deborah mitchell

Bowing in the right direction

1. Tuning Violin's Sister.
2. Doing Buri's exercises with the bow.
3. Bowing open strings.

I'm getting better at tuning with the pegs. AND Sister is staying more and more in tune. So tuning only takes a couple of minutes.

Once she's tuned, I can't practice long, maybe 5 or 8 minutes. But I have noticed that my bow arm is stronger than it was when I had to stop last summer. My bow used to bounce a lot because I was so weak; now it only bounces a little.

I've also realized that I don't mind doing the same barely musical things over and over again.

I'm happy bowing open strings.

Is it unusual to be happy doing simple exercises? I could bow open strings, right now at least, for an hour at a time. The mechanics are so interesting. The same goes for Buri's exercises, where one holds the bow still on a string, first at the middle of the bow, then the point, then the heel.

When I was taking lessons, I have to say that I sometimes felt rushed. I thought it was my own impatience to be making progress. But I think now, maybe, it was partly because deep inside I wanted to spend more time on the exercises, and I wasn't really ready to play a tune.

Even back then, I could spend five minutes fingering and bowing the same note, over and over, and be fascinated by what was happening.

Once our schedules line up, I'm going to begin lessons with my teacher again. Do you think I should mention my desire to spend more time mastering exercises to my teacher? On one hand, I don't want to interfere with her pedagogical approach; on the other, I think I'd be happier if I could do exercises longer between trying to learn new songs. I don't know.

Any thoughts?

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Violin's Sister

Who is Violin's Sister, you ask? She is a Cardinal RED Yamaha SV-200 Silent Practice violin. Red Red Red. Ok, and black and a bit of natural maple. And RED.

So, I open up the box. Uhhh. The bridge isn't installed. But there are instructions. Well, ok. I'll give it a shot. So I loosen the strings, which are already pretty loose, and slip the bridge in.

Now to try to tune her...

Uhhh, Uhhh. She only has one fine tuner on the E string.

Now please don't laugh, but I've never even turned a peg, and it takes me 15 minutes to get Sister tuned. When I pick her up about an hour later, she's out of tune again. So I tune her again. This happens again about an hour later. Each time she's a bit less out-of-tune. Which is a good sign, I hope.

Do you think she is going out of tune because I need to use some peg dope (which I don't have, so I'll have to go to the music store.) Or could it be because the strings are new? Is it just that I don't know what I'm doing? I'm pushing in the pegs as I turn them.

Violin stays in tune, or close, all the time, so this is new for me.

Sister sounds very nice. Perfectly audible without electronics, but plug in the earphones and she has a much better sound than I expected. Not as beautiful as Violin, of course, but much better than the more inexpensive traditional violins I tried.

The other thing that surprised me was how light Sister is. I had expected her to be heavier than Violin, but she isn't. We'll be going to Europe this summer and she should travel well. It's a relief to have her; I won't have to worry about Violin getting damaged in transit.

Of course Violin's sister needed a case of her own, so I bought a gig bag from Yamaha...

a Red gig-bag.

(Did I mention that she's Red?)

(Red, Red, Red)

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Back again

After my last entry, bowing caused increasing pain in my broken shoulder, and I found out the action was causing the plate in my shoulder to rub against the main nerve bundle. So I had to give up the violin altogether. I was too heartbroken to write about it.

I still may have to have surgery. However, I've been working hard to rehabilitate the shoulder, and it has improved quite a bit. So it's back to the violin for me.

This time, I want to work by myself for awhile before I bring a teacher in. If I can get to the point where I can work for half an hour without pain or injury, then I'll arrange to take lessons again. It's too frustrating for me and the teacher otherwise.

So, if anyone has any suggestions about self-learning, I'd love to learn them.

Also, I'm getting a Yamaha SV-200 for an anniversary present, so I can practice without disturbing the neighborhood. Any advice around electric violins would be welcome, too.

