Miguel de Maria -> RE: String tension and playing (Mar. 7 2006 16:18:58)
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ARgg...kind of confusing for me. Red herrings and the high-tension strings we use to tame them. I don't know, maybe my hands are just weaker than that of a normal person. I seem to get niggling injuries all the time. But one more thing...I know a guy named Humberto Bruni, a classical guitarist based in Venezuela. He told me an interesting story about when he was in grad school and studying the Aranjuez Concerto. For those of you not into CG, it is a Spanishy piece where the guitar plays the central role, "backed up" by a small orchestra. It was once known as a kind of initiation in that only "virtuoso" players could pull it off. Well, Humberto told me that although he had pretty much been able to master all the CG rep he had encountered up to that point, that the Aranjuez was killing him. He came to the conclusion that his current physical abilities were simply insufficient to play it. His solution was to develop a device to help increase the strength of his hands. Kind of a scary thought, wasn't it Schumann who permanently injured himself, thus forcing him to become a composer (to the world's benefit, fo course). Anyway, according to Humberto, it worked, it helped him get stronger and better and he was able to master the Concerto. Since then, he has developed this concept even more and made some computer-aided biofeedback devices that help focus the training! He is a very interesting person. He has even put together a presentation with graphs and charts showing that greater strength increases independence between i and a (the fingers he uses to do scales). I thought he had an interesting point and he has documented that it worked for him. He has a website which might have some more information.
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