Easter Sunday: I was absorbed all day in house projects, so we didn’t practice until after dinner. A mistake.
What we did:
- Played a few A1 sections from With Steady Hands in a few ways: M playing it all; me playing bass and M playing melody; M playing bass and me playing melody.
- Sang the A1 section a few times with a nice crescendo/decrescendo.
- Played the last section of the Canon a few times, with me playing the previous section at the same time. We went through the middle two bars a few extra times.
On the plus side, M had a couple repetitions of the Canon that she played with complete focus and excellent left-hand position.
On the negative side technically, M’s right hand looks pretty bad on With Steady Hands, and she doesn’t play with much dynamic contrast. Her thumb, in particular, is pretty awkward — hence my asking her to play just the bass notes.
On the negative side behaviorally, she continues with her passive-aggressive resistance. At one point, I said, “You know, I’m thinking of getting the chocolate bunny ears [an Easter treat we all planned to share], and each time you don’t do something I ask you to, I might take a bite of them.” She started crying at this, and I explained that I was trying to figure out some way to get her to cooperate and do what she’s asked, when she’s asked. She calmed down and her behavior improved slightly, but ultimately, I told her that she’d be skipping her treat tonight if she didn’t do as asked, when asked.
The passive-aggressive resistance today was a continuation of her behavior in her private lesson yesterday. Her studio teacher deals with it by making cheerful threats related to whatever game they’re playing (“You’d better get ready or I’ll get an extra roll of the dice! etc.). I’m not sure how different that is.