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Jul. 3, 2005 at 7:49 AM

Form-wise, my grip is pretty good, although, if I concentrate on my left hand, I often allow my fingers to become too loose and move too much on the bow. But my general upper body weakness has made bowing much more difficult than it has to be, I think. DM came up with some clever ideas, like leaning the right side of my body, including my upper right arm against a door/wall while playing. They do help some.

My husband bought me a cheap bow online, and I carry it around with me and use it to practice my grip. Although I didn't intend to use it to play the violin with, DM rosined it up and tried it, and it doesn't sound too bad. But mostly I got it to bring with me in the car or to practice my grip with while I watch the Red Sox on TV, things like that.

And DM is being much more patient with my glacial progress than I am, right now. I'm sure I'm far behind the average student, as far as progress goes, and I get frustrated a lot, but she takes it all in stride. As long as I'm motivated, practicing, and making some progress, even at a snail's pace, that is all she asks of me.

The good news is that I've been going to a personal trainer for a week, and have had one Alexander Technique session, and they have made a big difference in my ability to play and practice. Today I was able to practice longer, as much as 10 minutes, in a productive fashion. And the wavering sound on the down-bow is much less noticeable.

I can't say enough for the Alexander Technique. I know it's been discussed extensively elsewhere on this site by more knowledgeable people, but I must add my two-cents' worth. In my case, for the last 15 minutes of the session, which I spent on a table (like a massage table), my right arm and shoulder felt normal for the first time since I fell last October 4th. No pain, no tension, just normal and relaxed. After being in constant pain for so long, it was a revelation. And it has given me hope.

I haven't started practicing the technique at home yet, but I intend to do so tomorrow, and to try to recapture a little of that feeling.

The personal training is exhausting and somewhat painful, but has already produced results as far as upper body strength is concerned. So, the extra effort is paying off in a lot of ways. And the small improvements in technique and practice time have made me less impatient.

Maybe the thing that most keeps me going right now is something my husband said to me the other night when I made it through the first part of "Three Blind Mice" and had moved on to practice keeping my bow straight on the open Ding. He called to me from the kitchen, "I recognized that! See, you *are* making progress. Not only can you play "Three Blind Mice", but you can play the first note of Partita No. 2."

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Jun. 26, 2005 at 10:46 AM

Bowing and low ceiling fans do not mix.

After my most recent lesson, it has become clear to me that I have to remove my ceiling fan from my office, or replace it with one that hugs the ceiling, because it interferes with our bowing.

DM arrives promptly at 9 AM. My husband has her coffee ready in only a minute; he is so supportive, and knows how concerned I am about losing her as my teacher. I can tell she is astonished by his thoughtfulness, but very happy for the coffee. She carries it with her out to the living room, where we have to practice because of the ceiling fan.

I start by telling her that my therapist loves the idea of Alexander Technique. Also, that pizzicato is fine, except for the G string, which requires me to lift my arm too high. As I begin to explain to her about the nerve bundle it is irritating and why, she listens, and then proceeds to tell me a lot more about it, including its name, than my therapist did. Ok, so from now on I do pizzicato on the G string incorrectly until my arm can perform the correct motion.

She is not surprised to hear that one of my chief problems is a general lack of upper-body strength. After all, I have been largely sedentary for months. But I have solved that problem by arranging for sessions with a personal trainer, who also happens to be my therapist's brother. And my husband's kempo sensei.

(The coincidences don't end there, although I didn't mention them to her. My Alexander Technique teacher, who I found on the Internet, uses a dance studio for her lessons. As she gives me directions, I realize it's the studio where my husband and I take ballroom dancing. And our dance instructor there is a good friend of my therapist. And we found each of these people independently. Weird.)

So, we begin. I hold the bow and bounce it like a fishing rod in my hand. Then I hold it and find the point where it will balance in my hand. Now it's time to try to grip it correctly.

First, I point my thumb towards the ceiling, then rotate it and place it in position on the frog - "Like you're placing a dot of paint there with it," DM says. Then, the second finger. Oops, not the pianist's second finger, the VIOLINIST's second finger. Opposite the thumb, second joint, like so. Then the ring finger, like so. Index finger to the first knuckle, like so. Pinky on top, above the back of the frog, like so.

