In a recent discussion, Will (Miss Lonelyhearts) said:
"And why's he keep doing that scrunchy noise with his bow? Someone should give him a few lessons in tone production."
It was in jest, but it got me thinking. If you had a fiddle student who wasn't producing a good tone, what approach would you take in correcting it? What specific things would you watch for and in what order of precedence would you have the student work to correct them?
I suppose my question is really about pedagogy. What kind of systematic approach would you take that would allow the student to make steady progress?
Asuming their basic stance and bow hold was ball park OK - I'm taking into account that with this music, it doesn't really matter how, for example, you hold the bow - I don't think I'd "watch" for anything. I'd listen. And I'd see if I could get the student to do the same.
Most inexperienced fiddlers produce a bad tone when they're racing to keep up with themselves, sawing backwards and forwards in a semicircle with the bow, letting it tilt over so there's reduced contact with the strings, tightening up the bow grip and restricting the wrist's freedom of movement. Getting them to play at a pace where they can, as llig says, listen to themselves properly, should be a start. Get them to practise playing slowly, without cramming lots of ornaments into the tune, while concentrating on the contact between the bow and the strings. If they look down their nose at the strings just beyond the bridge, they should be able to identify the way the tone changes depending on the amount of contact it has with the strings and the degree to which a perpendicular contact is maintained in the motion of the bow. Get them to watch beyond the bridge as they play double stops on open strings - the fullest sound comes when the bow is flat and straight across both strings - then try to get them to reproduce that same contact on single strings, crossing up and down.
The other thing you can work on is minimising the amount of movement required by the bow hand when crossing strings. If the right elbow is too high and too far out from the body, the amount of movement required by the bow hand is increased, making transition from one string to another a slower and less smooth process, resulting in scratchy, unintentionally gritty tone. Getting them to manipulate the bow from the fingers, hand and wrist, and minimising the amount of movement from the elbow, will help to develop the agility that is required in order to produce a stable tone at speed. At first, the transition from large to small movements in the bow arm will probably make the tone worse, but it will improve it over time, or their playing will stagnate at a basic level until they work out that economy of movement is crucial to playing this music as it is meant to be played.
I think relaxation is the key to good tone - smooth, efficient movement and a relaxed grip of the bow are crucial - as is a relaxed hold on the fiddle itself. Try to show them that it is gravity that does a great deal of the work when playing the fiddle - that the bow arm is in one respect a stabiliser, steadying the natural rise and fall of the bow, guiding as much as driving the music, allowing the bow to glide over the strings, applying a minimal amount of even pressure, rather than using it to dig the music out of the fiddle.
Other more basic things to look at are the age of synthetic strings, the amount of residue allowed to build up on them, the cleanliness or otherwise of the bow hairs, the positioning of the bridge and soundpost etc.
As llig says, listening is the key to the whole thing. And in the early stages a tape recorder is invaluable. Partly because a fiddle sounds completely different under your chin than it does to an audience, but mainly because in the early stages you are so busy thinking about intonation and timing you don't have time to listen to the tone you are producing while you play.
As a student of two years, I agree with Dragut Reis about relaxation, which is very difficult when you think you sound like crap. Tension makes the tone worse. I find that slow and steady works. If I ramp up the speed, the tone seems to deteriorate. It's hard being patient.
The devil in this lies in the detail (as always), in particular the way in which the bow is held so as to attain the required degree of relaxation.
It helps first to understand that the bow is controlled by the first finger and the thumb. The second and third fingers don't do anything much except to rest lightly against the stick. The fourth finger (pinky) is only there to balance the weight of the bow when bowing in the lower third. It is the first finger that plays the violin - the bow is just a rather complex extension to that finger, just as a guitarist's plectrum is a substitute for the finger nails when playing on steel strings.
The first finger is wrapped around the stick in the region of the knuckle joint nearest the hand. The thumb, which must be kept bent at all times, is not directly opposite the first finger (you'd get very little control if you do that) but contacts the stick about 2 inches away towards the frog, opposite the relaxed second and third fingers. The second and third fingers should be quite relaxed and don't grip the stick - they may rest lightly against it sometimes, yes. The little finger, which, like the thumb, should always be kept bent, rests lightly on the end of the stick, so that when you're playing near the frog only a little pressure from that finger is required to balance the weight of the bow. The back of the hand should, as far as possible, be aligned with the forearm - too much drooping or raising of the wrist will cause tension.
