Tag Archives: Alexander Technique

When Good Posture Becomes A Bad Idea

This morning I was looking at some videos I’d found on YouTube after searching “good posture.” What I found was a mix of ideas and demonstrations, some helpful, many not so helpful. One of the things that many of the “not so helpful” videos had in common was in presenting posture as static. Something to be held.

Here were some of the most frequently given directions about holding this good posture:

Tuck your chin in as you lift your head upward, holding your head directly over your sternum (breast bone)
Pull your shoulders back and down, pinching your shoulder blades together
Lift your abdominal area, pulling your navel toward your spine
Tuck your pelvis slightly under, so that you’re not arching your back

Tucking, lifting, holding, pulling and pinching. Lot’s of doing. Lot’s of effort.

As an experiment, I took out my saxophone and followed these directions. Besides not being able to produce my sound in any reasonably pleasing way, I also noticed I couldn’t move. I couldn’t express myself. I couldn’t really breathe very well. I was not free. I was planted. I would get tired very quickly if I had to maintain such holding in my body.

As an Alexander Technique teacher, I wasn’t too surprised by this experiment. I see time and again musicians who get some kind of a notion about good posture, then make a mess of themselves (and the music!) as they try to maintain it.

Now in all fairness, if you were to look at snapshot of somebody maintaining this kind of holding, it would probably look like good posture. You’d likely be able to see the symmetrical alignment in the body. But if you were to put your hands on this same person’s body, you’d fell nothing but tension and rigidity.

According to the Alexander principles, good posture is a result of a good use of yourself. And this good use involves releasing yourself into balance.

Contrast the above directions above with the Alexander Technique primary directions:

I allow my neck to be free so that my head can release upward on top of my spine
I allow my torso to release into length and width
I allow my knees to release forward from my hip joints and one knee away from the other

Notice the word release is used in each direction. This is a matter of un-doing as opposed to doing, and involves much less effort. In truth, we are designed to release upwards into good balance, posture and alignment. It’s what we naturally default to (as long as we don’t interfere with it!) Just look at a small child sit, stand, and otherwise move and you’ll see this to be evident.

If you were to see somebody carrying out the above Alexander directions, they too would look like they were maintaining good posture (nicely aligned, etc.) But the difference is that they would be able to move easily, breathe easily and express themselves easily through these directions. Just like a small child. Balance instead of bracing.

So if you find yourself struggling to maintain the correct posture, think of balance and fluidity instead. This is where a good Alexander Technique teacher can help tremendously. In an Alexander lesson you’ll learn how you are creating habitual patterns of tension that are interfering with your natural, easy, upright balance and coordination.

Take a look at this video of the great pianist Artur Rubinstein performing Chopin. Notice how beautifully upright he is as he plays. If you were to take a snapshot of him in mid-flight, you would see what appears to be good posture. But as you can also see, he is free and flowing, expressing himself effortlessly and gracefully. Releasing into balance.

Imagination Plus Clear Direction Equals Good Intonation

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I had a wonderful moment of revelation this morning as I practiced my saxophone. It was one of those experiences that helps me to better see how interconnected thought is to result when it comes to playing music (or doing anything else, for that matter). I was working on my intonation by playing long tones with a tuning CD (recorded tracks of drones consisting of fourths and fifths).

It is very challenging to play the saxophone in tune with this recording because of the nature of the saxophone overtone series. I have to play each note with a very particular internal embouchure (i.e., how I shape the inside of my mouth and throat) to stay in tune. It’s like walking on a razor’s edge. For that reason it’s great practice. It really improves my ears, and makes staying in tune with other musicians (who possess reasonable intonation capabilities) a snap.

But what I noticed today is that I would typically attack each note ever so out of tune, then within a millisecond I’d correct it. It was almost indiscernible, but it made me realize something: I’m not really imagining the pitch before I’m playing, so much as I’m reacting to the pitch I’m hearing, then correcting it.

Now, I thought I was imagining the pitch. But if I was, why was I slightly off in that first part of my attack? I thought it was time to investigate this question.

