Viola Gauntlet, Day 5 (Friday): Vibrato & tone - key of E-flat major. A daily practice routine for viola with a play-along backing track: the score scrolls with a playhead, every exercise has a 2-bar count-in. Tone first: sounding point, bow speed and a dynamic ladder over an E-flat drone, then vibrato practised as measured rhythm (2, 3, 4 and 6 per beat) on every finger. It ends with an original slow cantabile in E-flat where the vibrato never stops and the phrases have room to breathe.
1. Open-string long tones - One unbroken tone per bow, in tune with the drone; contact point steady, watch the bow stay parallel to the bridge (stretch: 12-beat bows with no audible bow change) 2. Drone intonation - Each note rings with the drone - no beats; thirds low, leading note high 3. Fifths across strings - One finger flat across two strings: a pure fifth means the hand frame is right 4. Sounding point & bow speed - Move toward the bridge to get louder: slower bow, more weight, same clean tone 5. Dynamic ladder, pp to ff - Every bow one dynamic step louder (then softer), with the tone staying centred (stretch: the C-string pass, ppp to fff and back, with a ppp that still sings) 6. Measured vibrato: 2 and 3 per beat - Rock from the note to just below and back, exactly in time with the clicks 7. Measured vibrato: 4 and 6 per beat - Faster rocking, still even: 4 per beat, then 6 per beat (stretch) (stretch: 6 per beat (sextuplet speed), even and relaxed, on the 4th finger too) 8. Continuous vibrato - The vibrato keeps going through every finger change and bow change 9. Vibrato width & dynamics - pp = narrow and quick, ff = wide and rich; the vibrato follows the dynamic (stretch: the ff on the 4th-finger E-flat: wide vibrato with no pressing or bleat) 10. Cantabile in E-flat (original) - Sing it: unbroken vibrato, long bows, and let every rest breathe
Full week, PDFs and backing tracks: https://www.grahampaasch.com/viola-gauntlet