If you hold the bow as described and place the hair on the string you will find that if you gently squeeze the first finger and thumb together you will control the tension in the bow and bring the bow stick and the hair closer to each other - even touching if you overdo it! Note that this is being done without using hand or arm weight or muscular strength from the arm - it is just pressure from the first finger opposed by the thumb. If you have the thumb too close to the first finger you won't be getting the necessary leverage between the thumb and first finger to do this.
The bowing arm should hang loose and relaxed from the shoulder, like a heavy rope, with enough flexion at the elbow to bring the hand to the required position for bowing. The upper arm, most of the time, will lie quite close to the body and will separate from it only enough to enable the player to bow comfortable at the frog on the G string. The arm relaxation should be such that if someone were to gently remove the bow from your hand when playing, your hand and arm would immediately drop straight down. It's worth saying at this point that some fiddle players you see on shows (almost invariably young women) tend to hold their bowing arm high. This, I am assured, is for nothing more than showbiz visual effect. If you think about it, the shoulder muscles are doing a lot of work holding the arm high, and that surely can't be good in the long term.
Bowing parallel to the bridge. If the bow is held by the tips of all four fingers, most of them straight, and the thumb most probably straight as well, you will have a very stiff and tension-ridden hand (we've all seen this, I'm sure). Bowing parallel to the bridge is not often seen under these conditions and can only be achieved by a lot of otherwise unnecessary and inefficient arm movement. The relaxed hold I've described above will make bowing parallel to the bridge much easier and second nature - with sufficient relaxation the bow will track itself into that path of least resistance, which is parallel to the bridge. Now this can be difficult for the player to see for himself, and there can be a tendency for the bow to swerve offline at either end, especially in the early stages of learning. Get someone to watch what you're doing (not a mirror - that can be a distraction) to see if you're losing alignment at the ends of the bow. If you are, this is what you do - lose alignment at the top end during a down-bow stroke and the bow will tend to veer towards the fingerboard, so you gently push your bowing hand down and away from you to counteract this; and if you lose alignment in an up-bow stroke the bow will veer towards the bridge, so you gently move your hand inwards closer to your body. The two motions are a little like a rowing action; a little bit of practice and it will become second nature.
Another important part of tone production is where the bow contacts the string. For all normal playing it should be no closer to the fingerboard than halfway between the fingerboard and bridge. If you want that bit more tonal projection then move the point of bow contact closer to the bridge.
Some players get an unwanted bow bounce. This is almost always due to stiffness and tension in the bowing arm and starting the first note with a moving bow that comes down onto the string (like an aeroplane landing, as my teacher described it). The bounce, once started, will propagate along the whole bow stroke. Two things to get over this: the relaxed bow hold described above, and practice starting the first note of the tune, or of a phrase, with the bow stationary and relaxed on the string for an instant before you start the bow stroke.
The dreaded E-string squeaks when crossing from the A to an open E are caused mostly by tension and stiffness in bowing (although there are some strings that are inherently prone to it, and worn bow hairs don't help), so a good relaxed bowing technique will normally vanish them away.
And there's a few more devils in the detail in all of this
Furthermore, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that there are some trad musicians who neither care how they hold the bow nor wish to be taught. The title of this discussion is, after all, about teaching tone production.
This is what I tell my students (once they know how to hold the bow and can bow fairly straight):
The tone of the fiddle is all in the bow. You control that tone with three things.
1. Weight - How much weight of your arm, hand and bow is going into the string? How do you vary that?
2. Speed - How much of the bow are you using per stroke? How fast is the bow moving? Can you play at the same tempo using half as much bow? twice as much bow? How does that effect the tone?
3. Placement - Where on the string is your bow in contact? Is it closer to the bridge? Over the fingerboard? What is the difference in tone between the two? How about in the middle?
What a fiddler sounds like is determined by all these things put together. That is why no two fiddlers sound the same. Experement with all these things until you can control them all. Then you can sound the way YOU want to sound. There is no wrong way, as long as you are in control.
