gotta have faith

My cello teacher decided we should have a little break between study books, so at the moment, I'm working on a standalone piece called "La Foi" ("The Faith") by Goltermann. It's a nice, flowy, smooth piece for piano and cello, with plenty of opportunity to practice vibrato.

My vibrato has come a long way. First finger is still giving me fits, and if I'm not careful how I place my pinky finger, I get a slight shooting pain. Otherwise, it sounds like I may sort of perhaps quite possibly know what I'm doing. Kind of. If I squint my ears real hard.

I got the hang of the first page of the piece pretty easily. The second page - not so much. Frankly, the second page annoys me. It's a hell of a lot of shifting, although a large section of it is only on the A string and not at an overly fast pace. In theory, that should make things easier. In practice, it does not. Not to mention that one has to hold the right bow arm up for rather a long time, which can be tiring. Also, I've noticed that my A string sounds awfully bright compared to the other three strings, so it's a bit jarring when I get to that section in the piece. (Don't start in about changing out the A string for a new one. Cello strings are not cheap. I've got to work with what I have.)

I'm hoping the third page of this piece will be less annoying. I would like to be able to play the whole thing at least somewhat respectably. Right now, it's a trudge.