What I started doing was observing my thinking as I was playing. As I readied myself to play along with the drone, I asked myself if I was really hearing the pitch. I was sure I was, so I played. Same thing, slightly off (sharp), going immediately into tune.

How could this be? I explored this a few more times and found out something interesting about myself: I was imagining the pitch, to be sure, but I was not at all paying attention to what I was doing with myself as I did so.

So I gave it another go with the only intention being to notice what I was doing with myself as I prepared to play. What I discovered was that I was sort of “holding” my embouchure in a habitual way that wasn’t allowing me to attack the note with the kind of intonation that I was imagining. It dawned on me that I was dividing what I was imagining (the pitch) from what was going on inside my body (my embouchure as well as my head/neck/back relationship).

As I continued with this exploration, I realized that my “habitual” embouchure preparation involved tensing my neck ever so slightly, usually making me a bit sharp (flat on certain notes). I also noticed that I released this tension the moment I came in tune. (Actually, better to say the opposite: I came back in tune when I released this tension.)

In short I was reacting as opposed to directing myself with a clear intention.

Once I became aware of this, I simply gave myself a chance to integrate the two things into one whole: My imagination and my direction could be one inseparable thing. Immediately I found that I could make my attack with beautiful intonation. Consistently and easily. I was actually embodying my imagination.

I’m always so thankful for these experiences. Such great lessons that I seem to learn over and over again.

The Art Of Making Mistakes

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“Your biggest mistake wasn’t in playing the wrong note. Your biggest mistake was in what you did after you played the wrong note.” I heard this during a saxophone lesson I took nearly thirty years ago from the great teacher and woodwinds artist, Bill Green. I vividly remember what he told me word for word because it was such a moment of clarity for me.

What made me sound bad wasn’t the clunker note that I played in the etude during my lesson. What made me sound bad was how I sort of fell apart after playing that note.

I was so concerned with producing a “flawless” performance, that after I made my mistake I became at first flustered (thereby making more mistakes), and then I sort of gave up.

I still finished playing the piece, but at one point I just stopped seeing the point in giving it my full intention (after all it was now flawed!) I had effectively lost the music. Disconnected myself from it. Stopped feeling it and started judging myself instead.

At that point in my musical career I had the grand notion that, with enough hard work, I could play flawlessly like the great Bill Green. But what I learned from him instead is that his aim (and the aim of most great performers) is not to play flawlessly. Instead his aim is to stay present with the music.

When you stay present in the act of making music, you indirectly reduce the amount of mistakes you’ll make. When you stay present with the act of making music, you always stay within the realm of personal expression and artistry.

When I told Bill Green that I’d never heard him make a mistake, he just chuckled. Then he replied, “Oh, you’ve heard me make mistakes. You just didn’t notice them.” He said that the important thing is to keep the music going and stay present with your original intention. He went on to tell me an allegorical tale:

Imagine you’re in a dark forest, running for your life to elude an angry bear that is chasing you. You have a good head start on the bear, and if you keep running, you’ll make it to safety before the bear can catch you. But then (because it’s dark) you accidentally run into the low branches of a tree. Bam!

You’re not hurt, but you’re startled. You have to keep running though, so you continue to do so. But now your thoughts are on that tree that gave you a problem, and you keep looking back toward where it was. Then, Bam! You run into another tree. Same thing, you’re startled but not hurt. You keep running, still looking back at those damned low-lying branches that gave you trouble. Then, Bam again! And so on…

I think you get the point: once you’ve made a mistake, let it go. Stay present and keep moving forward toward your intended goal. It works in the forest running from a bear (it gives you better odds of survival, anyhow), and it works in playing music.

When I teach the Alexander Technique to performers who struggle with performance anxiety, I’m struck by one underlying theme: These folks are almost never in the present moment of their performance. They tend to live somewhere between fear of that which is yet to come (their fear of making mistakes), and regret of that which just happened (the mistakes they’ve made thus far).

This keeps them shifting back and forth from past to future, never having a chance to experience the exhilaration of the present moment. (Not exactly something that cultivates and supports an authentic and rich personal expression.) When I can get them back to the present moment, they are often stunned with the beauty and power of their performance.