Actually most of my students are adults. Children learn by being told what to do and how to do it. They don't understand the "why" of things as clearly. If you give adults the "why" the can work out the "how" fairly easily.
You might notice I gave no details on bow hold. There are so many schools of thought on that it's amazing. A student will change their bow hold on their own to get the bow to do what they want it to do, far more readily than they will because it's the "right" way to do it.
Gee llig, whose bed did you get up on the wrong side of anyway? People learn differently - some get to experimenting sooner than others - some never get there. Takes all kinds.
There may not be a "right way" to hold the bow but there are "wrong ways" --i.e. locking up you thumb so that can't flex as I did as kid makes bowing more difficult--or it did until I learned to keep my thumb bent. As I recall, Heifitz (Russian School) kept his thumb straight. There aren't any rules.
@fiddleK and @leoj. Yes, there are indeed different schools of thought on bowing, even (or perhaps especially!) at the top classical levels. Obviously, I can only describe the school of bowing I've been taught - a school that I understand goes back to great violin teachers of the 19th century - but of course others will describe other methods of bowing which work, with the right tuition.
When teaching beginners one has to be fairly specific and go by the rule book, as it were, otherwise the beginner will get confused and progress will be slow. It is a great help if the teacher understands the pupil and can recognise problems (due to the pupil's anatomy perhaps - e.g. Heifetz possibly), and make changes to suit the pupil's requirements. When the beginner is at an advanced stage and has gained experience he will understand what is going on and may feel free to modify the "rules" slightly on his own account to suit his individual circumstances - but even then, it would be wise for him to discuss it with the teacher first.
It all boils down to enabling the pupil to bow in as relaxed a manner as possible.
I disagree with Michael's notion that there is that much variety in how good fiddlers hold the bow. From what I've seen, the differences come down to:
1. Thumb "inside" the frog vs. thumb under the frog.
2. Fourth finger always on the stick, sometimes, or never.
3. Hand over the frog vs. hand further up the stick.
But these differences don't change the much more functionally important commonalities of having a flexible thumb and resting the index on the stick to weight and control it. Everyone that can play well does that.
When you look further up the hand--is the wrist loose and flexible or stiff and rigid--there are some more differences among good fiddlers, but not that many.
I teach tone production much along the lines of lazyhound's bow hand and fiddlek's three variables. I emphasize letting the bow do most of the work, using bow speed and proximity to the bridge or fingerboard over weight or pressure from the hand.
I do agree with Michael that most people suss it out on their own by listening, and through playing, learning to listen more closely to nuances and qualities of tone. But showing them the basics prevents bad habits and points them in a tone-full direction sooner than later. For example, it helps to suggest they keep the bow perpendicular to the strings--many people would neglect that at first because there's so much else to focus on. But a little attention to it early on fosters both a good draw of the bow and good tone.
Playing a musical instrument well is mostly about listening to the sounds you make and adjusting the obvious things to modify the tone until it is what you want it to be. A teacher or mentor can help with some of the details of technique, but more importantly can help the student to listen better--to hear more accurately and more vividly. It also helps the student hear the mentor's tone--to have an aural target of strong, clear, focused tone to aim for.
On my 'intermediate student' fiddle, the sounding points on the
strings are critical. I have to stay within about 1.5- 2 cm of the end
of the fingerboard. Notes on the A and E have to be towards the
far end of this zone, The G and D don't matter so much. It pretty
much sounds like crap if go beyond this too far toward the bridge. Needless to say, I only ever play in first and second
(rarely) positions.
Last year I had a chance to try out two very good fiddles and I
found they were much more forgiving. They seemed to sound
good no matter I did - I guess in comparison with what I've got.
@hup, interestingly, a couple of weeks ago my teacher asked me to bring my best fiddle to lessons rather than the session fiddle - for the same reasons. I had been alternating them in lessons. I play the old violin in orchestra but never in sessions, and the modern session fiddle is never taken to orchestra - it just wouldn't do the job tone-wise, but is fine for pub sessions and quiet late-night practice at home.
Hup, something to consider is that you'll want to vary bow speed to get the best tone depending on where on the string you're playing. The closer you are to the bridge, the slower bow speed can be, but generally with more weight on the bow. The nearer the fingerboard, the more bow speed you need. Ideally, you want to be able to instinctively adjust your bow speed and weight to get good strong tone no matter which "lane" you're in--near the bridge, in the middle, or near the fingerboard. (FWIW, classical players are usually taught to think of five such lanes between the bridge and fingerboard. For Irish fiddle, three lanes is plenty.)
