The Alexander Technique for Musicians

Judith Kleinman, Peter Buckoke

• Publisher: Methuen Drama
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781408176832
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Music Theory & Appreciation

The Alexander Technique for Musicians is a unique guide for all musicians, providing a practical, informative approach to being a successful and comfortable performer. Perfect as an introduction to the Alexander Technique, or to supplement the reader's lessons, the book looks at daily and last-minute practice, breathing, performance and performance anxiety, teacher–pupil relationships, ensemble skills, and the application of the Alexander Technique to instrumental and vocal work. Complete with diagrams and photographs to aid the learning process, as well as step-by-step procedures and diary entries written by participating students, The Alexander Technique for Musicians gives tried-and-tested advice, drawn from the authors' twenty-plus years of experience working with musicians, providing an essential handbook for musicians seeking the most from themselves and their art.

PART ONE

Prelude

CHAPTER ONE

Why might a musician use the Alexander Technique?

To say a musician plays with his hands is like saying a runner runs with his feet!¹

Health involves many things at many levels but full health is impossible unless we can maintain a balanced equilibrium in the face of forces which tend to disturb us.²

You could ask why humans might use the Alexander Technique in relation to any activity. One way of looking at this is to notice that some people find it easy to excel in their chosen field without any knowledge of the Alexander Technique. In fact, there are many musicians who are superbly coordinated without having learnt the Technique, however the majority of musicians do not have their best coordination available to them all of the time. It is quite often the case that a musician will have experienced moments of brilliance that convince them that they can play better than they do some or most of the time. Those glimpses, of achieving something like their potential, keep them practising hour after hour in the search of reliable coordination in their playing in general and performances in particular. Musicians are keen to practice and are expecting to learn by doing so. The Alexander Technique helps you to ‘learn how to learn’.

The technique is based on principles that help you to establish reliable coordination in your life and music making, so you are more likely to be able to do what you want to do in the way that you choose.

Highly trained athletes

Musicians have to train in a similar way to Olympic athletes. We may not need the heart and lung development of some athletes but we have to train various groups of muscles to even greater fitness and finesse than many sportsmen and women. We devote thousands of hours to developing our skills and we can easily feel under pressure when performing, just like athletes.

Talent versus skill

There is a generally held belief that ‘talent’ makes the difference between just being able to learn the sport or the instrument and reaching the higher levels of performance. Talent is all about doing what is required at the given moment; some musicians have those skills in place intuitively. The Alexander Technique helps you develop the way the mind and body connect, communicate and function in all activities. You could say, it develops your talent by working on the skills that the ‘talented’ have left in place, because they have not interfered with their coordination.

Modern life

Modern daily life includes sitting in front of computers, using the mobile, watching the TV, all of which can find us disengaging from our body and thinking only of the content on the screen in front of us – life has become more sedentary. We may think of relaxation in terms of collapsing on the sofa – on the other hand, when we come to play our instrument we have the idea of sitting or standing up straight (neither of them ideal). Alexander Technique helps us realize there is a connection between our Use in daily life and our music making.

Comfort and discomfort

The lifting, carrying and playing of a musical instrument often involves adopting challenging positions and movements. We might have to sit on an unsuitable chair for 6 hours or more in a day in a cramped space. We might have to travel for hours squeezed into an economy airline seat and then have to perform. The player moves to get a sound from the instrument and the movements can be comfortable or uncomfortable. If the early stages of learning a new instrument include discomfort, a critical situation has been reached. If at that point the musician decides that the discomfort is not acceptable and seeks a solution, the chances are that the learning will go on rapidly in a good direction. If the student musician puts up with discomfort or pain, the journey ahead will be going in the wrong direction. The unfortunate problem, or human challenge, is that we can easily override the discomfort on a tide of enthusiasm for the music or a passionate desire to play the instrument. Some musicians are so keen to play they screen out their sense of quality of movement that might avoid the discomfort in the first place.

‘There is no gain without pain’

The problem with that maxim is that the gain will be for the companies that make painkillers and for osteopaths rather than the musician.

Before the pain stage has been reached we have gone through poor coordination, awkwardness and increasing discomfort. If we can reverse the process we reduce the pain to discomfort to comfort and improve coordination along the way. There is almost always unnecessary tension involved in the negative pattern and there is, unfortunately, a corresponding reduction in sensitivity or sensation experienced through the body’s nervous system. So to state the situation briefly, ‘tension reduces sensation’. We learn to notice attitude, extra tension, loss of balance and freedom. Applying Alexander’s principles puts us back in the more reliable control of our reflex systems. One of the skills we learn when we study this technique is how to stop and recover.