There is art in all aspects of music making, both in what you intend to play, and in what you don’t intend to play. It comes down to how you react to what you do. To make mistakes artfully, you must react in such a way that allows the flow of your art to continue.

So notice how you react the next time you make a mistake while performing:

What happens in your body? Do you tense up? Stop breathing? If you notice that you become tense, see if you can discern a pattern. Do you stiffen your neck? Raise your shoulders? Lock your knees? Ask yourself if any of these patterns of tension might be preventing you from playing your best. If the answer is yes, practice not reacting with these patterns as you play. If you give yourself the chance to pay attention, you might also find that these same patterns of habitual tension rise up a great deal while you’re practicing as well. This is a wonderful opportunity to practice preventing these kinds of reactions. You can take this skill right into your performances.

Where does your attention go? (Does it move backwards or do you easily bring yourself back to the present moment? Do you “give up” on the performance, or stay with your intentions?) It’s important that you learn to let go of regret immediately after you’ve made a mistake. This takes a persistent, clear intention, as well as practice. But if you can learn to react by not reacting (no such thing, really, but I think you get the picture; just stay present and clamly alert) you’ll become a much more consistent, artful and authentic performer.

How Often Do You Stop Listening To Yourself As You Practice Your Instrument?

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I was giving an Alexander Technique lesson this morning to a young violinist who had come to me because of some problems with pain and tension (particularly in his left shoulder) as he played. This morning I wanted to see what he does with himself as he practices, so I had him practice an arpeggio exercise that he knew from memory. My intention was to let him play for about 10 minutes uninterrupted as I observed.

At one point in the exercise (playing the G diminished arpeggio), I began to hear his intonation go haywire. Most of his intervals became flat in pitch, and rather lifeless sounding, as well. It was in stark contrast to his typical intonation and complex tone color.

Yet he played straight through as if there were nothing at all wrong. Now, understand, this is a young man who is unusually mindful, very bright and has very nice intonation. (He’s the concert master in an honors youth orchestra here in Los Angeles.)

At this point (it was about 5 minutes into his practice) I decided I needed to stop him. I asked, ” Can you hear anything different about your intonation?” He paused, and said he wasn’t sure. So I had him go from the beginning again. When he arrived at the G diminished arpeggio, his intonation again began to suffer. I stopped him again and asked him this question:

“Where is your attention right now, more to what you’re doing, or more toward what you’re hearing?”

Without hesitation he said that it was much more toward what he was doing as he played as opposed to what he was hearing. (He wasn’t daydreaming or anything like that, he was just primarily focused on the mechanical aspect of what he was doing.)

I asked him if he started the exercise this way. He said no, that at first he had a balance between paying attention to what he was doing, and what he was hearing. As he got to the diminished arpeggios he said that he couldn’t aurally imagine them the same way he could with the diatonic arpeggios (tonic, subdominant). For that reason he realized he was trying to play the diminished arpeggio by concentrating on what he was doing at the expense of what he was hearing.

So first, I had him isolate and sing the G diminished arpeggio pattern that was part of the exercise. Then I asked him play it on his violin, but asked him to really listen to himself. Immediately he heard his bad intonation, smiled then began to correct it back to his normal, beautiful intonation.

All he had to do was to give himself a chance to actually hear what he was playing. It was that simple.

How often do you lose sight of your sound (of your whole self for that matter) when you narrow your attention to only take in the act of executing the music? I know that when sight reading or playing a difficult passage it’s easy to lose touch with everything (except the anxious anticipation of the unknown) .

But it doesn’t have to be this way.

If you find yourself doing this, simply shift your attention back to what you hear and what you are doing with yourself as you play.

In the case of my young violinist this morning, he had actually lost sight of both of these things, letting himself get wrapped up into the mechanics of executing the music, instead of the music of the music. (Yes, I actually meant to say that.)