Then again, some fiddles just sound weak or fuzzy or muffled. Why play an instrument that doesn't sound good in your own ear?
Yes, Will I know about speed v pressure and experiment all the
time but I think the time has come ... I was saving money for a
better flute but I think I have to get my priorities straight
If you love the music why wouldn't you use your best fiddle? Of course if the session is likely to the cause of damaging it is that particular session going to be conducive to your best playing?
You have to get "best fiddle" into perspective. For diddley music, you don't want an instrument that is able to project it's sound to the back of a large concert hall. Such instruments sound pretty harsh up close. You don't need an instrument that is finely balanced all the way up to sixth position. You don't want an instrument that costs more than your house. You don't want an instrument that costs more to insure than your year's wages.
I watched on telly the other day a programme where Ally Brain met that young scottish wifey whose been in all the classic charts, can't remember her name. Anyway, they were comparing fiddles. He's got a lovely fiddle, very open round sound, very responsive. They were just playing in his kitchen. Her strad was like a marshall stack up to eleven. Scare the heebejeebies out of you.
I don't know what the general experience is, but I get the impression that damage to instruments in sessions is rare. I don't recollect anything significant happening at sessions in my area other than a flute or whistle rolling off a table once or twice. Musicians look after their own instruments and keep an eye on a fellow musician's if it's left unattended for a short while (I'll exclude for the purposes of this discussion a session in Ireland when an irate session leader kicked a bodhran out of its owner's hands - no jury would have dared to convict!)
Further to what Michael said, the sort of fiddle he described if played in a session could in some circumstances be construed as being over-bearing or even grandstanding - anyway, quite unnecessary unless it's the musician's one and only.
llig, if I could afford an instrument like that I sure wouldn't be spending my time here! I'd be too busy working my a**e off to pay for it...
Off course the corollery of having such an instrument is being able to get the best out it under any circumstances which I'm sure you'll agree is down to the player not just the fiddle.
In my case such an intrument would be a waste as much as might like to think about having such a thing...
I wonder why people teach music by sight? Listening and feeling are the keys.
The fastest and surest teacher is a recording, heard with earphones so nothing is missed.
You are your tone, nor can you escape yourself. How you feel, how tense or relaxed you are all come thru immediately.
Playing is always a full-body experience, like all life. Working on yourself and your relaxation helps your playing without practicing. Because, when you are less in your own way, you play more easily.
However, there is no excuse for anyone to outblast another in a kitchen session. This shows lack of listening to oneself and the musical situation, and lack of musicianship. Obviously, regardless of other opinion, the Strad-wielder is not as much musician as Mr. Bain (who obviously is a great). [If she is who I think she is, she isn't a great. But the poor dear makes much more money than I. I prefer to make more music...]
Teaching tone production on fiddle
Teaching tone production on fiddle
In a recent discussion, Will (Miss Lonelyhearts) said:
"And why's he keep doing that scrunchy noise with his bow? Someone should give him a few lessons in tone production."
It was in jest, but it got me thinking. If you had a fiddle student who wasn't producing a good tone, what approach would you take in correcting it? What specific things would you watch for and in what order of precedence would you have the student work to correct them?
I suppose my question is really about pedagogy. What kind of systematic approach would you take that would allow the student to make steady progress?
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by tradshark
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Asuming their basic stance and bow hold was ball park OK - I'm taking into account that with this music, it doesn't really matter how, for example, you hold the bow - I don't think I'd "watch" for anything. I'd listen. And I'd see if I could get the student to do the same.
(a reasonable fiddle helps too, of course)
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by ...
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Most inexperienced fiddlers produce a bad tone when they're racing to keep up with themselves, sawing backwards and forwards in a semicircle with the bow, letting it tilt over so there's reduced contact with the strings, tightening up the bow grip and restricting the wrist's freedom of movement. Getting them to play at a pace where they can, as llig says, listen to themselves properly, should be a start. Get them to practise playing slowly, without cramming lots of ornaments into the tune, while concentrating on the contact between the bow and the strings. If they look down their nose at the strings just beyond the bridge, they should be able to identify the way the tone changes depending on the amount of contact it has with the strings and the degree to which a perpendicular contact is maintained in the motion of the bow. Get them to watch beyond the bridge as they play double stops on open strings - the fullest sound comes when the bow is flat and straight across both strings - then try to get them to reproduce that same contact on single strings, crossing up and down.
