Quick Practice Tip: The Power of the Stopped Bow

Over the years of teaching the Suzuki method, I have come to appreciate the power of the stopped bow. The Twinkle Variations that Dr. Suzuki put together are brilliant in terms of what the pieces teach the student about impulse control and the proper use of kinesthetic energy. The more I teach, the more I discover or uncover all the gems that Dr. Suzuki has included in the Suzuki repertoire. Nothing is more powerful to me than the lessons learned concerning the stopped bow.

I teach many students who play other violin music, such as fiddling or mariachi. I frequently encounter students who literally cannot stop their bow. The bow dribbles from one note to the next without ever clearly defining the end of one note and the beginning of the next note. Wait! Who am I kidding? The bow is not dribbling, it is moving 100 m.p.h.! This constant movement issue results in several problems:

• Messy bows and unclear articulation
• Rushing tempo or a tempo that pushes the “toe-side” of the beat rather than the “heel-side” (the energy is forward directed rather than “sitting in the saddle”)
• Inability to play staccato well
• Tight joints, especially the right elbow
• Squeezed back muscle, especially below the right shoulder
• Poor tone production: either a pressed sound because the student is squeezing the notes or a wispy sound because the student is so tight in the right elbow and back muscles, that the bow can put little weight into the sound
• Poor practice habits: inappropriate practice tempos and a failure to consider the actual sound made

Sometimes it may take me a few years to teach a student with the stopped bow problem how to get a good stopped bow staccato. If only I could take these students back to square one and the Twinkle Variations! The Twinkles are the foundation of all the necessary stopped bow combinations that the student will encounter in the later Suzuki repertoire.

Here are some beneficial uses of the stopped bow:

• It gives the student an opportunity to consider whether the bow will make a good contact point with the string in order to produce the next note.
• It gives the student a chance to place the bow properly on the appropriate string level (or string levels in the case of a double stop chord).
• It allows the student to consider how his or her body should pivot the bow quietly from one string level to the next without lifting the bow off the string.
• It allows the student an opportunity to “check in” with muscles and joints to unlock any unnecessary tension.
• It allows the student to “ping” the beginning of the next note to start the vibration of the next note, which helps the student to generate good, strong tone.
• Most of all, it allows the student to actually consider what sound the student makes when playing.

I also work with the student to uncover any unnecessary tension in the bow arm, right shoulder, or back. If I am working with a high energy level student, then this issue alone will take a long time to address. I may have to spend a considerable amount of time addressing posture issues, including how the student directs his or her physical energy in a playing stance.

If I work with an advanced student, I might ask them to play Perpetual Motion so that we can work on these issues, but anything will do, even a basic scale. My goal will be to get the student to slow down and actually stop playing after one note so that the student can prepare the next note. In some cases, I need to actually address the student's playing stance in order to encourage a more successful outcome.

I used several terms above that might require further explanation. When I talked about the "toe-side" and "heel-side" of the beat, I referred to the front side versus the back side of the beat. If you lean forward on your toes, you will feel the inevitable pull forward. Did you know that we walk by falling forward and then catching ourselves? This is how the front-side of the beat works. We fall forward when we play, so that the tempo surges forward and speeds up. When we put our weight in our heels, we add the sensation of grounding to our playing.

For anyone who is familiar with horses, the concept of toe-side and heel-side energy dissemination makes sense. Horses are very sensitive creatures. If you want to start moving, all you have to do is think about it. You bring your energy level "up" and "forward" and the horse starts moving. How much energy you send forward will direct how fast the horse will comply. When you want to slow the creature down to a stop, you turn your energy "off," let your breath out, and settle back into the saddle. The horse stops.

Students can relate to "toe-side" and "heel-side" as descriptions of playing stances. We experiment with both so that students understand how each stance feels. Then we practice "sitting back in the saddle" so that students learn the physical sensations of relaxing and grounding. The students learn how to shift their weight to the heels of their feet and to tilt their pelvises under so that the torso weight shifts backwards (they tuck their "kitty cat tails" under and between their legs). For good measure, I might suggest that they also practice letting all the air out of their lungs. Being the high energy person that I am, I often practice breathing out my air in a slow whoosh. I find that I can calm my energy level down to a stop when I practice this technique.

The most recent student that I worked with to learn how to play a stopped bow (it took us four semesters to master this skill at the university level), had to learn how to curb his energy level and his expression of energy while playing. In other words, he had to learn how to turn things "on" and "off." My long time readers know how much a fan I am of the "Dog Whisperer" show with Cesar Milan. I learned a lot about using energy properly from watching this show on the National Geographic channel. I have a dog pack of six adult dogs and one youngster. Currently I also have three puppies about 5 weeks old. Anyone who has that many dogs will know what I mean about how one uses one's physical energy. I can rile up or calm down my pack of sweethearts in two seconds just by how I turn my energy level "up" or "down." I have even taught this skill to several of my students in order to teach them how to improve their posture or to learn leadership skills. But this is another blog post for the future.

