October 07, 2007
Clarinet lesson #12 - its all in the wrist
Behold, the largest shot of my hands you will ever see. I even reduced the image but there it is. So lets continue to the lesson.
I hadn't seen Kirt in over a month due to scheduling conflicts, so I was a bit anixous and instead of taking the time to sit and play some long tones, I just started tootling around. Thats fine when I am on my own, but its not the way to start a lesson really, unless that is I am playing well to begin with. Oh well......
Once we settled down, Kirt honed on my hand position, or rather what I wasn't doing correctly, even though he has told me many times what to do.
Look at the photo carefully: the left hand (the hand sinister as they used to say in the middle ages, and quite applicaple for the clarinet) has the correct postion. Note in particular how the left wrist is dropped which collapses the hand, reducing the amount of distance you have to cover when you are moving your fingers. This is vitally important, and one of the things that is hardest to make a habit, even Kirt had difficultly with this one. For me, its a holdover from so many years of sax playing where both of your hand and fingers are basically perpendicular to the floor. Great for sax, bad for clarinet and a dead giveaway when you see a doubler.
Also note on both hands, the first three fingers are curved, not flat; the pinkies, which slap the keys, are flat although there is a slight curve on the left pinky, something to watch. The pinkies of both hands are on their respective anchor keys. I find this a great way to make sure that I am in close contact with the horn.
On the left hand again see how my first finger is resting on the A and Ab keys - makes for quick work when playing these notes, and recall that if you hit the A key, you are already lifting the Ab so no worries there.
Finally, again I emphasize that both hands are facing upward on a rough 45 degree angle, and the fingers, even fat fingers like mine, don't ever touch each other.
Back to the right hand, note how my first finger is resting on the side keys - this is the other anchor point for the right hand, and in my case the crease of my finger is resting right over the upper of the two lower keys. For you of course it may well be a bit different. As it turns out, Kirts hands and mine are almost identical in size, so I can't ever make the case that he can do things on the horn I can't due to some different in finger lenght, etc. Bummer! Again, resting your hand on the right anchor makes it much closer to the horn, a good thing in all ways.
One other thing Kirt pointed out to me is that when I look at my right hand, I could see the impressions of the rings on my fingertips, which means I was pressing far too hard with my fingers. As he says, it should be a caress, not a death grip. Easy to say when you know how to do it, hard when you are still learing and are in fear of the dreaded squeaks.
As I say, we spent most of the lesson going over this, and as a result I can't move on yet to new exercises or other things. Kirt is a task master, but he is correct, there is no point moving on until I can make these finger positions a habit, and I can tell you when I do have my hands correct, it makes everything much easier.
Until the next lesson I will continue to concentrate on the hand postion, since by now - trust me on this! - i have memorized all the exercises.
So - have you practiced in front of a mirror lately? You may want to consider it.......