The other thing you can work on is minimising the amount of movement required by the bow hand when crossing strings. If the right elbow is too high and too far out from the body, the amount of movement required by the bow hand is increased, making transition from one string to another a slower and less smooth process, resulting in scratchy, unintentionally gritty tone. Getting them to manipulate the bow from the fingers, hand and wrist, and minimising the amount of movement from the elbow, will help to develop the agility that is required in order to produce a stable tone at speed. At first, the transition from large to small movements in the bow arm will probably make the tone worse, but it will improve it over time, or their playing will stagnate at a basic level until they work out that economy of movement is crucial to playing this music as it is meant to be played.
I think relaxation is the key to good tone - smooth, efficient movement and a relaxed grip of the bow are crucial - as is a relaxed hold on the fiddle itself. Try to show them that it is gravity that does a great deal of the work when playing the fiddle - that the bow arm is in one respect a stabiliser, steadying the natural rise and fall of the bow, guiding as much as driving the music, allowing the bow to glide over the strings, applying a minimal amount of even pressure, rather than using it to dig the music out of the fiddle.
Other more basic things to look at are the age of synthetic strings, the amount of residue allowed to build up on them, the cleanliness or otherwise of the bow hairs, the positioning of the bridge and soundpost etc.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by Dragut Reis
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
As llig says, listening is the key to the whole thing. And in the early stages a tape recorder is invaluable. Partly because a fiddle sounds completely different under your chin than it does to an audience, but mainly because in the early stages you are so busy thinking about intonation and timing you don't have time to listen to the tone you are producing while you play.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by skreech
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
As a student of two years, I agree with Dragut Reis about relaxation, which is very difficult when you think you sound like crap. Tension makes the tone worse. I find that slow and steady works. If I ramp up the speed, the tone seems to deteriorate. It's hard being patient.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by boxielady
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
The devil in this lies in the detail (as always), in particular the way in which the bow is held so as to attain the required degree of relaxation.
It helps first to understand that the bow is controlled by the first finger and the thumb. The second and third fingers don't do anything much except to rest lightly against the stick. The fourth finger (pinky) is only there to balance the weight of the bow when bowing in the lower third. It is the first finger that plays the violin - the bow is just a rather complex extension to that finger, just as a guitarist's plectrum is a substitute for the finger nails when playing on steel strings.
The first finger is wrapped around the stick in the region of the knuckle joint nearest the hand. The thumb, which must be kept bent at all times, is not directly opposite the first finger (you'd get very little control if you do that) but contacts the stick about 2 inches away towards the frog, opposite the relaxed second and third fingers. The second and third fingers should be quite relaxed and don't grip the stick - they may rest lightly against it sometimes, yes. The little finger, which, like the thumb, should always be kept bent, rests lightly on the end of the stick, so that when you're playing near the frog only a little pressure from that finger is required to balance the weight of the bow. The back of the hand should, as far as possible, be aligned with the forearm - too much drooping or raising of the wrist will cause tension.
If you hold the bow as described and place the hair on the string you will find that if you gently squeeze the first finger and thumb together you will control the tension in the bow and bring the bow stick and the hair closer to each other - even touching if you overdo it! Note that this is being done without using hand or arm weight or muscular strength from the arm - it is just pressure from the first finger opposed by the thumb. If you have the thumb too close to the first finger you won't be getting the necessary leverage between the thumb and first finger to do this.
The bowing arm should hang loose and relaxed from the shoulder, like a heavy rope, with enough flexion at the elbow to bring the hand to the required position for bowing. The upper arm, most of the time, will lie quite close to the body and will separate from it only enough to enable the player to bow comfortable at the frog on the G string. The arm relaxation should be such that if someone were to gently remove the bow from your hand when playing, your hand and arm would immediately drop straight down. It's worth saying at this point that some fiddle players you see on shows (almost invariably young women) tend to hold their bowing arm high. This, I am assured, is for nothing more than showbiz visual effect. If you think about it, the shoulder muscles are doing a lot of work holding the arm high, and that surely can't be good in the long term.
