It is week three already, and I definitely think that I am making progress with this piece. My right hand is coming along very nicely — I am making fewer and fewer mistakes each time I practice. The same goes for my left hand; however, I definitely feel that it is a little bit harder. Although the right hand is far more complex, as it is the melody, I have an easier time with keeping the tempo. As you can see and hear from the videos, I still make mistakes as I am playing, but I am confident that in a week or two I will be able to start playing hands together. Further, the length of the videos for both my right and left hand lessened by about three to four minutes from my last videos, indicating that I am getting better and making fewer mistakes.
I noticed while I was playing that the majority of my mistakes — with both the right and left hand — were near the end of the piece. As I thought about why this might be, I realized that I practice the first part of the piece more often than the end. This is not something that I do purposefully; however, anytime I mess up when practicing, I often go back to the start to try again. Although this doesn’t necessarily sound like a problem, if I am continuously going back to the start of the piece and re-playing the parts I know well until I make a mistake, I am effectively practicing the parts that I mess up. Now that I am aware of this, I will adjust my practicing strategies accordingly. Instead of restarting the entire piece, I will focus more on specific measures of the song that I need to improve.