Cello Lesson - The Arm-Weight Concept, Explained
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 4 ส.ค. 2015
- www.virtualsheetmusic.com/expe...
In this video, Prof. Mendoes talks about the Arm-Weight concept often found in cello literature and teaching.
Be sure to post your comments, questions or requested on this video's dedicated page below:
www.virtualsheetmusic.com/expe...
Enjoy your cello learning and be sure to share this video with your friends or with anyone may find it useful!
If you are wondering what's the music played at the beginning and end of the video, that's the Prelude from Suite No. 5 by Johann Sebastian Bach for cello. Find the sheet music of it, instantly downloadable at the link below:
www.virtualsheetmusic.com/sco...
And be sure to like this video! - เพลง
![บุษบา - วงชานเมือง [LiveCoverVertion] Original : เมนทอล](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Dm81sKcd9rs/mqdefault.jpg)
I so agree with you on this. I'm just starting cello playing but forty years as a physicist and systems analyst , I listen to my cello teacher giving this description of "arm weight on the bow" with total disbelief. In listening the explanation, it was obvious that this was verbatim of what they had been taught. In the absence of the correct explantation, it may be better than nothing but what needs to be discussed is the benefits of a semi relaxed arm muscle structure which is compliant and flowing rather than a rigid but stiff structure leading to complex stiction interaction of bow/string grip and arm support forces and gravity forces. Similarly little is discussed regarding balancing wrist torque used to maintain correct bow angle as frog to string distance increasing causing bow torque due constant arm weight at increased distance on support (the string). Torque is always the vector cross product between Force at some distance from the possible axis of rotation. Unfortunately for the beginner, the correct posture and stance feels non-natural. There is no sense of intimacy between instrument and player, result... rigid, stiff, total lack of fluidity. So how does one get to Carnage Hall? Practice, practice and yet more practice. For an adult with a critical ear, the nuances of what leads to the right sound can be determined but an incorrect explanation does not help.
Thank you for your input on this video - If you have any questions, please direct your them to our expert with the link in the description - Also, please feel free to check out the other videos that we have posted! Best of luck!
Yes! I have been told this exact thing, so many times, and every time, it made no sense and didn't work for me. I am pretty literal when I listen, so communicating this "idea" of something was always just confusing to me. Thank you for explaining this concept in a way I can understand.
I think a simple way to explain it is that you are digging into the strings to increase the tone. Great video. Actually I have watched many of yours and they are always excellent.
My teacher uses an image that helped me understand it : play into the string, not passing over it. Worked well with me
I took some lessons as a beginning adult learner. The instructor emphasized the arm weight idea in combination with bent thumb so ardently that I was convinced it was the only way to go. My tone is horrid, crunchy and scratchy when I play with all that in mind. So, I don’t much practice with the arm weight concept at the forefront of my thinking, but I feel guilty, like a bad student for ignoring the instruction. So thank you for your discussion here. It is consistent with my observations when actually producing a more tolerable tone and rids me of the sense of guilt for rejecting instruction from an experienced cellist.
I'm glad you're explaining this to other people; I've been doing the same. I was first confronted with this "arm weight" concept in the 90's. At that time I had been a chemistry student for a while, and so my knowledge of basic physics was quite solid, and therefore this idea made little sense. I think that, originally, this idea was meant to have students relax their bowing arm ("feel the weight of your arm"), which would be good, but in the end it tends to confuse people, IMHO. Maybe it was an inadequate description of the idea that the necessary torque is produced mostly from the shoulder.
Thank you. You are so right and helpful for baffled beginners.
You are very welcome! Be sure to check out all other videos by Prof. Mendoes on VSM: www.virtualsheetmusic.com/experts/joseph/
I think freedom of movement is a more useful
concept than arm weight. I was taught by Anna Shuttleworth, and I lost count of the number of times she insisted that I was “constantly mobile”. I learned that, even with the tiniest physical movements, every part of me needs to move - nothing should be stuck.
Heard and noted. Thank you for making this video.
Thank you Joseph.....I was struggling with the arm weight concept myself..for the same reasons..
Thank you for your input on this video - If you have any questions, please direct your them to our expert with the link in the description - Also, please feel free to check out the other videos that we have posted! Best of luck!
Thank you for a great explanation! I have been struggling with the concept of arm weight, it just doesn't make sense to me. Thanks for helping me understand it in a different way.
Thanks ! Just starting cello late in life - but 40 years of music practice - and I felt this whole arm weight was a big approximation to say the least. Also if arm weight was such and advantage, then the bigger the arm, the most powerful the sound. Lots of very small / thin great cellists are here to prove this wrong - Sol Gabetta comes to mind…
@Douglas James ♪ Interesting ! Long story short : yours arms are so big your shoulders can’t support them alone :-)
That said, as I’m progressing in producing and projecting sound I start to understand better the concept of arm weight. To me it is more about relaxing your arm in order to avoid the stiffness to prevent the string to vibrate by blocking the bow. That’s how I feel it. And this solves the issue that lighter built cellists - women usually, but also asian guys, teens, etc - can produce massive sound un-correlated with their actual « weight ». Jacqueline Du Pré was lighter than, say, Rostropovich. However she could easily match or even outperform bigger boys. So in short I agree with your « no arm weight at the frog, no big sound » statement but it’s not « the heavier arm, the bigger sound ». Just the more relaxed :-)
your "power transfer" will depend on string, easiest to achieve on GD, you put an arm weight in the beginning of a down-bow and once bow balance point is reached you transfer power to the index finger, reverse when up-bowing.
