As I lay my fiddle back in the case this morning, I thought of something Albert Einstein once remarked. He said, ‘To expect a different result from an activity that is repeated without some change is a sign of mental illness.’

Well, in the past I experienced my share of ‘mental illness’ during practice. I try to avoid it like the plague now.

The repetition of errors is something you want to keep to an absolute minimum.

Sometimes the little gray cells need things Real Slow to ‘get the picture.’ And you’ve gotta have good mental pictures – a.k.a. ‘neural maps’ – to safely conduct you through tricky music. And again, One very accurate, slow, thought-full performance of a passage is worth more than any number of fast, but flawed ones.

OK, enough said about that. Here’s what I mean to write about today.

I had a kind gentleman write in over the weekend asking how to develop a wrist vibrato in conjunction with a left hand violin hold. To date he has used an arm vibrato almost exclusively, especially in the first positions where he cannot use the side of the violin as a fulcrum for the hand movement.

First off, let me say this about the arm vibrato. Though I have reasoning for favoring a wrist vibrato – there is generally less tension in the arm and you don’t have to secure the violin with the chin and shoulder – there are times when bringing some arm into the sound works to good effect.

In months 7 and 8 of Violin Mastery Beginners Circle I teach and give exercises for both, though there is a much greater attention to the wrist vibrato.

After I have folks up and running with the wrist motion in third position – yes, using the side of the violin as a fulcrum – I begin to wean them off the crutch provided by the side of the violin.

The danger is that once the top of the wrist is floated away from the violin, the wrist flexion will cause the forearm to oscillate as well as the hand. This results in a net loss of ‘V’ power because the energy supplied by the wrist is now going in two opposite directions; the hand, and the forearm.

So, when you begin weaning yourself off the side of the violin you have to back up a few steps, slow down, look at your hand and arm in a mirror, and gradually develop control over the wrist such that you can move the hand back and forth without the forearm getting into the act.

Part of a good warm up, by the way, includes exercising one’s vibrato. In both ‘Allegro Player’s’ and ‘Beginner’s Circle’ I provide scales and arpeggios in part for their use in vibrato development.

And one last thing for Dr. John, aside from encouraging him to invest in the ‘Beginner’s Circle’ program, is this. After doing some wider, ‘slow oscillation’ vibrato moves on, say, whole notes in 1st position, then go back, narrow the range of the movement, relax the hand, and play the same tones with a faster rate of oscillation. In this way you’re coming to goal of a warm, expressive wrist vibrato from two different directions.

All the best,

Clayton Haslop

P.S. By investing in a full year’s subscription to the ‘Beginner’s Circle’ you’ll not only save a nice sum, you’ll also receive all 12 months coaching at once. You can then move through the program completely at your own pace; a great way to review all the essential fundammentals.