I’ve used the following language around ‘elements’ and their ‘extensions’ to help me develop practice strategies, communicate with parents about practice, and spice up group classes. I don’t believe any other Suzuki teachers use the word ‘element,’ I’m just borrowing it from the permaculture community.

I define an element in the violin worlds as a graspable, practicable unit. Any piece would fall under this category. As would a scale or etude or game. A general concept, such as vibrato would not. If the concept of vibrato were distilled into a useful exercise, such as peg knocks, string polishing, or oscillations with a recording, then it would be become an element.

If you assign ‘tone’ to your student, it’s likely they won’t know how to practice it– how to manifest tone. They will even have a subtle resistance against practicing tone because the work of sorting vague technique into a coherent set of things to DO is effortful.

Ask students to play Dr. Suzuki’s tonalization, and suddenly the effort of tone practice is only the effort of producing great tone. Not figuring out what to play.

The other beautiful aspect of an element, versus a vague concept, is that it can be manipulated and twisted and grafted and painted a different color while retaining its structure. I call this transmutation ‘extension.’

Challenge, creativity, and fun go hand in hand. Extension is what brings challenge and creativity into the lesson. [Read more…]

Permaculture names two of the following as core design principles
1) Each element performs many functions
2) Each function is supported by many elements

In a homestead we could see this exemplified easily in a fruit tree. The fruit tree (an element) provides (the functions of) shade, food production, nutrient concentration, and soil creation.

Each function, shade, food production, nutrient concentration, and soil creation, depends on far more than just the fruit tree. For shade we might depend on other trees, the sides of buildings, and fences, and natural slope. For food production we have a wide variety of other fruit trees, nut trees, and perennial vegetables, herbs and medicinals. Nutrients are concentrated by cover crops and animal droppings. Soil creation is performed by the fruit tree, but also all other trees, green manure, and composting.

It would be extremely risky to depend on the fruit tree for all food production. It would also be extremely risky if the fruit tree’s only function was to make fruit.

This is why beautiful, bountiful, resilient gardens are full of a wide variety of elements, which all serve a host of functions.

Suzuki encouraged teachers to study natural patterns. It makes far more sense to teach which nature, not against it.

When moving through the repertoire with students, we should keep these principles in mind. [Read more…]

Is it the left hand?
Is it the finger angle?
Is it the ability to adjust up or down on the fly?
Is it the tone from the bow making the pitch fuzzy?

It is all of these things.
But intonation solutions all start in the same place: Listening.

Roughly six weeks into working together your student’s excitement for violin lessons vanish.

Violin is no longer shiny and new.
They understand what the pattern of each lesson and practice is.
The work is becoming challenging.

This is where parents often hit a wall.

The Suzuki Philosophy is built on the belief that children who are motivated by their environment to play violin will love practicing violin. We spend so much time and effort setting up an environment which encourages music making — playing the recording, establishing a practice spot and time, attending concerts, observing other lessons and group classes — that we (parents and teachers) can be flummoxed when a student flat out says no, they don’t want to do something.

When this happens, and it inevitably will, please remember the following. [Read more…]