Rather lovely (and a real surprise) to be the model for an award winning portrait photo. The photograph was taken by Victoria Jane Kettel who is based in the Midlands. She also photographs events including concerts extremely well.
You can see more of her shots of me here.
Alex’s article for the magazine of the Music Teacher’s Association advises how we can collaborate to ensure the continuing success of music education. The article is titled:
The Future of Music Education
Courage, open-hearted generosity and sharing everything
These videos were originally recorded for the Benedetti Foundation.
It is really important to activate your body and hands before playing the violin. It is never a good idea just to launch into playing – especially something fast and tricky.
Here is a video guiding you through some simple warm up ideas for your bow hold. It will help you activate your right hand fingers.
Here is a video that guides you through warming up and activating your left hand – especially that tricky “fiddly fourth finger”. It will help with ideas on improving the speed and ease of movement.
THE SECRETS OF VIOLIN BOWING
How does an aspiring violinist learn the art of violin bowing? I always suggest to my students that they go to as many concerts as they can. More importantly, and in the case of violin concertos especially, I advise that they try at least once to get as close as possible to the solo violinist. Seeing and hearing the student’s reactions when they experience a great player like Pinchas Zuckerman or Maxim Vengerov at close quarters is always very telling, because every time it causes a major change in perception. None of them can believe how big the sound is, but most interestingly, they all report that they hear a huge amount of extra noise or grit in the sound. The students, listening in close proximity to great violinists, are experiencing how much articulation of the bow is required to make a soloistic sound.
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