What my student also realized was that, as he lost touch with his sound, he had also lost touch to how he was using himself. Because of this he went back into some of his old patterns of harmfully misdirected effort (his left shoulder began to tense up quite a bit). As he stopped to give himself a chance to hear himself, he also returned to the newer, lighter, easier, more efficient use of himself. (He let go of that shoulder tension.)

What you hear and what you do as you play music go seamlessly hand in hand. One supports the other. One relies upon the other. One affects the other (for better or worse). You might be surprised at how often you stop hearing yourself because you’ve stopped listening the your music.

The practice room is a great place to work on this expanded, integrated attention. And I know from experience that it is highly possible to cultivate this kind of attention. So see what you do as the music gets more difficult or nebulous. Then simply listen.

Opening Your Mouth: One Simple Tip For Wind Instrumentalists And Singers

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As an Alexander Technique teacher, one of the most common habits of mal-coordination I observe involves how wind instrumentalists and singers open their mouths as they perform. Whether to take a breath, or to simply set the embouchure (in the case of the wind player), I too often see this: the performer opening the mouth from the wrong side of the joint. Let me explain.

Your jaw is a joint that has two movable sides: A bottom side (called the mandible, or “jawbone” side of the joint) and a top side (called the maxilla, or “skull” side of the joint). Technically speaking you only have one jaw, and that’s the part (the mandible) that hangs from the skull. But in reality you can open your mouth from either side of the joint, skull-side or jaw-side.

By far, the most efficient way to open your mouth is from the jaw-side. This is really mostly a matter of letting the jaw release away from the skull. But what I see far too often are singers and wind instrumentalists opening their mouths from the skull-side of the joint. By doing so they put excessive strain not only on the jaw structure, but also on the entire head/neck structure which creates a type of tension that interferes significantly with breath and coordination.

Try this little experiment:

Place one of your hands, palm-side down under the bottom of your chin, so that your fingers are lightly touching your throat. Now, keeping your hand still to stop your jaw from moving, open your mouth (you’ll be opening your mouth from the skull-side of the joint). Now close your mouth from the jaw-side of the joint. Repeat this open and close process two more times. You’ll feel your head being pulled back by all the tension you’re placing on your neck to open your mouth.

In Alexander lingo, we say pulling your head back by tightening your neck in such a way interferes with your primary control, that is, the relationship of your head to your neck and back that is absolutely primary in how it conditions the quality of your entire bodily coordination (including breathing!)

If you pull your head back to open your mouth your directly interfere with to things. First, by tightening your neck you interfere with the free use of your limbs (your hands will be compromised). Second, by pulling your head back you will press your larynx in towards the bones of your neck significantly interfering with your ability to inhale. (If you’re a singer, it’s also going to create way more tension on your vocal mechanisms.)

Also, almost without fail what goes hand in hand with this habit is gasping the breath in noisily through the mouth during inhalation. Not only is this disruptive to the music, but it is not the most efficient way to breath in quickly. (I’m going to write specifically about this in a future post.)

So what do you do when you open your mouth? Observe yourself when playing or singing, especially when you must take breaths quickly. You might find that you already are in the habit of letting your jaw release away from your skull to open your mouth. If so, great! You might also find that for the most part you let your jaw release away from your skull, but under the pinch of taking a quick breath you start to go toward pulling your head back as you open your mouth from the “wrong” side of the joint.

If you find yourself doing this habitually, now’s the time to start lessening that tendency (aiming to eventually eliminate it!) Here’s a way to proceed:

Start practicing opening your mouth without your instrument. Just think about letting your head stay in easy balance on top of your spine as you let your jaw release away from your skull.
Practice opening your mouth with your instrument as you bring your instrument toward your face. Then place your instrument in (or onto) your mouth and let your jaw and lips come to the instrument, but don’t yet make a sound.
Repeat this step, but this time once the instrument is “in place”, blow a bit of slow, warm air without any intention of producing a sound.
Put it all together. Give yourself a few moments each day, maybe when working on long tones or other tone studies to be mindful about how you open your mouth.

Your sound, breathing, ease and coordination will all improve by subtracting this one little habit in your playing.

What is your habit? Observe yourself as you play and sing, especially when taking quick breaths.