"Excellent," she says, "You must have held a bow in a previous life. But you need to curve your thumb and pinky. If you look down the bow, your hand should look like the curl of a wave." Easier said than done.

Then we begin with some exercises. Pinky pushups. Windshield wiper. Fishing pole. Between spending most of the last 22 years of my life on a computer keyboard, and playing video games, my pinky is pretty strong and the pushups aren't a problem. Even though DM talks about why we are doing all of these, only the pinky pushups make sense right now to me.

"Now, place the bow firmly on the D string, but try to make no sound." Scratch, scritch, ping and it's there. "Draw the bow down." I do, and it makes a wavery, but somewhat recognizable sound. "Now place it on the E string and do the same thing." Screech! Chalk on a blackboard. It's so bad, such an aural clichè, that I laugh uncontrollably.

At this point, I need to rest the shoulder a minute, so we stop for a sip of coffee. (My husband makes great coffee.) In our conversation, she mentions she started taking violin lessons at 7. I ask her if it had been voluntary.

"Oh, yes," she says, smiling, "One day I was watching Captain Kangaroo, and after the introduction was finished, I asked my mom, 'What was that, making the "do do do" sound?" My mom said, 'The violin.' I said, 'I want to do that. I want to play the violin.'"

This is a motivation I understand completely, because I *love* the Captain. I have the intro on iTunes and play it at least once a week. Now I sooooo want to be able to play the "do do do" sound, too.

We go back to it. She shows me how to address the string and slightly turn my wrist as I begin and end the stroke. I practice a few times, with very limited success and lots of wavery noise and screeches. Bowing doesn't hurt, but I can feel that my arm and shoulder are trembling with fatigue. When I tell her I think exhaustion is the biggest problem at the moment, and try to explain what's happening, she listens, then touches the section of my rotator cuff that is experiencing the worst of it, and says, "Of course! I can see it." So she supports the weight of my arm while I try again, and I do better.

My thumb keeps straightening out, as does the pinky. But I get a few reasonable sounds amidst more unpleasant noises. We stop and she shows me some exercises for strengthening my hand and wrist, also my left and right arms, as well as stretches for my hands, neck, arms, and shoulders.

I ask how long I can practice. She says only 10 minutes. Sigh. I say I am finding it easier right now to practice in short sips and maybe I could do a little more if I break it up. Ok, she gives in and says 3 5 minute sessions.

She tells me to keep a practice journal and give her a report the next time she comes. But not to worry about practicing today; the lesson is enough. She puts her coffee cup in the sink, her violin in it's case, and then she's gone.

She doesn't know it, but I am frustrated and discouraged. When I held the bow, there were tiny moments it seemed to float in my hand. It felt ready to begin, as though it were alive, full of eagerness and good will. Like a horse under my reins in my girlhood, it felt as if it would move with me, in joy and pleasure with me, if I held it correctly and signaled the proper command.

But my injury is in the way. And will be for months. I worry, and tell my husband, that my shoulder will never improve enough for me to succeed as a violinist. He reminds me that my therapist was able to measure recent improvement, and give me new exercises. That I'm going to start with the personal trainer and the Alexander Technique. That I'm exhausted. He is right, and, with effort, I regain my perspective.

The restrictions on practice are almost as hard to bear. I can only practice a few minutes at a time, but I can do that more than three times a day. I understand she doesn't want me to burn out, or to injure my arm, but I love practice. On the other hand, she told me during our lesson that she had to take a year off once, because of the effects of over-practice.

I take my violin back into my room and place it and my bow in their case with great reluctance.

Later, after a nap, I sit on my daybed and type on my computer. From time to time, I cast brief, longing glances in the direction of the violin case, as if it were hiding some illicit lover. Finally, after an hour, I set my computer down and step over.

I have practiced enough to bring my violin up onto my shoulder in one easy motion with my left hand. I carefully establish a good stance and my best left hand and arm positions. I wrap my right thumb and fingers around the bow and keep adjusting them over and over, until they fall into place, relax and make the curl of the wave. Then, almost on its own, the bow floats and rises up and sweeps down across the D string. Just once. The note vibrates true in the cool air.

