Week 9: 10/20/11 I practiced my piece on the piano today for 15 minutes, and I practiced yesterday for 15 minutes. Tomorrow is Melissa's lesson. Perhaps we will practice with the organ again. I still need to look up You Tube videos on organ playing. I talked with my neighbor who I consider to be a great organist, but she said she did not really understand the stops either. She would just practice and guess at which stops she wanted to use and then would fool around until she had the piece sounding the way she wanted. I can't get the information that I was hoping to get from her. That is how I have been playing also. On Sundays when I am the organist (just once a month), I just fool around with the stops until I think it sounds ok and then try to remember what I decided. She also said she did not use the pedals. That made me feel a lot better. I know the other organists don't use the pedals either so I suppose they are hard for everyone. This duet piece is very special though and I would really like to be able to use the pedals proficiently for it.
So to summarize up to this point, I have been practicing a lot on the piano to learn the piece. I have practiced on the organ alone and with Melissa. I have talked to my neighbor and found that she would not be the reservoir of information that I was hoping for. My pedaling is awful and I need to keep practicing. I did watch twice the tutorial video that came with the organ and learned a lot. It so far has taught me the most about the workings of the organ and the stops. I hope I can find a book that will teach me how the organ works and some philosophy behind the workings of the stops.