Bowing parallel to the bridge. If the bow is held by the tips of all four fingers, most of them straight, and the thumb most probably straight as well, you will have a very stiff and tension-ridden hand (we've all seen this, I'm sure). Bowing parallel to the bridge is not often seen under these conditions and can only be achieved by a lot of otherwise unnecessary and inefficient arm movement. The relaxed hold I've described above will make bowing parallel to the bridge much easier and second nature - with sufficient relaxation the bow will track itself into that path of least resistance, which is parallel to the bridge. Now this can be difficult for the player to see for himself, and there can be a tendency for the bow to swerve offline at either end, especially in the early stages of learning. Get someone to watch what you're doing (not a mirror - that can be a distraction) to see if you're losing alignment at the ends of the bow. If you are, this is what you do - lose alignment at the top end during a down-bow stroke and the bow will tend to veer towards the fingerboard, so you gently push your bowing hand down and away from you to counteract this; and if you lose alignment in an up-bow stroke the bow will veer towards the bridge, so you gently move your hand inwards closer to your body. The two motions are a little like a rowing action; a little bit of practice and it will become second nature.
Another important part of tone production is where the bow contacts the string. For all normal playing it should be no closer to the fingerboard than halfway between the fingerboard and bridge. If you want that bit more tonal projection then move the point of bow contact closer to the bridge.
Some players get an unwanted bow bounce. This is almost always due to stiffness and tension in the bowing arm and starting the first note with a moving bow that comes down onto the string (like an aeroplane landing, as my teacher described it). The bounce, once started, will propagate along the whole bow stroke. Two things to get over this: the relaxed bow hold described above, and practice starting the first note of the tune, or of a phrase, with the bow stationary and relaxed on the string for an instant before you start the bow stroke.
The dreaded E-string squeaks when crossing from the A to an open E are caused mostly by tension and stiffness in bowing (although there are some strings that are inherently prone to it, and worn bow hairs don't help), so a good relaxed bowing technique will normally vanish them away.
And there's a few more devils in the detail in all of this
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
"The devil in this lies in the detail (as always), in particular the way in which the bow is held"
Then how come there's as many ways to hold the bow as there are trad musicians?
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by ...
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Some ways are better than others, and "trad musicians" is a very broad church.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Furthermore, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that there are some trad musicians who neither care how they hold the bow nor wish to be taught. The title of this discussion is, after all, about teaching tone production.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
There are many trad musicians with great tone who neither care how they hold the bow nor wish to be taught.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by ...
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Agreed - but they're doing something right. There are many musicians out there who aren't and who wish to be taught.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
This is what I tell my students (once they know how to hold the bow and can bow fairly straight):
The tone of the fiddle is all in the bow. You control that tone with three things.
1. Weight - How much weight of your arm, hand and bow is going into the string? How do you vary that?
2. Speed - How much of the bow are you using per stroke? How fast is the bow moving? Can you play at the same tempo using half as much bow? twice as much bow? How does that effect the tone?
3. Placement - Where on the string is your bow in contact? Is it closer to the bridge? Over the fingerboard? What is the difference in tone between the two? How about in the middle?
What a fiddler sounds like is determined by all these things put together. That is why no two fiddlers sound the same. Experement with all these things until you can control them all. Then you can sound the way YOU want to sound. There is no wrong way, as long as you are in control.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by fiddleK
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
That's a good post. Three simple things, very straight forward. And the combination of those three simple things give you limitless variation of tone.
I just hope your students are young children. Because you'd have to have a mental age of a young child not to have worked it out for yourself.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by ...
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Actually most of my students are adults. Children learn by being told what to do and how to do it. They don't understand the "why" of things as clearly. If you give adults the "why" the can work out the "how" fairly easily.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by fiddleK
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
You might notice I gave no details on bow hold. There are so many schools of thought on that it's amazing. A student will change their bow hold on their own to get the bow to do what they want it to do, far more readily than they will because it's the "right" way to do it.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by fiddleK
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Gee llig, whose bed did you get up on the wrong side of anyway? People learn differently - some get to experimenting sooner than others - some never get there. Takes all kinds.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by airport
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
There may not be a "right way" to hold the bow but there are "wrong ways" --i.e. locking up you thumb so that can't flex as I did as kid makes bowing more difficult--or it did until I learned to keep my thumb bent. As I recall, Heifitz (Russian School) kept his thumb straight. There aren't any rules.
