Miguel de Maria -> RE: sticking points for speed (Jul. 21 2006 16:15:09)
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Hmmm... there is a fellow, Humberto Bruni, who studied this intensely. He even created some graphs illustrating some of his conclusions. He used ia for scales, and if I recall, measured the speed of i independently. Theoretically, the maximum possible speed would be double the speed of i. I find that I can play i (one finger alternating) faster than sixteenth notes at 120 bpm for 1 beat bursts, and m just as fast. So, let's say that it's 120, my maximum possible speed for im would be 240! That would be fast enough I guess. I'm sure most people have never even tried, but I bet a lot of inexperienced players would be better off doing picado with one finger! Much less to go wrong. I guess this really doesn't have that much to do with your calculations, Sean. Anyways, Bruni did some studies and created machines and workout regimes to increase the strength of the fingers. He reasoned that on a slack guitar you can easily play almost anything, but once the strings are high tension and esp. on a big Ramirez, things become very difficult. It seems to affect coordination. So, obviously the only difference is strength...the ease of getting through the string. His graphs showed a steady progress of speed closer and closer to the ideal maxium (which of course can never be reached). So for me the conclusion was clear that if you can find ways to strengthen those fingers in a way that will make it easier for them to get through the strings, your speed will increase. Unfortunately, his website is down right now. Continuing on with my intial thought, if I can play bursts of i at 120, but can only play scales at 160, it seems there is a lot of room for improvement. Whether it's a matter of strength, precision/coordination, or improving the alternation mechanism itself, there is some head space there. I think most people doing the measurements would find similiar conclusions. Except for Grisha. I bet he is not that far off from his top speed right now.
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