The one thing keeping me from progressing from being a decent fiddler to a good fiddler is my right wrist. I don't use it enough. Beginner players tend to bow at the shoulder; I tend to bow at the elbow. To really get that folksy legato sound, I need to learn to bow mostly at the wrist.

Elke bugged me about this at the beginning, but for a while, talk about my bowing has mostly given way to talk about style. Melinda Crawford commented on it at the Royal Mile jam back in November. And Elke hit on it again at the studio recital. And though Philippe didn't mention it directly, he made it clear that I'm vastly too staccato for the Irish idiom, that I need to "loosen up".

So to this end, I've been consciously working on bowing almost entirely from the wrist. And it's exhausting. Those aren't well-developed muscles there. But I like the sound I get when I can get into a good groove with wrist-bowing, so I'm going to continue to force myself to concentrate on it.

I've also been thinking about reel tempos. I've been trying to play my reels too fast. In the piping world (esp. for Highland dancers), 96 BPM is a fast reel; though that would be slow for a fiddle reel (about right for a Scotch measure). Even in the fiddling & Scottish country dance worlds, 108 BPM is an acceptable tempo. There's never any reason to play faster than 116 BPM; any faster is just showing off. I already play any reel I know well very comfortably at 116 BPM. So there's no reason whatsoever for me to try to increase my skill at higher tempos. Best to concentrate on accenting and articulation at the tempos I can play at.

Piping proceeds incrementally. I'm still having trouble pointing the heavy beats in strathspeys enough. After a 9 week absence (4 of which were health, holiday, or weather-related), I return to band practice tonight.