# Posted on March 19th 2010 by leoj
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Six years in, and I still think my tone is pants... but not getting worse. Good thread.
# Posted on March 20th 2010 by drone
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
@fiddleK and @leoj. Yes, there are indeed different schools of thought on bowing, even (or perhaps especially!) at the top classical levels. Obviously, I can only describe the school of bowing I've been taught - a school that I understand goes back to great violin teachers of the 19th century - but of course others will describe other methods of bowing which work, with the right tuition.
When teaching beginners one has to be fairly specific and go by the rule book, as it were, otherwise the beginner will get confused and progress will be slow. It is a great help if the teacher understands the pupil and can recognise problems (due to the pupil's anatomy perhaps - e.g. Heifetz possibly), and make changes to suit the pupil's requirements. When the beginner is at an advanced stage and has gained experience he will understand what is going on and may feel free to modify the "rules" slightly on his own account to suit his individual circumstances - but even then, it would be wise for him to discuss it with the teacher first.
It all boils down to enabling the pupil to bow in as relaxed a manner as possible.
# Posted on March 20th 2010 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
I disagree with Michael's notion that there is that much variety in how good fiddlers hold the bow. From what I've seen, the differences come down to:
1. Thumb "inside" the frog vs. thumb under the frog.
2. Fourth finger always on the stick, sometimes, or never.
3. Hand over the frog vs. hand further up the stick.
But these differences don't change the much more functionally important commonalities of having a flexible thumb and resting the index on the stick to weight and control it. Everyone that can play well does that.
When you look further up the hand--is the wrist loose and flexible or stiff and rigid--there are some more differences among good fiddlers, but not that many.
I teach tone production much along the lines of lazyhound's bow hand and fiddlek's three variables. I emphasize letting the bow do most of the work, using bow speed and proximity to the bridge or fingerboard over weight or pressure from the hand.
I do agree with Michael that most people suss it out on their own by listening, and through playing, learning to listen more closely to nuances and qualities of tone. But showing them the basics prevents bad habits and points them in a tone-full direction sooner than later. For example, it helps to suggest they keep the bow perpendicular to the strings--many people would neglect that at first because there's so much else to focus on. But a little attention to it early on fosters both a good draw of the bow and good tone.
Playing a musical instrument well is mostly about listening to the sounds you make and adjusting the obvious things to modify the tone until it is what you want it to be. A teacher or mentor can help with some of the details of technique, but more importantly can help the student to listen better--to hear more accurately and more vividly. It also helps the student hear the mentor's tone--to have an aural target of strong, clear, focused tone to aim for.
# Posted on March 20th 2010 by Will Harmon
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
On my 'intermediate student' fiddle, the sounding points on the
strings are critical. I have to stay within about 1.5- 2 cm of the end
of the fingerboard. Notes on the A and E have to be towards the
far end of this zone, The G and D don't matter so much. It pretty
much sounds like crap if go beyond this too far toward the bridge. Needless to say, I only ever play in first and second
(rarely) positions.
Last year I had a chance to try out two very good fiddles and I
found they were much more forgiving. They seemed to sound
good no matter I did - I guess in comparison with what I've got.
# Posted on March 21st 2010 by Hup
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
@hup, interestingly, a couple of weeks ago my teacher asked me to bring my best fiddle to lessons rather than the session fiddle - for the same reasons. I had been alternating them in lessons. I play the old violin in orchestra but never in sessions, and the modern session fiddle is never taken to orchestra - it just wouldn't do the job tone-wise, but is fine for pub sessions and quiet late-night practice at home.
Horses for courses.
# Posted on March 21st 2010 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
I guess I will have upgrade soon. Until recently I thought the
instrument quality didn't matter for this type of music I but believe
I was mistaken.
