Practice Journal – Third Journey Returning with Fresh Eyes

After taking a day away from the piece, I came back to the first page of Recercar con obligo by Girolamo Frescobaldi. To my surprise, it flowed much more naturally. The passages that felt complicated before now seemed clearer, and I was able to play the first page quite fluently.

With that small sense of progress, I moved on to the second page and repeated the same process. Since my practice time during the school day was limited to a 30-minute block, the goal for this session was simply a rough sight-reading. I focused on identifying the voices and noticing where the hands jump between different registrations.

In the following practice session, I began refining the fingering again. Just like on the first page, this meant trying different options and seeing what allowed the phrases to move most naturally.

Recercar con obligo 2nd page with fingering

Sometimes a slightly stretched hand position works better than constantly changing fingers. This can reduce unnecessary finger swaps and help keep the line more stable. However, these solutions don’t settle immediately, they need several repetitions before the hand feels secure. I also like to put fingering at the start of the phrase, so that it's easy for me to follow.

Each small adjustment gradually brings greater technical ease and clearer voices, helping the contrapuntal lines speak more naturally.

Altogether, about three solid hours of focused work logged in the practice journal have brought me to this point.