hi in this video I want to talk about
stiffness in the right arm and the bow
arm specifically in the wrist and
fingers and if you're a beginning player
you may not even know that you have
stiffness in your wrist but if you are
experiencing problems keeping a straight
bow or if you hear that sometimes your
tone is is shaky it's not really pure
and deep and you know something is up
likely you have tension in in your wrist
and or fingers now I do think that they
are both connected I think if you have
tension in your wrist then likely it's
because your fingers are stiff and then
vice versa and you can just do this
quick demo for yourself and you can just
feel how they are connected so just
tighten your fingers as if you're
holding a bow tighten that you can feel
immediately in your wrist you can feel
things tightened through here and then
just try not to move your wrist just
hold it you know keep it really rigid
and you're going to feel your fingers
want to tighten as well so you know
you've heard many times I'm sure in
other videos that you know the bow arm
needs to be relaxed that you allow for
the weight of the arm into the strings
that's a real common phrase we teachers
use but it's it's easy to hear that an
intellectually grasp it and harder to do
but generally speaking we learned once
we sort of understand certain concepts
so do another little demo and you can do
this too so use your left arm as the
base user and let's get our bow bow
holds ready
so just elevate your arm now if you can
let your wrist be floppy like this then
really you have no issues with tension
you might be an older beginner and feel
like you know loose joins our thing of
the past but if you can bend your
fingers and you can let your wrist be
dangled like this then you're fine so
the only tension in the arm at all
really is just what we need in the
shoulder to hold the arm up so sort of a
contradiction allow the weight of the
arm to sink into the strings yet we have
to support our arm and we have to
support the bow so there is some
necessary tension to begin with
we just want to make sure that it's just
in certain spots so really this muscle
here okay this is the one you need to
keep the arm elevated and and it's very
different we don't want to raise the
shoulder like this so we just lift the
arm from the elbow and it just elevates
our arm okay so let your wrist angle
like this and hold your arm out and just
start to drop your arm and fingers hit
first so as soon as the fingers hit
there's no tension the fingers start to
bend and then the wrist starts to lower
as you let the arm sink sink further and
further down okay so do that again now
if your fingers are stiff okay and you
do this it's going to be really hard to
let your wrist come down the wrist
doesn't want to bend if you do this it
wants to you know create this steel
support here but if you let your fingers
then relax allow them to Bend then
everything will Bend as well okay now
take this one little step further rotate
in as if you're holding the bow and do
it like this so imagine a little bit of
a bow grip fingers hit first now start
to really notice - in these knuckle
lines see what happens here in this
knuckle line and in this knuckle line
this is really this is quite crucial
okay - having a super fluid relaxed
Bohan that these these knuckles here are
flexible so you can you can see the
fingers come up like this and then the
wrist comes down okay so I'm turned like
this now my wrist is going on this
diagonal that we that we have maintained
when we're when we're playing okay now
get some kind of a pencil or writing
utensil okay and just do the same thing
that's going to feel a little gonna be a
little harder because now that that
thumb is now engaged holding the the pen
or the pencil but you can still see as
soon as it gets down the fingers thin
the wrist comes down and it lowers here
from the shoulder - so this is how that
weight now is going to transfer in to
the bow which is then going to transfer
into the string
and and just feel feel that your arm
feel some weight you know submerging
into you know your other arm
now keep your fingers straight try to do
this with straight fingers it's not
going to happen okay so now let's do
this with with the violin and the bow so
the same concept you can even still use
your left hand as a support so hopefully
your well supported here will let your
left hand put your bow on string and
then be suspended bring your elbow up so
you're at least on the d-string level
and then just allow that weight kind of
do what you were doing see that your
knuckles are moving your fingers are
bending and your wrist is lowering its
going to be a little different because
now you have this bow in the way and the
Frog kind of puts a little barrier there
with the thumb but you'll feel the
concept okay so now when you make these
bows what I want you to do is add this
visual as you're going up oh imagine
that strings just like a puppet like a
marionette
are attached to your wrist elbow and
your hand not your shoulder okay because
the string that elevates the elbow will
bring your arm okay and as you play
uh-oh
imagine these strings are lifting the
bow arm and the string right here that
pulls up the wrist elevates the wrist
want you'll want to tilt the bow away
from you as you get to the Frog that
also helps bring the wrist up okay and
now imagine that the strings are all cut
and this very this very floppy puppet
arm that does not have a will of its own
it's just dependent on the laws of
gravity and just it's just gonna now see
[Music]
me
[Music]
okay and do that a bunch and and start
to feel and hear what happens to your
sound now back to the bowing straight
okay this is going to this has
implications for our straight bowing so
as we come up now players with stiffness
here often experience this it's off
track here because there's no
flexibility in the wrist again if the
fingers are tight it's not going to be
able to do that very easily so when you
get to this again watch loose here loose
here imagine the string and then keep
the bow on track
[Music]
so just isolate these kinds of things
just work on that and and I know that
you're going to hear immediate
improvement in your tone as well as
you're going to be able to keep the bow
moving straighter and all will be better