How do you play the Pag Caprice #5

[David Tseng]

After the A minor arpeggios and scales and chromatics, I play the group of 3s in up-bow and the singles in down-bow. But a friend said it should be the other way round. How do you play it?

[Carlo_jsb]

Paganini indicated it as three downs and one up.

Carlo.

[staylor]

For the time being I'm doing seperate bows, and I think that soon, when the left hand is very confident and by heart, it will then be a relatively minor matter to do the finesse with the bowings etc.

In my edition it has three down one up, three down one up, four down four up and then says simile for the rest.

Can anyone explain this to me? I don't understand what are all the occasions to what it recomends 4 in a bow.

Yes, in fact if I knew this for sure, I would probably be practicing it like that already, but not being sure, I just do all seperate in the meantime.

Help would be appreciated by me too!

[technique_doc]

Yes, well clearly it is 3 downs, up, but in practice do what is best for you. I don't like the written way much and I wouldn't let this stop me from playing the piece. It's all for left hand anyway so separates are fine.

T_D

[D_A]

My smart-aleck reply to your topic is one of two things "Not nearly as fast or in tune as I would like to." or "With great difficulty!"

But to answer your question, when I studied it I did it separately (ON to start, and then OFF as I got more facility) although in my old David edition it was marked 4 downs and 4 ups (had to have been intended as ricochet). The Ricci edition has 3+1, which would be much easier IMHO.

[David Tseng]

The middle section should be 3/1 all the way through. If I play the single notes in up-bow, I tend to make accent which should not be there. I feel #5 is very good for warm-up exercise (play A - + scales many times and a short section of the middle part.)

[lcc]

The Sauret edition marks 3 down, 1 up; 3 down, 1 up; followed by 4 down, 4 up. Flesch edition has the same grouping, except it does not indicate up or down bow.

[staylor]

Quote:

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The Sauret edition marks 3 down, 1 up; 3 down, 1 up; followed by 4 down, 4 up. Flesch edition has the same grouping, except it does not indicate up or down bow.

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Exactly. So I was asking if THIS is the meaning of 3 down one up, or does it mean uniformly throught, without the 4 in one also? (which would therefore be a different variation)

[David Tseng]

Ricci and Galamian are 3/1 all the way through the mid-section. I guess you can change the bowing any way you like.

[staylor]

Thanks David Tseng!

So in that case, I think the best way of learning the caprice would be to spend all the time one needs, in the simplest bowing which is detache, non staccato, until the left hand has become very confident with the caprice, and only then to experiment with different bowings, once the left hand doesn't need much further attention anymore (and certainly by heart).

Then you could split up the caprice into between 2 and 4 sections and alternate bowing system more than once, within each playing (practicing) of the caprice, whilst trying to find out what seems best to you. Like first 4 lines detache, second 4 lines 3 and 1, third, 3 and 1 and 4 and 4 fourth, same proccess but non staccato etc.