A FRESH START

Taking on other people’s ex-pupils can be a tricky business – especially when they come with ingrained unhealthy habits. Focusing on upper strings, Alun Thomas outlines what may need to be addressed to make progress

ILLUSTRATIONS BY ADELAIDE IZAT

Among the many regular, occasionally intense conversations I have with my colleagues and friends about playing and teaching, one stands out in some relief. Stated axiomatically, it goes something like this: ‘Inherit a student and you inherit their teachers’ habits!’

Over the last few years I’ve pondered, indirectly, the validity of this statement: if there were some truth in the claim, it follows that on the one hand it would be a good idea to maximise the positive aspects for the betterment of the student; on the other hand, however, minimising any potentially negative effects would be the primary task for the inheriting teacher. But as with any other axiom and especially in the world of string teaching, there are plenty of caveats and contradictions, and occasionally there is some special pleading.

As an experienced violinist and tutor, including a specialist psychophysical teacher (Alexander Technique) for more than two decades, I had the initial idea for this article following extended periods of inheriting small teaching practices – one at a well-appointed private school and another at a state music centre in Wales.

There are so many facets to a positive teacher–pupil transition. For younger children, warmth, fun and kindness take precedence, whereas for a serious slightly older pupil (teenagers and college students form the group that I mainly consider) – desirable though these softer elements must always be – the progressive route must include, at times, their capacity to accept the unvarnished truth on the road to resilience.

USING THE BACK

I well remember a student who told me that his (esteemed) previous teacher had begun to encourage him to ‘use his back’ when he played. I was intrigued to see that his own conception of the directive yielded the exact opposite! He’d contorted himself in such a way that he had cut off the connection between his arms and his back, rounding his back in such a way as to lose overall height, thus restricting easy and free breathing.

It is too often the case that any direct muscular response to a teaching directive simply results in a rearrangement of habits – one habit may be lost and several others enter by the back door. It takes a gentle but firm hand to guide a new student to do less and take on a process-oriented mindset – that is, using thought rather than leaping straight into doing something muscularly.

PHYSICALITY OF PLAYING – SET-UPS AND INDIVIDUALITY

One perennial debate concerns chin rests and shoulder rests and the pros and cons of commercial and home-made alternatives.

A misunderstanding of what constitutes necessary support – of the jaw and collarbone, and the separate metric of collarbone and shoulder/acromioclavicular joint – is still common even in quite experienced teachers, hence my frequent need to explain that a long neck does not always, or even often, necessitate a high shoulder rest or other type of spacer.

Good set-ups perform their designated duty only when they take into account the coherence, reliability and temporal nature of a student’s operant system; in other words, a teacher must beware of fitting or choosing hardware to mask a pupil’s misuse or ‘conformity–deformity’. High chin rests are, in any case, almost always a firm no-no for the vast majority of children, as are very high shoulder rests.

It’s my contention that when the essentials of opposition, balance, leverage and freedom are understood not as floppiness but as a dynamic balance coupled with a suitable chin rest (sometimes a small sponge underneath the violin is the best option), very little support is required.

Too-high chin rests can be problematic

A good teacher should be able to encourage active exploration, at times even helping a pupil explore the wrongly felt thing – why something does not work – resulting ultimately in a better outcome. The violin is a fabulously matured form seeking our cooperative embrace; it does not need to be tamed by an assemblage of expensive accessories.

THE MAP ILLUMINATES THE TERRITORY

Teachers at all stages have a duty to be able to map basic anatomical structure. A singing teacher I once met had no idea that the lungs are high in the body cavity (not near the stomach!) and even extend upwards beyond the clavicles. So the violin teacher who cannot map the acromioclavicular joint, say, or real origin of the fingers and associated areas of the shoulder girdle that support the violin, might hinder a student who thrives on factual information.

POSITIONING Most good teachers know the very basics. However, my experience with a number of students that I inherited a few years back from a particular teacher should alert us all to important subtleties that can be missed. For example, is the violin too slanted (from G to E), encouraging the left elbow way too far to the left; and, if this is the case, how much of the collarbone (if any of it) is available to provide feedback and support?

