How To Play With a Straight Bow | Kennedy Violins
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Hello Everyone,
Today’s video is about how to play with a straight bow.
Playing with a straight bow is very important because it will give you CONTROL over your bow contact point (where your bow contacts the string of your instrument). If you are in control of your contact point, then you can control such things as:
-Dynamics: How loud or quiet you can play
-The quality of your sound: warm, scratchy, bright, airy, focused etc.
There are 3 primary things to remember about the mechanics of how your bow arm functions.
1. Your arm is separated into 2 distinct parts: Forearm and bicep
2. These 2 parts will work in specific ways, depending on where you are in the bow: tip VS frog.
3. The #1 reason why people play with a crooked bow is that they have a LOCKED joints. The #1 joint to NOT lock is the elbow.
HOW, do you use your bow arm? There are 3 most important things to remember.
1. On a DOWN bow, you will move your bicep first and complete the stroke with your forearm.
2. On the UP stroke, you will move your forearm first and complete the stroke with your bicep.
3. You will NEVER want to lock up your elbow.
4. You must have a flexible bow hand: Fingers/Wrist. If your pinky is locked, that’s a problem!
Here is are 2 simple exercises the are easy and will help you play with a straiter bow.
1. Play open strings slowly from the frog to the tip with just open strings or with a scale. Watch closely how your arm is being used and keep an eye on how your bow is contacting the strings. Make sure you are keeping the bow in the same place between the fingerboard and the bridge and remember to use the metronome!
2. Play open strings or a scale slowly, but with your arm/bicep against the wall. This does not replicate a perfectly functioning arm BUT it will teach you to bend your elbow while using your bow.
Happy practicing and don’t forget to visit Kennedy Violins!
Web site: www.kennedyviolins.com
Instagram: / kennedyviol. .
Facebook: / kennedyviolins
Пікірлер: 47
g-day ken 😊keep them coming mate 🎉 what once was a bedroom door closed by my wife when I practice is now a left open. I think she is now pinged of that I'm doing well !!💕💕arrr yes .love is in the air.🇦🇺
I've been playing for 11 years and just in the past couple of weeks have I really honed in on my right-arm technique and it's definitely improving my tone; my teacher has pointed me towards many of the tips in this video (including the classic shoulder-to-wall)
@KennedyViolins
Жыл бұрын
Cool! Happy practicing!
This is brilliant! Thank you! All that straightforward rationale, just what we need!
Thank you so so sooo much for this! My first violin tutor never told me any of this and so I never understood the point in practicing open string bows and I didn't even hold the bow correctly and I had a hard time bowing because of it later on:( when I got moved to a new Korean tutor he showed me all of these crucial fundamentals and your videos are exactly like his instructions so I always come back here to remember and practice well. I'm really thankful to start again the right way. Now open bow string practice makes sense to me and its all about hold and muscle training! So I'm finding joy and improvement in it.
@KennedyViolins
Жыл бұрын
Awesome. Glad to help and thanks for letting me know!
Hi Joel i'm a violinist I'm in love with your videos the fact that you explain it is so helpful
I really struggle with this. Found this really helpful! Thank you!
@KennedyViolins
5 жыл бұрын
Glad I could help! Let me know if you have any other questions.
As a beginner, I appreciate your teaching videos immensely. Knowing that I am getting the best advice from a caring, experienced teacher means a lot. Each one of these is a classic teaching tool that will contribute to new players for years. Paul
@KennedyViolins
3 жыл бұрын
Wow. Thanks!
It is really unbelievable the difference that your instruction has made to my bowing as an aged beginner. It is so practical and so simple and makes so much common sense when one stops and thinks. Thank you.
Excellent video. So helpful!
@KennedyViolins
8 ай бұрын
Glad to help!
I have my first lesson today with a kennedy violin I just purchased recently. Really looking forward to learning the violin and your videos are very helpful.
@KennedyViolins
Жыл бұрын
Good luck!!
Thank you so much for this amazing video. Really appreciate it.
Great advice!
@KennedyViolins
Жыл бұрын
Cool. Thanks!
Thank you!!
@KennedyViolins
Жыл бұрын
Glad to help!
@zena1022
Жыл бұрын
I am one of those adult beginners who gave up after five years, after 17 years I am back. This time I hope to achieve the relaxed way of playing! Thanks for the scientific way of explaining how to achieve that. Still not there yet.
Awesome Joel! Big help!
@KennedyViolins
3 жыл бұрын
Glad to help. Thanks for letting me know!
@suvrabanerjee2013
3 жыл бұрын
Kennedy Violins Joel, btw Kennedy Violin is the only company I trust to buy violin online. After watching multiple of your videos and attention to detail of your products I grew confidence to buy online. Great work! Both my violin and my son’s violin is from Kennedy violin. You are the Tesla of violin.
