4 audio recordings he’s made over the course of his career; the recording for Casette Tapes from the 80’s is very different than the 2-CD recordings from the 90’s that I “grew up” on.

See you tomorrow!
—Eric