INHERITED CONFUSIONS, CERTIFICATION AND VALUE

I’m sometimes perplexed by new students’ confident pronouncement that they have ‘passed Grade 8’. The case of a particular young violinist, a bright and confident child whom I was happy to take on, exemplifies a wrong-headed approach to learning – and the teaching that informs it. This type of pupil’s goal is to get through the grades far too quickly, so that they develop a faintly half-hearted form of healthy action, perpetuating what might be called the ‘fallacy of certification’.

Stylistic sense, intelligent bow division and distribution, playing off the string, reliable shifting and the fundamental knowledge of the mechanics of sound production – in other words, the lexicon of foundational action – seem to be particularly poor stepchildren in the inventory of basic skills passed up by some on the teaching line.

FIXED IDEAS ABOUT BEING FREE

Myths and legends suggesting that upper string players should, for example, ‘stand with their weight on the left foot’ – or similar positional advice – are also an invitation to embody a fixed and clenched stance that will rebound and influence every level of playing and performance.

‘Trying to feel’, ‘using the back’, ‘encouraging arm weight’ are often invitations to unnecessary tightening, or a floppiness that hinders easy, effective balance. I’ve lost count of the number of times that I’ve had to dispel such myths for new pupils. Likewise, attempting to help the pupil replicate the outer form and apparently unimpeded action of another’s intimate and long-matured internal choreography (usually a famous player’s) is to take teaching licence of a very broad nature.

UNITING LEFT AND RIGHT

It’s often said that most problems in life are problems of relationship – and for violinists this is definitely true! Right and left must work together, and there’s always room for improvement. Students are always amused when I suggest, quite seriously, that their right and left hands could be properly synchronised – after all, if they’ve played hard pieces their coordination must be OK, right? Well, no, actually. The aim must always be in favour of what we might call inhibitory preparation – creating the best conditions for future action, however tiny those actions might be, and allowing what works, to work. In other words, stop doing what you don’t need to do, then stop it some more!

BEING ‘BOWISTS’

Unequal attention to right and left hands is still fairly common in teaching – so much so that I have sometimes encouraged new students to think of themselves as ‘bowists’ rather than just violinists. Indeed, I often find new students gazing, almost hypnotically, at my left hand when I am illustrating something to do with the bow. To some extent this must illustrate the relative imbalance in some teaching traditions where too much importance is given to digital facility at the expense of the right hand and arm.

There is also the importance of understanding bilateral transfer – left and right sides chatting, hopefully to each other’s mutual benefit; especially the conversation between right and left thumbs. This is definitely worth exploring.

KNOWING THE SCORE

Evidence of deliberate, immersive learning – knowing the full score (not being a one-clef wonder) of appropriate repertoire – seems still to be a little underrepresented, at least in more advanced students who find their way to me. Better a Vivaldi concerto mindfully prepared in this manner, than a Mozart concerto played, proverbially, on thin ice.

Perhaps we could all become ‘bowists’

ILLUSTRATIONS ADELAIDE IZAT. PHOTO ELMA AQUINO

STUDENTS ARE ALWAYS AMUSED WHEN I SUGGEST, QUITE SERIOUSLY, THAT THEIR RIGHT AND LEFT HANDS COULD BE BETTER SYNCHRONISED

GETTING AROUND THE VIOLIN – FINGERINGS

For those already quite serious about their playing I suspect that more attention could be paid, earlier on, to fingering systems that embrace a half-step, crawling-type action. For example, many students seem flummoxed when faced with a passage that is crying out for second position – they’re determined instead to find a solution revolving around the first, third or fifth position. One of today’s most interesting and accomplished violinists, Augustin Hadelich, has related that if he had to choose something to take with him to a desert island, he would forego Shakespeare and instead take second position!

A crawling-type attitude to the left hand should be encouraged

GETTING AROUND THE VIOLIN – SHIFTING

To encourage a more virtuosic and exploratory sense of getting around the fingerboard, I advocate a shifting system, better understood as pivoting, that allows a greater range within the frame of the hand, and in the light of what the great violinist (and Paganini analyst) Ruggiero Ricci revealed, incorporating the use of all four fingers and thumb. This facilitates a backward and upward reach (staying in one position) rather than always wheeling out a lazy, odd position shift.

New students, especially those previously more examoriented, find this radical and uncomfortable to begin with, but later realise its worth.

SCALES

Jascha Heifetz said: ‘Many students are afraid of scales... you are usually afraid of something you are not familiar with.’ I often find new pupils bringing with them a fatalistic outlook regarding scales – a self-fulfilling prophecy at some level, perhaps.

