Sustaining between stages
Lesson time: (4min 11sec)
Simon Fischer demonstrates a variation on the tone exercise, sustaining even whole bows between stages to keep the flow and momentum of the bow.
Course preview
This lesson is part of the course The Secrets of Tone Production Part 3: Fundamental Tone Exercises Continued
Watch a preview of the full course below.
Lesson transcript:
Music Lesson
Another way to do it is, before each new stage, sustain whole bows evenly without the heavy lights, as in exercise.
- Feel the flow, evenness, and momentum of the bow.
- Then keep the same feeling of flow as you continue without stopping, straight into the divisions.
- Heavy. Very good.
- It's just down here that you need to feel the string. Just down there. Very good. Very good.
Now do six at about this tempo. That's good.
- Don't nod with each stroke.
- 40. 40. 40.
- Be careful with bow division. Okay?
Let me show you something.
- If you do, you're doing six in a bow at the moment.
- Watch this.
- Remember the tempo: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.
- 1, 3, 4, 5, six.
- 1, 4, 5.
Then you do it like that, sustaining between the heavy lights.
- Feel the flow, feel the momentum.
- Now the same feeling. That's great. And again.
- Repeat it.
Feel the flow.
- Five, six, one.
- Now same feeling.
- Make it even.
- Heavy and light.
- And heavy and light. Very good.
Now do two in one bow.
- Light, heavy, light.
- Feel the flow.
- Heavy, light, heavy, light.
Just try once, not pulsing it, but just playing one long stroke.
- Imagine the pulsing.
- Feel the flow and momentum there.
- It's better.
- Heavy, light, heavy, light.
- Keep the momentum.
Do just one long bow.
- And back.
- Now do three pulses.
- Heavy, heavy.
- Little faster would be easier.
- That's very good, though. Very good.
Heavy, light, heavy.
You know, it's not heavy, light and heavy light. It's heavy, light, heavy. Very good.
- Heavy, light, heavy, light.
- Good.
- Heavy, light, heavy, light.
- Very good. Very good.
Thank you.
About the instructor
Simon Fischer enjoys a distinguished and wide-ranging career as a performer, educator and recording artist. He has performed worldwide as a recitalist, and committed three Brahms Sonatas to record, a recording that received high praise in Gramophone Magazine. Simon is recognised as having a place amongst the world's elite teachers. He is a professor at the Guildhall School of Music, and has held positions at the Yehudi Menuhin School, Wells Cathedral School and the Purcell School, and for 15 years was a visiting professor at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music. Having studied in London with Yfrah Neaman, and in New York with Dorothy DeLay, Fischer's approach unites the best elements of the French, Russian and American violin traditions. Fischer's published work greatly influences the teaching of the violin. Having written for The Strad magazine since 1991, his monthly articles have attracted a worldwide following. Published by Edition Peters, his technique books Basics and Practice (translated into Korean, Italian and German), Scales and The Violin Lesson, and the DVD The Secrets of Tone Production (now available to stream via MusicGurus), have become standards on many continents. His book and DVD Warming Up was described by The Strad magazine as "23 pages of pure technical gold". In 2014 Simon Fischer was awarded the European String Teachers Association prize "In celebration of a lifetime contribution to String Teaching". In his four-part Secrets of Tone Production course, Simon guides you through getting to know your instrument and then working through his fundamental tone exercises step by step, so you can produce a richer, more controlled and more beautiful sound on the violin. read more