I was browsing youtube again and came across this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qVOBAek7-8

I'm NO expert but that looks pretty shocking .....! The blonde girl has the scroll practically on her knees.

I think this video originated in the United States but still it's interesting. Here in the UK, people often complain that school music lessons are bad or non-existent.... well other countries, it appears, often aren't much better.

GOOD GOD! That really is shocking. I play in music competitions/concerts quite often and it really is shocking how the simple things like posture and hold are often overlooked.



HK x

That blond girl has a very bad hold (all the front row did)
When I did my last festival, I was 1 point away from 1st place (out of 8 people) because of the posture

Do you think this might be a space rather than a person problem? It's difficult to see from the camera angle but if they all held the Violin in the correct position isn't it possible they would be poking the person next to them in the face. Perhaps they were seated too close together?

The row behind doesn't seem to have that problem and they are much bigger older kids.

I think it's the camera angle thats making them look stuck together. Thats what happens if you take of a row of seated people sideways on.

......and her bowing is equally awful. All from the shoulder so that she looks as if she's cutting through a piece of wood. The one sat to her right isn't any better - she's slumped backwards, round-shouldered, on a chair.

I think the biggest problem with group teaching in schools is the lack of time the teacher can spend with each pupil. You're given something like 20 minutes for a lesson with four pupils. Bearing in mind most of them will arrive with violins that haven't been tuned since the previous week (YES...you'd be surprised how many don't even consider tuning the strings between lessons!), there really isn't much time left to go through posture fundamentals with each student individually. You have to demonstrate to them all in one go and HOPE they are paying attention.......

Additionally, we are no longer allowed to have any physical contact with pupils. So if they don't understand what you are saying or showing them - and you're running out of ideas to get the point across! - physically moving their arm or hand is a no-no and you're back to square one.

Learning to play a string instrument is much like learning to dance, especially ballet. There are times when it requires some sort of physical contact from the teacher to guide the students limbs in the right direction. Descriptives are as bad as simply reading instructions from a book - they can be open to many interpretations and how will a total novice know which is the right one? Sometimes arms and hands just have to be pushed and pulled so that the pupil actually "feels" what the correct posture or hold is like. Only then will they fully understand and get things right.

And people wonder why I prefer teaching privately. It makes life so much easier when you can obtain direct parental consent to touch the childs arms and hands when necessary.

She needs a shoulder rest. They have bad posture because they don't use a shoulder rest.

In this case, possibly true, but no everyone indeed uses a shoulder rest, or needs one. Anne-Sophie Mutter doesn't use a shoulder rest and her posture is fine. A lot depends on the length of your neck.

There are an equally large number of pupils for whom an ill-fitting or badly adjusted shoulder rest (and sometimes chinrest) causes exactly the same posture problems as those shown in the video.

People who don't have to teach large groups of violin students in schools (who may have been previously badly taught!) probably have very little idea what violin peris are actually up against.

In most cases there are no supportive or knowledgeable parents at home reminding the kids to practise, and you can forget shoulder rests - many of the parents of the kids I teach in schools are very reluctant to fork out for extras like shoulder rests, new strings etc etc, or decent violins for that matter. The teacher often ends up having to deal with kids who turn up late with horrible violins, old strings that keep slipping because the tuning pegs are ***p, chin rests that fall off, too-long finger-nails etc etc etc. And then you have to teach four of them in a broom cupboard with one wonky old music stand missing screws so it keeps slipping down.

You couldn't make it up, honestly.

I've just been offered two more jobs in schools. Hmmm.

Violinia

Well yea but generally most people would start with a shoulder rest and then branch out from there - whether they want it or not. I guess it depends on the length of your neck but I have heard of some people with rather long necks managing without one! I don't know how comfortable they feel though.

I would have thought people with short necks might do without a shoulder rest but that long neck would require a higher shoulder rest. Shows how much I know

I only nead a short one. Doesn't feel comfortable without one though