This is great stuff! I really like Mary Cohen’s teaching material, and what’s more, so do my students. As usual her use of exciting violin techniques, combined with thought provoking titles, gets the student thinking and using their imaginations in these intermediate violin duets and studies to develop vibrato, shifting and double stopping. She explores vibrato, glissandi and long flowing bows in Asleep in the Hammock, pizzicato bowing and left hand pizzicato in On the Spot and the clever use of a pizzicato ostinato line A Passing Passacaglia duet. Lots of dynamics and bowing indications are given to keep the student on their toes and in the latter half of Clouds of Blossom she suggests you work out your own possibilities for fingering and dynamics. I especially like her suggestions at the beginning of each piece, which remind the student (or parent) what it was all about when they get home.
European String Teachers Association, Winter 2006