Thoughts/questions about practice

a slight bit of swivelling - it just doesn't take over. AFF

With regards to putting the thumb under as early as possible, I've noticed more that the movement of tucking towards the base of the fifth finger consolidates the arch structure of the hand. I've found it very educational to miss out the thumb's notes in scales and just keep it tucked under while the other fingers play their notes. I think you mention something similar to this in Craft, Alan, with regards to trills.

Could be... I can't remember that far back! AFF

I had an interesting breakthrough with regards to arpeggios yesterday (more of a 'DUH!' moment actually.) It seems there were certain areas where I had not been activating the fingers to play (such as putting the thumb under, or going over the thumb), and in fact just pushing them into the key with the movement that should just have been positioning them above the key. This one change made everything sound better, and made playing so much easier. I'm actually looking forward to passing the thumb underneath fingers 3 and 4 now, rather than approaching it with a muted sense of dread. I'd been aware that something of the sort was the issue for a while, but hadn't quite made the link between the bumps in my sound and a lack of activation - after all, I had still been connecting the notes. I guess in this respect I got lazy. No longer though!

Hello again folks! I thought I'd give a quick update. The advice given by Zack and Alan has proven very useful, it is much appreciated. My arpeggios are becoming much more secure, though they've still got a long way to go. However, since they were the worst aspect of my technique I decided to make them the best. I've taken to fingertapping everything I practice, then playing staccato (as if fingertapped), which I've found really helps with the co-ordination between the hands and also for the horizontal movement of the arm during scales and arpeggios. The I practice legato, portamento and in combinations between the hands at a variety of dynamic levels. Practising this way has developed my listening too. I do have a couple more questions: 1. Leggiermente or leggiero - they both mean lightly, but do they indicate how notes should be connected to each other? Smoothly, detached or anything in between. Or does the interpretation change depending on the context? 2. Repeated chords are currently causing me a little trouble. There are a couple of songs that I play in my band which involve lots of fairly quick repeated chords. The left hand usually plays the root and fifth of each chord and doesn't seem to tire nearly as much as the right, which plays root, third and fifth. This fatigue amounts to a tightening of the muscles (and maybe tendons) of the forearm. I've experimented with the amount of activation from the fingers, the height of the hand. Aiming to have the hands pushed upwards rather than downwards for each chord appears to help, but I still haven't hit on a method that minimises effort. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance, Nick

i don't know the difference between is light - there are many different touches that might get you various versions of that light sound, so you have to fool around with it a little. There is no one right answer. As for the repeated triads - almost for sure your fatigue stems from your 2nd metacarpal-phalangeal collapsing in relation to your thumb. Keep your thumb under and your 2nd MCP joint HIGH and see what that does for you. The left hand doesn't bother you because your 2nd finger doesn't have to play a note, you can lift its MCP joint and keep it high easily. Good luck! AFF

Thanks for the quick response Alan. I'll play around with what you've suggested and report back to let you know how I've got on.

I haven't experimented with repeated chords yet, though I shall soon as I'm looking at learning Schubert's Impromptu in C minor. I did have a revelation yesterday, though. I was playing around with the over holding and 'breathing' arm, which I've found difficult for so long. I noticed that as I started to get the hang of it, my fifth finger bones aligned themselves for the first time. This allowed me to release the fifth finger in scales, which I was tightening when doing thumb under/finger over movements. I think the fifth finger had been trying to help out in a similar way to the thumb, due to some collapse elsewhere. The result seems to be ease of execution that I was preventing myself from attaining before. If I can apply the same thing to the guitar then that should allow me to bring my playing of both instruments to new levels.

Very cool, a nice precise observation. Thanks! AFF

It appears that when I am able to release the tension in my fifth fingers, a chain reaction occurs. Gradually the muscles between the metacarpals begin to release, giving a wonderful sensation of space in the hand, that I've had occasionally whilst doing various Alexander technique work on myself. I don't know which part of the mechanism will feel the effects next, but I'm eagerly anticipating the next discovery! Edit 27/08/11: Whoa, the "Maximum Articulation of the Fingers" chapter in the book is quite something! I'm having a lot of fun freeing up my mechanism with activation. When I first got the book a couple of years a go I looked at this chapter and decided it was too hard. Now I'm producing louder, more colourful notes with my fingers alone than I used to by pushing with my arms!