Pain as a stimulus (Peter’s story)

Often musicians come to Alexander work through the ‘discomfort and pain’ route. I am an example. Initially I was perfectly happy to use the technique to ‘just get out of pain’. When I got out of pain, by studying the Alexander Technique, I enjoyed playing, practising and performing much more. I started to see the musical potential of the principles as a by-product of the pain-relieving journey I was taking. Looking back, I am glad I had pain as a stimulus; I had to change! The musical pay-off was very exciting. I changed my expectations of what I might achieve musically and have been changing them ever since. I realized you don’t have to react automatically on the basis of your feelings all the time; you can make conscious decisions about interpretation and creativity. Thinking back, I can remember being in rehearsals and not being open to musical suggestions from colleagues or conductors because I felt they were wrong; after Alexander lessons I became a more flexible musician because I realized I could choose my behaviour consciously.

A brief look at musical habit

To briefly consider matters musical; the Alexander Technique looks at habit. Do we respond habitually in musical situations? Do we always play the same short notes when there are dots on them? Do we always produce the same sound in legato tunes? Do we respond to ‘A’ major in a predictable way? Do we rush in fast music or when there is a crescendo in the part? Is our habit to play quietly in the same old way when our solo line in a sonata changes to an accompaniment? Have we developed habitual responses that stifle creativity and spontaneity? To be spontaneous and creative we have to avoid habitual, automatic playing. Alexander Technique can liberate the musician from habit and free up their musicianship.

Practice

Alexander work has a lot to offer in the practice room. We look at the structure of our time spent there, including playing and not playing. We consider the use of semi-supine position as a practice tool, often combined with the use of imagination. We explore the efficient development of instrumental technique and preparation of pieces for performance. We question our use of repetition and qualities that we can bring to it. We consider the influence of our balance, breathing, seeing and hearing on our playing. We look at our attitude and how to deal with our expectations of our practice. We develop a connection between the way we use our mind and body in relation to our instrument and developing musical responses. We endeavour to open our mind to enjoying ourselves and maintaining comfort and health while engaging in this essential part of being a musician.

Performance

The Alexander Technique can help us to see the differences between practice and performance. We develop our ability to communicate with our colleagues and the audience. As consciousness of our psychophysical responses to playing and performing develop, we improve our ability to express our genuine relationship with the music.

Performance anxiety

Musicians have complex demands on them and many of us experience performance anxiety. Some players seem to have no problem with performing and stay sanguine when other players are feeling stressed.

The way Alexander saw this situation was simply that we are experiencing our ‘habitual response to the stimulus’. I am sure we all find it possible to say or think, ‘This is a big concert, no wonder I am feeling shaky!’ However, we can probably agree that the complex music or the ‘high profile recital’ is not the problem; the problem is our response to the situation. When you feel stressed before a concert, you are (presumably) not choosing that response. The recognition and understanding of this is the start of a road to recovery. If you develop a deep understanding of the Alexander Technique, you can find a solution to performance anxiety.

Look after yourself for more than one reason

No musician would damage their instrument on a daily basis and expect it to work well but some of us misuse our body and apparently expect it to carry on producing good results for a lifetime. Some performers have continued to perform at the highest level of the profession for many decades. Rubenstein, Casals, Horowitz and Heifitz spring to mind. Every one of them had great Use. Studying the Alexander Technique can improve our Use and prepare us for a long, successful and comfortable career.

Perhaps the biggest gift of the Alexander Technique is how it allows us to become deeply present and involved in the moment of making music.

Student quotes

Many musicians are not aware that when they come to play their instrument, they are actually using two instruments. Their Self is the primary instrument and the musical instrument is the secondary one. If one is ever to find full pleasure and comfort with playing one’s secondary instrument, one’s primary instrument must be working in a way which allows that.

Ashok Klouda, cellist

The most crucial change in my thinking that the Alexander Technique has influenced is the awareness of the fact that I am able to take responsibility for my body and mind. It is my decision how I treat my body, how I practise, how I deal with stressful times and how I respond to physical pain or psychological pressure.

Anna Eichholz, violinist

¹Yosuke Riley Chatmaleerat, pianist.

²Wilfred Barlow, The Alexander Principle, Arrow Books, London, 1984, p. 47.

CHAPTER TWO

How to use this book

We have written this book for musicians who are receiving Alexander lessons. The book will also be useful if you are not having lessons, though we encourage you to have the hands-on experience of Alexander lessons if you can. Alexander work is oriented to thinking about what you are doing while you are doing it. The experience of interacting with a teacher helps you understand the approach to improved use of the mind and body that is potentially mystifying if you only read about it in a book.

The writing does not avoid reiteration of key points. It will be productive to read the book from cover to cover but it has been written and organized in a way that makes it easy to dip into different aspects of the Technique and musicianship, chapter by chapter. If you have not heard an account of how Alexander developed his Principles we st...