6 Micro Study 10 – turn around 2

Micro study 10 kicks off with the last chord of micro study 9, it is the second turn around pattern for this etude, again ending on the B7 or V chord of E minor. Like the last turn around idea (also known as a cadential sequence), the use of smart LH fingering is going to be important. The anchor fingers are noted with a dotted line, while the guide fingers are below with arrows. Use them to effectively negotiate the changes.

The turn around bars should be practiced as separate entities as they really will improve the coordination of the LH with the RH. There is a lot of fore thought that needs to go into adjusting the various fingers into each change. So take you time.

Top tips for micro study 10 are:

• Keep LH finger 3 down during bar 26, everything rotates around it.
• LH finger 4 is a stretch for the G bass note, but not impossible (just needs work).
• Bar 27 uses a full barre idea moved up from fret 1 to 2, my advice is to leave finger 3 down but it is also possible with a finger 2.
• Guide fingers are 1 & 3; and then a 4 right on the end.
• Bar 27 finger 3 is again anchor for beat 2 to 3 change.

There is nothing that is overly challenging in these two bars, the RH for the most part is doing the work selecting the correct strings, so make sure to practice it slow with full planting to gain more security and accuracy to your string choices.

The end?

And believe it or not that is it for this study in terms of learning bars. What Villa-Lobos does next is for training the RH chord mechanism, and thumb independence. So the harmony iterates over the exact same material (chords) you have just covered, but with a different RH pattern. However if you have played through micro study one already you will find this section just needs work on coordinating the LH & RH. On the next page we are going to have a look at three different bars from that section just to go over RH planting and of course the ending.

A note on Learning

Only tackle as much of the above sequence as you can, whilst staying mentally fresh. Take as long as you need to get all the information correct, it will save you having to re-finger at a later date when you find out the fingering will not work at faster tempos. It is suggested no more than 20 minute sessions.