My approach, to whet the appetite, counters any ‘violindroid’ tendencies, transforming traditional (position-based) fingerings, weak rhythmic direction or expressionless scales as well as the strange idea that a scale played without vibrato is somehow the great leveller. It instead considers scales and broken chords a variable resource, to be played with a crawling left hand and practised often in dance rhythms – from sarabande and louré to foxtrot and tango. Scales are fun!

Jascha Heifetz teaching in 1978

I SIMPLY LOVE PLAYING STRING DUOS WITH EVERY ONE OF MY STUDENTS, AT WHATEVER STAGE THEY MAY BE

TEACHING FROM THE HEAD DOWN…

It takes some time before I can convince a new student that really excellent playing is a function of the ‘back-end’ business – that arms and hands are ambassadors of the back and legs. I get them to try playing a few notes standing on one leg and they soon see what I mean!

‘ARM WEIGHT’ AND (DREADED) TENSION

Encouraging a pupil to feel ‘arm weight’ is a most unhelpful directive – it’s a good example of how sensory information can be misinterpreted. This is especially so for pupils who might already lack support for their arms and who need connection and not collapse – however comfortable it feels.

Trying to ‘feel’ arm, or any, weight is to miss the essential point that it’s our own tensional matrix or ‘web’ that we feel. Attempting to add or assess weight must always be a function of our personal neuromuscular situation.

Tension can only ever be redistributed. Attempts to do what we feel is reducing tension on a piecemeal basis are a misinterpretation of its message.

INCORRECT EXPECTATIONS

One of the most pernicious myths about string teachers seems to be that great ones can somehow get inside a pupil’s head, direct their movements and guarantee success. It’s a good idea to be clear with new students (and their parents!) as to the true nature of the contract – that success can never be assured.

HEIFETZ PHOTO COURTESY OF HEIFETZ ESTATE

DUOS

One way that I’ve found to gain trust, placate those needy of certification and encourage a chamber music approach is by playing string duos. I simply love playing duos with every one of my students, at whatever stage they may be. These help them to imbibe the sheer joy of playing and to share musical ideas in multiple, progressive musical styles (taking in Mazas, Spohr, Bartók, improvisation and more) while encouraging better sightreading into the bargain.

IT CAN BE DISAPPOINTING WHEN A STUDENT STILL SPEAKS OF THEIR PAST TEACHER’S OPINIONS IN TERMS OF THE PRESENT

PLAYING PHOTOS ELMA AQUINO. ILLUSTRATIONS ADELAIDE IZAT

MIRROR NEURONS, AND ALL THAT JAZZ

I remember giving a few consultation lessons to a player who had studied with a well-known violinist and had copied his former mentor’s habit of tuning his violin rather aggressively, with accented down bows preceding a flashy twiddle.

I feel that mildly irritating, mirrored habits such as this are within my remit to point out, if my advice is being sought. It goes without saying that doing so with much care is important. Asking for an explanation can be a way in, and sometimes a means to instant change.

Tuning should be undertaken with thought and care

‘MY LAST TEACHER SAID…’

Of course, I do encounter pupils who have obviously had excellent prior teaching, and I love discovering others’ great ideas – especially if they are useful for my personal progress or my own teaching. That said, there are times when a new student–teacher pairing just does not work – for reasons of personality or at times for annoyingly practical reasons. I have also had to lose a potentially excellent younger pupil because my views have clashed with those of the parents. When this happens, I am mindful to keep the peace – after all, they might return when all other avenues are exhausted and I may have been vindicated.

It can be particularly disappointing when a student still speaks of their past teacher’s conceptions or opinions in terms of the present. It’s also a sign, I believe, that a measure of security is still being sought. I take it as an invitation to connect, indirectly, with the former teacher and say something like, ‘Yes, that’s a very good idea, and have you also thought about this…?’ Lessons learnt from the concept of ‘non-violent communication’ are most useful in instances like this. Instead of saying, for example, ‘It’s a bad idea to hunch and tighten your shoulders,’ you might suggest instead to ‘imagine some wider space between them’.

Approaches like this enable kind continuity and an assurance that everything is OK, and that like the student’s last (cherished) teacher, you are fully on their side, and you are both working for mutual benefit and fun.