In my last lesson I didn't realize my digital recorder was almost out of room on the memory chip, and so I didn't get any thing at all recorded. Never underestimate the power of paper and pen! So I will fill in the gap here with just a few thoughts after reading this: Gino Cioffis basic ideas of playing the clarinet . Please read this first if you haven't yet, its well worth reading.
The way I stumbled on this is I bought a barrel for my Selmer, and the barrel was from the collection of the late Mr. Cioffi, who was a Selmer artist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, The Metropolitan Opera and other prestigious US orchestras. In every sense, a heavyweight.
In the document, Cioffi makes points that I have heard endless times from my own teacher, but for some reason these are making more sense, now, don't ask me why, perhaps coming from another source, I don't know. What Cioffi says is the main problem with clarinet players is the tendency to have tense hands, arms, shoulders. I know in my own case this is quite true, where I seem to want to grip the horn like it was going to run away from me. This makes sense if you come from playing the saxophone, where the keys are covered, but its just the worst thing you can do for your playing. Case in point: in the last lesson, I was playing something and was having difficulties with it. Kirt has shown me this Akido exercise to loosen up my hands and arms. We stopped the lesson and did that for a few minutes, and then when I sat down to play the difficult part again, I could do it easily. Makes sense, eh?
The other thing Cioffi talks about is playing slowly. Again, everyone knows this, not many do it. But the difference with Cioffi is that he speaks about playing slowly in the context of keeping the hands relaxed. This is a different take than what I ever considered when practicing slowly; for me up to this point I was just practicing slowly since it is obviously easier to play difficult fingerings slow rather than quick when you first learning them. However, playing slowly so that you can play with your fingers, hands, arms and shoulders loose, rather than tight, to me is an entirely new way to play.
Let me explain what I have been doing with these two concepts in the last couple of weeks. To begin with, I am now once again using the neck strap when I play. Its not just to take the weight off my hands, but also to try and combat other pains in my neck and shoulders. First I take a quick glance at the Cioffi article, to remind me of what I should be doing with my practice. Then, I begin by doing the simplest exercise possible to stretch the muscles in my hand, which my wife showed me; take your hand - in my case, my right hand, since that is the one that hurts - and while standing up, place the palm flat against a wall at shoulder height. Now, turn your body away from your had as much as possible, twisting from the feet up. You can see how this works, its just the opposite motion from when you place your fingers on the instrument. I do this several times now during the course of any one practice session, whenever I feel my hands tense up.
Now when I begin to play, I try as much as possible to keep my fingers relaxed. As Cioffi says, your hands should be so relaxed that they should just droop from the ends of your arms. If you think about this, if as I am being taught you make sure that your fingers are hitting the keys with the fingers pointing down, not flat and perpendicular to the floor as many players do, then it really makes perfect sense: the fingers just naturally fall into place.
When my right hand starts to tense up a little, if I don't get up and do either of the exercises I mentioned, I will at least stop and stretch my fingers out, and let the hand drop just to remind me of how I should be playing. I was practicing the other night, and thinking about the loading I am putting on my body, and realized that even if my hand is relaxed, I still must keep my right arm up to support the horn, even with the neck strap. After all, your thumb still has to hit the thumb rest.
Even though my hand is relaxed, my arm is not. I even had a brief thought of putting a sling on my arm, like it was broken. That would take away all the tension from holding up my arm, but besides looking like a total idiot, it of course would not be practical in any sense. There isn't really any help for this, except to try and be very aware of how much pressure you are putting on your muscles to hold up your arm.
The other thing I do most times to help relieve the pressure on my arms is to place the bell of the horn on my knee. This has two good outcomes: one, it reduces the weight of the horn by a lot, and also forces me to sit straight up, as you are supposed to do when playing. My teacher has noticed that as I have difficulty playing an passage, I sometimes start to slump forward as I am concentrating. A very bad habit, but being aware of it helps.
Going back to the issue of speed, I have dialed down the rate at which I practice exercises. For instance, for some time I played my scales at 80 = ΒΌ note. Then I decided that it would easier on my lungs to bump up the speed to 88, and indeed it was, and it made me feel like I was making more progress. Now I have ramped down the speed back to 80 for the scales that I am familiar with, and slow down on the new ones I am learning. I have to say, I am playing better from doing this. Since I am still learning all the scales, until I get to the point where I can play them all easily at 80, I am not moving the counter up. I have done the same with other exercises, and at times slowing them down whenever I need to. Once I got over the pride thing, its actually better, since in the end its all about how it sounds, not how fast it is.
To sum up: trying to relax, playing slowly to keep the hands and fingers relaxed, has had a positive effect on my playing, so maybe this will help you too.