I completely agree with you on this
Glad to know that!
Good thoughts. I have some students that have bow arm/hand issues- feeling tension in the right hand, squeezing, not getting a big enough sound. The torque idea makes sense. Maybe a combination of that torque and strength from the back muscles? Any good exercises you recommend to help this?
+Ryan Reardon Thank you for your input on this video - You can also direct your questions or comments to our expert with the link in the description - Please feel free to check out the other videos that we have posted! Best of luck!
Great analysis.
Glad you liked it.
I like the concept but I squeezed more this way
Maybe arm weight works partially to get a big sound in violin and viola playing. That would be because the weight of the arm through the bow near the frog is almost vertically on the string. Even for those instruments, it couldn't be dead weight, though. The arm weight would not transfer to the string near the tip. There would be controlled relaxation at the shoulder from tip to frog. Perhaps, as you say, teachers who talk of arm weight are actually asking their students not to tighten up. And the language, not the actual weight transmission, works for some students to reduce inappropriate tension in their arms.
I found it helpful. I found the arm weight idea was quite hard to get and I thought I was just being stupid!!
Glad it was helpful! :)
Please tell me you live in the SF bay area and give lessons!!!
How do I produce the necessary torque with my bow hand without putting too much strain on my thumb? I feel like the requirements to create plenty of torque while keeping the hand relaxed seem mutually exclusive. I'm a beginner violinist. I've always found the "arm weight" advice to be somewhat disingenuous, so thank you for this video. I always want to respond by drawing a free body diagram of the bow and show that this would produce a rotation about the contact point where the bow meets the strings, unless an additional torque is created with the bow hand. Btw you used the word "counterweight" correctly.
That's right, you got the main point of this video right. Please, if you have any questions for Joseph, post them on his page below:
www.virtualsheetmusic.com/experts/joseph/
He won't answer questions posted here in TH-cam.
Did you ever get this figured out? I'm a few weeks into cello and this is EXACTLY what I'm trying to figure out right now. How do I keep my thumb relaxed while providing the necessary torque?
@@WubTheory I'm happy to report that I no longer have this issue. Now my left thumb is the problem! I'd be lying if I said I know for sure how I fixed it. I work on bowing by playing open strings so I can focus on my bow hand and arm, making sure all the joints in the thumb and elsewhere are flexible. When my thumb hurt I took a day off. Eventually I found I could bow comfortably. Best of luck!
@@Warszawianin Thanks for the response. Sounds like it's maybe a thumb strength issue then? If the thumb is strong enough I guess it could feel relaxed while acting as the pivot.
@@WubTheory Could be. Also it could be that I was overpressing initially, and gradually learned the right amount of pressure. Either way, I recommend focusing on staying flexible, and don't go pushing extra hard trying to build strength like you're at the gym. You can hurt your hand that way.
I would refine the explanation of "arm weight" a bit. As I see it, there is a linear progression at play here. When starting a "downbow" stroke at the frog of the bow, the arm muscles subtract arm weight. In other words, as you illustrate, the dead weight of the arm is way too much to generate pleasant sound. You get grunts and scratches. So your muscles subtract just the amount of weight you need in order to produce the sound you seek. As you proceed up the bow towards the tip, you progressively and linearly add arm weight, leveraged by the twisting motion you cite (torque). At a theoretical point somewhere before the middle of the bow, you are in equilibrium -- you need not add nor subtract arm weight. As you continue "up the bow," you must add torque linearly in order to maintain the same amplitude, given your other variables are constant, e.g., contact point and bow speed. Of course, the reverse is put into play when you reverse direction.
I think this is a better way to conceive of the "arm weight" idea. I teach the deployment of your natural weight as an ergonomic principle: using our own body's mass as an assist in tone production. To think otherwise would be to deploy muscles constantly in a state of opposing tension, then "adding and subtracting pressure" while under constant opposing muscle tension, which results in all sorts of problems down the road. Then come the aches and pains to which so may cellists fall victim.
Thank you for your detailed comment, but unfortunately Prof. Mendoes doens't read comments here on TH-cam. Please, post everything on this video's dedicated page on VSM, where Prof. Mendoes will be happy to answer and reply to all inquiries: www.virtualsheetmusic.com/experts/joseph/arm-weight/
Arm weight is a dumb concept. Everything comes down to how well you can convert your energy. The reason why instrumentalists get tense is they are putting their bodies in artificial positions (as playing a string instrument requires you to do) without directing all that tension into something stable. When only some of that energy is transferred to the string, voila you get tension because it's the equivalent of holding up your arm with no table to support it.
I feel kind of sorry for you because you really think all great cellists are mistaken while you yourself are doing it the right way. Well, I think it is the other way round