Success. At last. I smile, turn back to the case, and put my violin away for the day.

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Jun. 22, 2005 at 10:36 PM

So, on the 15th, when I knew my right shoulder was in no condition for a lesson the next day, I called my violin teacher with fear and trepidation in my heart. She wasn't there, so I left a voice message saying I had to cancel, yet again.

She called back. I'm sure, to begin with, she was going to suggest we discontinue our lessons. She was concerned about my shoulder and about my lack of progress. It wasn't a matter of payment at all, as we had agreed at the start that she would be paid whether a lesson occurred or not. She was very kind, and very concerned for me, but I could see she did not want to continue if the violin were bothering my shoulder, nor if it were going to be a waste of her time and effort.

After much begging and pleading and promises to take the violin to my physical therapist and get his opinion, she agreed to a "let's see" lesson on Monday. The relief was overwhelming, and afterwards, I sat and cried, which I almost never do.

The other agreement was that I would let my arm rest until Monday, and practice only so long as I felt no strain or pain.

I did everything I said I would, and when Monday came, DM showed up at the door. You can't imagine how delighted I was to see her.

We took a step backwards, as it were, and went over everything from the beginning. I could have done better, but I could have done much worse, as well. We decided using the bow might be less stressful for my right shoulder, so she showed me how to rosen it, and said we'd start bowing my next lesson. She also gave me some exercises to help me find the first position on the D and A strings with reliable precision, and said I should do short sessions many times a day. The goal is to be able to go from an open string to the first position precisely, ten times in a row, at least 3 times a day.

This may sound strange, but I actually like doing scales and exercises more than playing tunes right now. Maybe it's because I don't find it as jarring when I make a mistake.

Since Monday morning, I have practiced faithfully a few minutes at a time, many times a day. By tomorrow morning, I'll have at least an hour in, which is significantly more than my previous 15 minutes a day. Although I am not always precise, I am much more confident of those positions than I was before Monday morning.

Also, trying to develop precision has made me realize just how important good, consistent finger, thumb, hand, wrist, arm, shoulder, etc. positions are. Just a tiny change in the position of the wrist or of the neck of the violin on the base knuckle of the index finger is enough to make a previous placement of the index finger-tip on the string go from being true to being flat or sharp.

So my husband put a mirror on the back of my office door, and now I can see what my arm, wrist and thumb look like. I found some excellent photographs of arm, wrist, hand, finger and thumb positioning that are exactly as my teacher requires, which I'm going to put up on the door for comparison.

As promised, I went to my physical therapist. My shoulder has made good progress. I brought my violin, showed him pizzicato, and he said that I couldn't hold my arm as high as one normally would when plucking the G string, as my humerus isn't being pulled back into the proper position yet, and is irritating the major nerve bundle that goes from the neck to the arm.

I also asked him about Alexander technique, which he enthusiastically recommended. Now I need to find an Alexander instructor here in Marin.

Bowing tomorrow! I am so excited!

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Jun. 14, 2005 at 8:50 AM

Helping our friends move a very large house packed to the absolute brim with things many people would consider junk, violins have disappeared from my life, outside of the radio. Except they were playing metal, punk, and grunge. Oh, and Neil Diamond. Since the 2nd of June, I have yearned for my violin, but it would never survive intact through the move.

A drought of violins. None to play, no lessons, no one to talk to about them, no opportunity to listen to them, no time for more than a very occasional quick scan of violinist.com....

And then, Sunday night, magic happens. My nephew, who kindly volunteered to help, has been cleaning out the garage, which is a fate worse than death and a testimony to his affection for me. About 6 PM, when we are sitting in the upstairs of the house, packing, exhausted, grimy, and sneezing from dust, he walks up the stairs carrying something in his hands as though it is very precious and frail. Just like he used to carry butterflies, baseball cards, and flowers, a very long time ago.

I recognize it immediately. An old violin case! How could that be? No one in the family was remotely musical. No one had ever mentioned violins.