For now, look to yourself and your students. Observe how you and your students are doing with their stopped bows and staccatos. If you find problems, consider whether you or your students are too energetic in your playing and then work out a step-by-step program to "slow" things down.

This blog post began as a quick practice tip and quickly became a long discussion about the physical manifestation of energy while playing. No, I am not an alien. I really do think about these things -- a lot. I apologize that the "quick" practice tip was anything but quick. This week, think about the power of a stopped bow and check whether you are providing yourself and your students with the opportunities to create good stopped bows. If you or one of your students has difficulty in this area, consider whether the student is physically standing and playing in a way that would discourage or encourage a good stopped bow.

Happy practicing!

Intonation, part 4: a Hodgepodge

In addition to our previous discussions about intonation, I have included here a mixture of additional ideas for practicing intonation. Please leave me a comment about your own personal favorite intonation exercises.

Drones: Have a note playing like a drone while playing scales or some passage. Most tuners are capable of sounding a note like a drone. At first play the tonic note as the drone. Later play other important notes in the key, such as the dominant or subdominant notes. When the exercise seems fairly easy, try playing to a drone note in an unrelated key, e.g., drone E natural while playing in the Bb key, or drone F# while playing in C major. It is also possible to play and use one's own open strings as a drone during practice.

Fun with Scales: Have someone whose intonation you trust play a scale a major third below you. For example, if you are playing D major, have the other person play Bb at the same time. I got this idea from a scale book entitled "Scales Plus!" by William Starr published by Alfred Music Publishing.

Have someone play a scale a major second below you. For example, if you are playing a D major scale, have the other person play in C major. This is another idea from William Starr.

Doublestops: Have the student do extensive practice with doublestops. There are several possible books that one can use:

A popular book for intermediate and advanced students is "Scales for Advanced Violinists" by Barbara Barber published by Alfred Publishing. For each key, Ms. Barber has provided the basic scales for doublestops in thirds, sixths, octaves, tenths, fingered octaves, and harmonics along with the basic major and melodic minor scales, broken thirds, and the general arpeggio routine through all the arpeggios related to the major scale (tonic minor, tonic major, submediant, subdominant, subdominant minor, diminished, and dominant seventh).

"Melodious Double-Stops" by Josephine Trott, volumes 1 & 2, published by G. Schirmer, Inc. Initially Ms. Trott presents doublestop etudes that incorporate the open strings, but the volumes progress in difficulty. My students generally like the tunefulness of the melodies versus just practicing scales alone.

"Quint Etudes for Violin" by Shinichi Suzuki, Revised Edition, published by Suzuki Method International. This book is my personal favorite. Dr. Suzuki discusses the difficulty of keeping the fingers in the correct placement across the various four strings. As the fingers move from one string to another, they may not land in the correct placement because the student's perception is inaccurate due to the finger angle changing. And, if the student has another problem, such as not moving the elbow under the instrument to accommodate the various string levels, then the fingers will not land in correct placement. The Quint Etudes address and correct these problems, and the etudes use perfect intervals such as fourths, fifths, and unisons to strengthen the student's ear. I have had great success with this etude book in identifying left hand placement issues and in strengthening the student's ear.

Hand in hand with the Quint Etudes, I have used the "Position Etudes" by Shinichi Suzuki, Revised Edition, published by Suzuki Method International. As a student plays progressively higher in pitch up the violin fingerboard, the tonal quality of the notes sounds thicker to the ear, and students can become confused about the correct pitch. This etude book can help to address that problem by progressively exposing the student to each position using a song that is very familiar to Suzuki students, i.e., "Perpetual Motion." Suzuki students learn this basic tune in book 1, but later in book 2, students are introduced to a transposition of this song into Bb. From that transposition, the students learn the basic fingering of the song beginning with the first finger. This fingering is then used to introduce the students to each successive position, still using the melody of "Perpetual Motion."

Playing Along: My husband is a professional trombonist, and I was curious as to how he worked with his students to build proper intonation, as the trombone seemed similar to the violin in terms of how easy it would be to "land" on the incorrect pitch. He told me that he plays along with his students constantly at their lessons and is relentless about having them match pitch.

We Aren't Finished Yet: Finally, the subject of intonation is more complex than I have presented here. So many areas of a player's technique and general life condition can have adverse effects on pitch, including improper posture, lazy ears, sloppy practice and listening habits, health considerations (waxy ear build up, or a cold or sinus infection), and less than stellar equipment (false or old strings and lesser quality instruments). And I haven't even touched upon the advanced tuning strategies that professionals employ to fine tune intonation in performance. The ideas included above are just a few of the many possible ideas I know about how to address intonation problems. I like to think of these ideas as arrows in my quiver: I have many different arrows stored up for use depending on the particular student and his or her intonation problem.

I look forward to hearing from you what ideas you favor and find useful that I may not have included here.

We are winding down 2010. Just a few days left to vote in the polls printed here in the right sidebar. Let your vote count! New polls are coming in 2011.

Stay tuned for the new year on January 1, 2011, because I will be issuing a practice challenge. You won't want to miss January 1st and my practice challenge! Everyone can do this!