Paganini's Pencil!

Written by Stephen Brivati
Published: March 4, 2015 at 6:52 AM [UTC]

The other day I stumbled across a rather disconcerting web site claiming to be a specific school of violin playing that had inherited the secrets of Paganini. Said site was generously giving them all to us. All this is done with quasi-dramatic backdrop, voice and so on. In point of fact, the violinistic advice given wasn't bad at all, except the so-called "Paganini bow hold" owed a lot more to the protagonist's rather stubby fingers than any real secret. There actually wasn't anything there that isn't standard teaching practice. If you want to know the secrets of Paganini you'd be much better of reading Ricci's book on technique.

One of the things that made me burst out laughing was the discussion of how a big secret was practicing the right hand with a stick or pencil. An advert then flashed up on the screen for a pencil company and it was stated that "the x school of violin playing has been using these pencils for over a hundred years." Paganini for pencils, or is it the other way around?

Having calmed down with some stewed prunes (another of Paganini's secrets) I did get to thinking about how we can enhance and extend our practice time away from the violin with a little thought. For example, when I first went to college I was advised by my teacher to carry a pencil around and practice finger movements when I am on a train or whatever. So it dawned on me that what was useful then is still good now. Even with my limited resources and time, I can do really useful practice away from the instrument. Not only straightening and bending the fingers, but dropping the hand from its neutral straight-ahead position and letting the fingers extend. Then raising it above wrist height and contracting the fingers. Then there is windscreen wiping, or rotating from the elbow. Actually I much prefer this with a pencil for young players anyway. Or how about just stretching out the arm in a down bow further than normal and then doing an up bow further than normal so your range of movement is increased?

After a week of this doodling around I could actually sense some improvement in my bowing.

It seems to me that there is a great deal we can do, with or without Paganini's Pencil, to improve our playing, even if we are busy adults with only a few minutes to spare or doing a boring job like train crossing guard. Of course, in this day and age, everybody has a keyboard, but I don't recommend using that for bowing exercises.

Cheers,
Buri

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• Creeping around the fingerboard - Ricci on Glissando
• Ten-Minute Tangent on Paganini
• Interview with Philippe Quint: Paganini works