# Posted on March 21st 2010 by Hup
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Hup, something to consider is that you'll want to vary bow speed to get the best tone depending on where on the string you're playing. The closer you are to the bridge, the slower bow speed can be, but generally with more weight on the bow. The nearer the fingerboard, the more bow speed you need. Ideally, you want to be able to instinctively adjust your bow speed and weight to get good strong tone no matter which "lane" you're in--near the bridge, in the middle, or near the fingerboard. (FWIW, classical players are usually taught to think of five such lanes between the bridge and fingerboard. For Irish fiddle, three lanes is plenty.)
Then again, some fiddles just sound weak or fuzzy or muffled. Why play an instrument that doesn't sound good in your own ear?
# Posted on March 21st 2010 by Will Harmon
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Yes, Will I know about speed v pressure and experiment all the
time but I think the time has come ... I was saving money for a
better flute but I think I have to get my priorities straight
# Posted on March 22nd 2010 by Hup
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Yep, nothing beats a fiddle that responds and resonates.
# Posted on March 22nd 2010 by Will Harmon
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
If you love the music why wouldn't you use your best fiddle? Of course if the session is likely to the cause of damaging it is that particular session going to be conducive to your best playing?
# Posted on March 22nd 2010 by john knoss
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
You have to get "best fiddle" into perspective. For diddley music, you don't want an instrument that is able to project it's sound to the back of a large concert hall. Such instruments sound pretty harsh up close. You don't need an instrument that is finely balanced all the way up to sixth position. You don't want an instrument that costs more than your house. You don't want an instrument that costs more to insure than your year's wages.
I watched on telly the other day a programme where Ally Brain met that young scottish wifey whose been in all the classic charts, can't remember her name. Anyway, they were comparing fiddles. He's got a lovely fiddle, very open round sound, very responsive. They were just playing in his kitchen. Her strad was like a marshall stack up to eleven. Scare the heebejeebies out of you.
# Posted on March 22nd 2010 by ...
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Michael's first paragraph got it in one - except that mine isn't an S!
# Posted on March 22nd 2010 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
I don't know what the general experience is, but I get the impression that damage to instruments in sessions is rare. I don't recollect anything significant happening at sessions in my area other than a flute or whistle rolling off a table once or twice. Musicians look after their own instruments and keep an eye on a fellow musician's if it's left unattended for a short while (I'll exclude for the purposes of this discussion a session in Ireland when an irate session leader kicked a bodhran out of its owner's hands - no jury would have dared to convict!)
Further to what Michael said, the sort of fiddle he described if played in a session could in some circumstances be construed as being over-bearing or even grandstanding - anyway, quite unnecessary unless it's the musician's one and only.
# Posted on March 22nd 2010 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
Thanks for all the comments guys, some of you put a lot of work into discussing this topic, and I appreciate it.
I'll certainly be referring back to this thread when I need to work on a student's tone (or my own for that matter).
# Posted on March 22nd 2010 by tradshark
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
llig, if I could afford an instrument like that I sure wouldn't be spending my time here! I'd be too busy working my a**e off to pay for it...
Off course the corollery of having such an instrument is being able to get the best out it under any circumstances which I'm sure you'll agree is down to the player not just the fiddle.
In my case such an intrument would be a waste as much as might like to think about having such a thing...
# Posted on March 22nd 2010 by john knoss
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
grr typo... as much as I might...
Which I think brings us neatly back to the original inspiration for this discussion.
# Posted on March 22nd 2010 by john knoss
Re: Teaching tone production on fiddle
I wonder why people teach music by sight? Listening and feeling are the keys.
The fastest and surest teacher is a recording, heard with earphones so nothing is missed.
You are your tone, nor can you escape yourself. How you feel, how tense or relaxed you are all come thru immediately.
Playing is always a full-body experience, like all life. Working on yourself and your relaxation helps your playing without practicing. Because, when you are less in your own way, you play more easily.
However, there is no excuse for anyone to outblast another in a kitchen session. This shows lack of listening to oneself and the musical situation, and lack of musicianship. Obviously, regardless of other opinion, the Strad-wielder is not as much musician as Mr. Bain (who obviously is a great). [If she is who I think she is, she isn't a great. But the poor dear makes much more money than I. I prefer to make more music...]
Happy playing!
vlnplyr
# Posted on March 26th 2010 by vlnplyr