But there the case is in his hands, riddled with dry rot, obviously broken beyond repair. Could there be a violin in there? If so, would it be intact?

My friend Laura, seeing the damage and almost in tears, says over and over, "That must be Grandpa's lost violin."

My nephew brings it to me, and I gently open the case. No need to unlatch it or worry about rusted hinges. It has split completely around about an inch from the top. So I just lift the top, parts of which crumble in my hands.

The velvet lining has long ago rotted away, leaving red tatters hanging here and there. The inside is littered with debris. I turn the top over in my hands. Lo and behold, the bow is still attached and in one piece! Taking it out of the case, I see it was put away with the horsehair still taut. It looks in excellent condition, with only a single hair detached.

"Look, the bow is intact. This part, the frog, is made of ebony with mother-of-pearl inlays. Isn't it pretty?" I show it to Laura, and she smiles a little. The first smile I have seen on her haunted, weary face in many days.

Carefully, I loosen the hair and put the bow aside. I say nothing to her, but wonder if being stored taut has ruined the bow for performance.

"Laura, there is a lot of dry rot in the case. The violin may not be in very good condition." I try to keep her from getting her hopes up too high, and she nods, unable to speak.

Beneath the debris is a piece of green velvet, shaped roughly like a violin. The bits of rotted wood and sawdust lie so thick that I fear they are all that remains of her grandfather's violin. Using both hands, I lift the cloth out with trepidation. Crumbs of wood shake off onto the floor.

But underneath, still in the case, the violin is whole. The strings are older than Eden, all squiggly and loose. The bridge has fallen over. But the violin is whole.

Using two hands, I raise it slowly from the case. Laura leans forward and touches it with infinite tenderness, the same tenderness I saw her use when first touching her newborn son in the delivery room, almost 5 years ago. Finally, tears fall from her eyes, she laughs softly, her shoulders heave - from joy, stress, grief old or new... I don't know, I don't know. But the tension in her shoulders eases; her hands relax and stop shaking for the first time since she picked us up at the airport.

Other than one long crack that I think can be repaired, and lots of grime, scratches and nicks, the violin is in good condition. The fingerboard, pegs, and chin rest are ebony, and the tailpiece seems to be rosewood with a mother of pearl inlay. It's certainly old, and reminds me of the descriptions I've read online of violins produced in Germany in the late 1800s. Not that I know enough to tell, one way or the other.

"It's in pretty good shape, I think. Here's a crack, but I think it can be repaired. I'm going to my luthier next week for a new chin rest and I can take it to them for an assessment, if you'd like me to." Other than to my husband, I haven't mentioned my violin to a single soul, but desperate times require desperate measures, and I want her to have confidence in me. She deserves some joy, some emotional gain out of all the wreck that surrounds her.

"Would you? Do you think it can be played again? I must call Aunt Bonnie now."

Come to find out, it was during Aunt Bonnie's move to the West Coast that the violin was lost. And her brother, Laura's father, had been asking for it. Not to play, none of them could, but for sentiments' sake.

While Laura talks to her aunt, I loosen the E string, the only one tight at all, and stand the bridge upright. Tightening them all a bit, I go back to the A string, and try to tune it. Believe it or not, I had been carrying my electronic tuner around with me in my purse, and sneaking in a few seconds of listening to A, here and there, for pitch-training.

Well, grandpa's violin won't tune for me the way my own lovely does, and I'm afraid to hurt it, so I loosen the strings again, and examine the body closely. I can't see a label inside, but on the back, scratched into the varnish right below the nose is a faint name. O. Raettig, looks like to me.

Meanwhile, Laura is trying to convince her aunt to come back and see it. Her aunt is exhausted from moving herself the previous weekend, and then helping Laura pack for the last two days. She is excited, but doesn't want to get back up. When I mention the signature to Laura and she passes it on, Aunt Bonnie says she'll be there shortly.

While we are waiting, I look in the box again. There is an unused (I think) bridge, an old cellophane envelope for a D string, and three music books. The D string envelope is for "The Perfection Violin String". "Made of the very best Material".