Hi Joel, many thanks for your very clear teaching. Please could you explain how to do fast up bow staccato- about an octave per bow. I am thinking specifically of BIZARRERIE by Elgar. Louise Howell, South Africa.
@KennedyViolins
2 жыл бұрын
LOL. I lack the vocabulary or creativity to describe such a technique with the written word. Might be a good video though!
Can you do a video on how to reduce bounce from a bow or even how to place a bow on the instrument? Or if it exists direct me to it? Thanks!!
About the hair contact with the strings: is the entire band of hair lay flat in contact with string or just the side of the hair ?
@KennedyViolins
Жыл бұрын
It really depends on what kind of sound and the amount of sound you want from the violin. The more hair, the more sound and the more focused the sound will be. The opposite is true as well. As a general rule, most violinists probably use about 70-%80% for most music.
Great lesson. I have a challenge with my left-hand pinky. It goes up like a scorpion's tail while playing. I take it down each time I notice it. I searched the web but didn't find anyone talking about this issue. Moreover, I feel pain in my right shoulder after playing only a few minutes. I tried several things but didn't solve the problem.
@KennedyViolins
Жыл бұрын
Well, that's a pretty tough one to answer without seeing what you are doing. Assuming that your shoulder is not injured and the pain is specific to the violin, the most common issue with right shoulder pain is lifting your shoulder while bowing. Look in the mirror when playing a song and/or a scale and see if you "shrug". The shrugging issue is common and it causes tension, which causes pain. The way to remedy this is long bow stroke practice while warming up and retraining your mind and body to not shrug while playing. As far as the pinky, this is common and a remnant of improper finger placement function when you first started learning the violin. The way to retrain is to do slow scales and keep an eye on your pinky. Make sure you don't pick it up until you have to (keep all fingers down until you need to pick up) and this is the easiest way to retrain it but honestly, this kind of habit is very difficult to change. It's not the end of the world in my experience, however. As long as you can get it down when you need to, it's probably fine. Inefficient, but fine.
@waelkash
Жыл бұрын
@@KennedyViolins Your advise is highly appreciated. I'll do my best to beat the challenge.
@KennedyViolins
Жыл бұрын
@@waelkash You can do it!
Hey, Im a beginner and Im currently doing some open string exercises and it works pretty well, Im able to get a pretty acceptable sound I think. However, I wanted to apply some tape to start using fingers, now as soon as I place my finger anywhere on the finger board I get almost no sound at all, or more like scratching a blackboard or something. Is that so extremely different from playing an open string? Im getting myself a teacher next month, but at the current time it stresses me alot while practicing, I feel like im hitting a wall.
@KennedyViolins
5 жыл бұрын
Hmmm.... well, it's hard to say without seeing what you are doing. It's quite possible that you are not pushing the string down enough. You must push the string down with enough force that it makes very good contact with the fingerboard. If you only push it down half way, then the string will make an awful choking kind of sound when you try to play. That is the first thing I'd check!
@y4playiny4self
5 жыл бұрын
@@KennedyViolins Wow that was a fast answer. Ty Yeah, I already have experimented with that. When I play open strings I feel like the G string is the easiest to play and the E is the hardest, like there is more tension on the E string and therefor its harder to get it to vibrate nicely. Same difficulty when I play the A note on the G string. I will do some more open string training, wont hurt for sure and when I have someone in person he will be able to tell me what I can do. PS: Your tutorials are very well made, very good structure and very understandable! Thanks for doing this, without people like you I probably wouldnt have gotten myself a Violin and so far I love the instrument, even though its very hard :D
@KennedyViolins
5 жыл бұрын
@@y4playiny4self Thanks for the clarification and the nice comment. I''m always hoping that these videos are helping people. If you have any other questions, just let me know and hopefully your new teacher will be able to do a better job of helping you! Happy practicing. 😀
@y4playiny4self
5 жыл бұрын
@@KennedyViolins Oh I have a thousand questions :D most arent important just yet, but 1 thing you will surely be able to tell me, I have rented the violin at a music store so its not a new one. On the bow there are 2 or 3 hairs that go zigzag accross almost the entire bow, can/should I cut them out or is that a bad idea?
@KennedyViolins
5 жыл бұрын
@@y4playiny4self You can go ahead and cut them. No big deal at all. Is the bow fully tightened when you see the zig zag hairs? If not, then you'll want to have the bow correctly tightened, so you can correctly ascertain any properly offending hairs. :)
I am being taught that as you move from A to D and G, you need to raise the wrist/hand...
@KennedyViolins
Жыл бұрын
The wrist always moves with the elbow. 👍