Some thoughts on practising (II) – this time, pain-free

As requested by a reader (thank you Junior for the suggestion), I am writing this as an add-on to the previous post on practising. I would also like to thank everyone for your kind words and support that you have given me. It means a lot! 🙂 

In the previous post on practising, I wrote more about how we should be solving problems instead of playing through whatever we have learnt. If you haven’t read it, you may want to take a look at it here. Other than that, I have also noticed that students tend to disregard how their bodies feel, especially the fingers and arms, while practising. With the violin being such an unnatural instrument to pick up, it is all too easy to play with excessive tension. This can lead to injuries in more severe cases. The most worrying part is that we tend to think that it is because we are still getting used to the instrument and thus it is normal to experience pain while playing! You may feel some level of discomfort especially in the beginning stages but it shouldn’t be pain. 

Both kids and adults face this problem but I am usually more worried about adult students who have a higher threshold for pain and discomfort, as well as the discipline to practise for much longer hours – a recipe for injuries! I wasn’t an exception as well and I did get injured in my first few years of violin playing which got me obsessed over avoiding such injuries for quite a period of time (and I perhaps drove my teachers crazy back then (; ). In fact, tension problems can exacerbate during performance when you get nervous, and can negatively affect your playing especially in crucial settings like exams, recitals, auditions etc. 

As such, I hope that we will be more mindful towards our bodies during practising and not just focus on hitting the right notes at all costs. Again, I’ll use some examples from violin playing to explain what I mean and I hope that other instrumentalists can draw parallels from them too. 

Checking for excessive tension while practising 

With so many studies and books being published on violin-related injuries, I’ve realised that violinists (and violists too) need to be really careful in not playing with excessive tension. We are most at risk of sustaining a long list of injuries that include neck and shoulder injuries, back injuries, tendonitis, etc. I’ll include some links below for further reading if you want to read up more on the topic.  

It’s not just about getting injured, but playing with excessive tension makes it difficult for us to fully express whatever we are playing. How do you play with freedom of expression if you are not even comfortable with the instrument? And how will you effectively convey your musical ideas to the audience if you are grappling with excessive tension? Of course, it takes time to get used to the awkward position and movements needed to play the violin but that does not mean we need to work against our bodies and make it harder for ourselves… 

The most common issue is that students tend to focus so much on getting things right and not pay attention to what their bodies tell them. In some cases, they persist in practising although they feel pain, instead of trying to find out what’s causing it and how to fix it. 

The bow hold 

The bow is a good place to start – are you holding the bow more tightly than you need to? Can you hold it a little less tightly with the fingers? Do the fingers feel cramped or strained? Are the fingers in their natural position? Did you extend any finger too far away from the others? I’m not going to start a war on which type of bow hold is better but perhaps you’ll want to take just a few minutes to feel how little effort it takes to let the bow just stay on the strings. As one of my teachers said, “The best bow hold is no bow hold.” Work with gravity and try to feel the weight of the bow on the string. It is easier to do this at the frog where the bow feels heavier and try removing a few fingers after placing the bow at the frog. As always, this article is no substitute for a proper violin teacher and you will need someone to teach you about good sound production. The point here is to give you some idea as to what you can do during your practice sessions and be more aware about how your body feels. 

The left hand  

The left hand also has several areas which we can look at, and see if we can reduce excessive tension. Are you gripping the violin too tightly because you are afraid that it will drop? Is your thumb squeezing the neck? Are your fingers pressing too hard on the strings to get the notes to sound? Do you tense up when a shift is coming? 

See if you can relax the thumb and fingers more. Again, it is crucial to find a comfortable left hand position so that you can navigate up and down the fingerboard with ease. This can be a huge step to achieving better intonation, shifting, and vibrato.

Playing loud 

Playing loud is one of the many things that can cause us to stiffen up because we want to put in more effort to get a bigger sound, and we can get worried about whether we can achieve sufficient projection. One of the common issues is to tense up the bow arm and press harder on the bow (whatever you do, please don’t press the bow down with the index finger!). In fact, we need to relax more, work with gravity, and let the bow sit better on the string. You can also explore the sounds that you can get from different sounding points. 

The violin set-up 

Last but not least, if you find that excessive tension persists and adjustments made to your technique seem to be ineffective, you may want to take a look at your own violin set-up (i.e. your chin rest and/or shoulder rest combination).  See if they are of the right shape, size, height etc. that suits you. 

This is important as it can reduce a lot of unwanted tension in the neck and shoulders just to accommodate the instrument. For example, if your chin rest is too low, you will have to bring your head too far down just to rest on it. The opposite is true as well – if the chin rest is too high, you create unnecessary tension in the neck and jaw too. And to make things worse, you can feel aches and pains after practising, or even get injured. I’m sure that if you are reading this post up to this point, you’re pretty serious about learning the violin and the last thing you want is to not be able to play the violin for a period of time right? 

Conclusion 

These are just a few things that you may want to start looking out for in your practice sessions. A blog post is insufficient to cover much depth nor serve justice to such a huge and important topic. However, I hope that this will help you to get started on looking at these issues, even if they may seem trivial. There is no quick fix to tension issues and the best time to get started is now. 

As always, do leave a comment to let me know your thoughts. Do subscribe to the blog too! Happy practising and cheers! 

~Vanessa

Articles for further reading: 

Moraes, G., & Antunes, A. (2012). Musculoskeletal disorders in professional violinists and violists. Acta Ortopédica Brasileira, 20(1), 43-47. doi: 10.1590/s1413-78522012000100009 Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3718408/

Niles, L. (2018, October 23). Preventing violin-related injuries, with Pamela Frank and Howard Nelson. Retrieved from https://www.violinist.com/blog/laurie/201810/27513/

Schallock, M. (2017). How to hold a violin. Retrieved from https://www.violinist.com/violin/how-to-hold-a-violin/

The Strad. (2018, September 18). 10 ways to avoid tension in your playing. Retrieved from https://www.thestrad.com/10-ways-to-avoid-tension-in-your-playing/21.article