Two of the books are promotional items. And, I kid you not, one is for snake oil. Yes, it really is from a company that sells patent medicines, the star of which is Hamlins Wizard Oil!

Hamlins has a cure for all ills. If Wizard Oil won't do you, then you can try Wizard Stomach & Blood Regulator, Wizard Cold Tablets, Wizard Liver Whips, Wizard Cough Cordial, or, if you have "ailments peculiar to women", you might want to try Old Virginia Herb Tea.

I could write an entire blog entry on this book. The cover is red and black. In the middle is an elephant dressed up as a doctor with top hat, sitting on an old wooden office chair, holding a bottle of Wizard Oil in its trunk. On the back is a bottle of Wizard Oil, with the phrase "Directions in " in English, German, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Italian, Polish, Czech (I think), Spanish, and French. The book contains "Songs as sung by the Wizard Oil Concert Companies giving free concerts from wagons drawn by four or six horses."

I must scan Hamlin in, make a PDF of it, and put it online. It is a work of art. And it has given me a time frame, of sorts, as it contains testimonials dated 1912 and 1913.

The other book has no cover, but also no patter, and many more songs, courtesy of the Sharples Cream Separator Co., West Chester, PA. Both books contain old favorites, like "Old Kentucky Home" and "Suwanee River". Sharples seems to be fond of Gaelic folk songs like "Annie Laurie", "Robin Adair", and "Flow Softly, Sweet Afton". On the other hand, Hamlin's offers "Bridal Chorus from Lohegrin".

By the time we look through both of them, Aunt Bonnie arrives. We turn to the third. I'm too ignorant to know the correct name for the kind of book it is, but I'll describe it as an old music composition notebook with a stiff blue cover. Later I see it is a "No. 10 - 12 lines", "Monarch Brand" sold by the Carl Fischer Company. We open it up and Aunt Bonnie (a very excitable lady) screams, "That's my grandmother's writing! I'd know it anywhere!"

Evidently Laura's great-grandmother was a pianist and played in concerts, although what that really means I don't know, and don't think they do, either. Could she have been a member of a "Wizard Oil Concert Company"?

What has great-grandma put in her book? "I Praise Him for Morning" and other old-fashioned hymns. A march from Wagner. "Roman Races - H. Lincoln" gives us a date, as I found the original sheet music for sale online with a copyright of 1914. "Mardi Gras" by Opler gives us another date, as it is really "While We Danced At The Mardi Gras" by John Mercer and Alfred Opler and was published in 1931. "Springtime in the Rockies" - yet another date, this was written for the Carmen Miranda movie, "Springtime in the Rockies", released in 1942. "Yankee Doodle Dandy" and "Jingle Bells".

At this point, Laura and Aunt Bonnie are both jumping up and down like excited school girls. They look at the signature. Could it be N. Raettig? That would be great-grandma. No, it is definitely O. Raettig.

Can the crack really be repaired? Do we need a new case? Is there some way to hang it up for display? Can we find out how old it is, who made it? Can it be fixed by Christmas, so we can give it to Laura's dad as his Christmas gift?

"We'll have to see," I say, "I'll do my best."

"This is one of the best days of my life," Aunt Bonnie says.

"It's almost worth all of this," says Laura, and I know she is talking about a lot more than just the packing.

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Jun. 2, 2005 at 2:18 AM

Just when I think I'm going to be able to go home and spend lots of time with my violin, my godson's mom calls from California and says they are losing their home and would I please come down as soon as I get in. She's picking my husband and I up at the airport, taking him home, and taking me back with her for comfort and packing.

There goes my lesson Friday, and any hope of practicing who knows how many more days.

In desperation, I ordered Janice Tucker Rhoda's "The ABCs of Violin for the Absolute Beginner", and the accompanying CD. It was my thought that listening to the CD while following in the book would be something, anyway.

The course of true love never does run smooth.

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May. 24, 2005 at 8:02 PM

This week I had my ups and downs in practice, and during the first part of my lesson this morning, I felt slow and stupid, like my body feels when I try to walk under water. My left hand had a mind of its own, and nothing DM said seemed to change what that hand was doing, even though I thought I understood her.

