Exploring Independent Film: Vitus

Last night I watched a film that was recommended to me by a fellow librarian called Vitus. The film is about a boy of high IQ who at the age of six knew innately how to play the piano and by the age of 12 mastered the music of the most prominent virtuosos of western music--Mozart, Bach, Liszt, Schumann to name a few. He was not only a genius at the piano, but he proved to be quite skilled at learning anything. He was a veracious reader, was fascinated by aviation as his grandfather, the listening devices that were invented by his father, chess, and also taught himself the ins and outs of the stock market.
This movie was made in Germany, so if you don't mind reading subtitles, I would highly recommend it if you feel the need for inspiration from a young musical genius.

A Lesson in Art (Drawing)-- Task 1: Form

I picked up an art book recently that would help me build upon my skills in drawing. The Complete Drawing Course is filled with hundreds of tasks in which you practice your skill. The first task which I have just completed is "form". The assignment was to find two objects of different form and create a drawing only of its form. To create a form drawing one is simply creating a line drawing without any sense of light or coloring. One is simply trying to interpret the shape of the object. My form drawing is of a small jewelry box and a cup. The more I look at the drawing the more incomplete the drawing feels. You not only want to draw the outline of the items but if there are other lines that create shape to the item you want to include that as well which I realized when I looked back at the text. So my little box should have more to it. I can't go back to this drawing because I have already moved the items out of place, but at least I know where there can be improvement. One think I would like to note about this is that once you begin to concentrate you start to really see all the ways in which the shape of the object moves. The more you look, the more discoveries you find in your chosen object.

A Lesson in Music: Piano Technique

Since my classes have ended I have been able to get back to other activities which I have always enjoyed. One such activity is playing the piano. I have been away from my instrument from quite some time and have become quite rusty, so I've decided to retrain myself in the skill. Slowly I hope to push myself past the level of which I was. Today I have gone back to working with my Hanon book of 60 piano exercises for the virtuoso pianist. Not that I ever was a virtuoso, the exercises, if practiced regularly, really helps a player attain great skill in their technique. The goal of this book is to be able to get through all 60 exercises at once. The book explains that if mastered correctly a player can get through all the exercises within an hour. At the most I have gone through 29 of them at once in my time as a pianist. Today, since I have not played in such a long time, I had the endurance to only get through 13 of the 60 exercises, which is pretty horrible if you ask me. So it looks like another challenge for me to get through.
Another handbook which I am studying from is Czerny School of Velocity. I remember when I had studied this book before I would get tired of it really fast. I am trying to motivate myself to this book because my fingers need to gain better agility and coordination. Today I found myself fumbling an awful lot, which was making my music sound very sloppy.