DM's words concerning position and fingering made sense, of course, in an intellectual way. But deep inside, I was having a hard time understanding what it was I was supposed to do, and why I had to hold all of the fingers in position on the string, even though I was only trying to play one note. It seemed much easier to just place the finger needed to produce the note I wanted, for instance, just the ring finger when I wanted to play G# on the D string. Putting all of them in position felt awkward and uncomfortable, and I didn't see the point. I just wanted "Twinkle, Twinkle" to sound right.

She could see I wasn't getting it, but that I wanted to and was trying to, and so she patiently kept trying to explain things, frequently referring to "muscle memory". I understood what she meant by that, but my understanding wasn't translating into anything useful with the violin.

Finally, when we were both frustrated (although she was kind enough not to weigh me down with hers), I asked if she would play and just let me watch. So she sat down, and I stood over her, and she began to play the exercises she wanted me to do.

I watched DM's fingers closely as she tried to explain, and suddenly I understood. Keeping the fingers in position allows one to hit notes reliably. My keeping my fingers in position on the strings would help me memorize where those positions were relative to the violin and the other fingers.

As I watched even more closely, it came to me that the violinist's left hand performs a dance on the neck and strings. That dance defines the frequencies of the notes given voice by plucking the strings or bowing. Bowing is, no doubt, another, quite different, dance all its own.

As soon as this metaphor came to me, I relaxed. I love to dance, understand the process of learning a new dance, and being able to tap into that understanding allowed DM's explanations to become meaningful to me in a deep way. Muscle memory? Of course! All became clear and I saw my path before me.

Right now, for me, learning the violin is like learning to dance - it's all about position. And, as in dance, knowing the starting position and being able to return to it is of the first importance. DM had been focusing on position all along; I just hadn't accepted everything she had to say about it. When I was a child, I would have accepted her instructions much more readily.

Again it became obvious to me that to succeed at this, I must be as a child. So easy to do in some things, so hard in others. Not only must I have the playfulness of a child, I must also have a child's acceptance of my teacher's instruction. I needed, in fact, to let go of control, of my image of myself as someone with expertise. Not easy for an adult to do.

At the time, I wasn't able to voice my insight to DM in this coherent way. But I felt a resistance I didn't know I had just melt away. Maybe she could feel it, too. I think she could see that my eyes had been opened. She told me about how, when she first started teaching, she'd hand a student a book, violin, and bow, show them the left and right hand positions, and then not understand why they didn't just up and start playing. Finally, she realized her job was to break it all down into a sequence of tiny tasks her students could master, one at a time. Only then could she teach and her students learn.

Now that we weren't battling my hidden resistance, she could explain more to me and I could listen with acceptance and understanding. She suggested exercises I could do that would help me pin down the E position on the D string and the Bb position on the A string.

We learned a new song, "Baa Baa Black Sheep", and she promised "Ode to Joy" soon. Then it was over and she was on her way.

I'm exhausted, but from the emotional conflict I went through, not from playing the violin. I can see that I will be my biggest obstacle to learning.

Here on Violinist.Com, under the topic, "Practicing Well", Aleksandr Salamov says, " You must know what do you need to do...." Simple and seemingly obvious, but profound. Until today, I didn't even know I didn't know what I needed to do in order to learn to play the violin.

Now I know my next two tasks:

1. To learn to accept instruction like a child.
2. To learn the basic steps of the left-hand violin dance.

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May. 24, 2005 at 6:41 AM

What changed from the evil practice the day before?

I wasn't tired.
I had something to drink before I started.
I used a stop watch to measure what I could do, instead of a timer to dictate what I should do.
I relaxed and worried less about being perfectly on pitch.

The other thing I did was read a lot here about practice and technique.

And that is one of the most important sources of my confidence that I can succeed. I have this website to turn to. Being home-bound, without Violinist.com I would be without a community to turn to for information and encouragement.

I am back to having to restrain myself from running into my "boudoir" and practicing to the point of pain.

Thanks, all.

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