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I have recently noticed that my intonation is some times better than others.
I do understand that this probably happens to everyone, but right now I’m noticing that the quality of my intonation is a reflection of where I’m putting my attention.
My intonation is often poor when I’m working on learning new music or focused on specific difficult passages or techniques. Sometimes it's so bad that I embarrass myself -- even when nobody else is around!
But when I let loose and leap into playing some favorite music -- without thinking -- my intonation is most often spot-on. I use lots of double-stops and drone notes so it’s easy to tell when it’s right or wrong.
I don’t know exactly how this works. Maybe it’s a left-brain vs right-brain thing. Or maybe it’s having my attention closely focused on the tune or thinking about positions, strokes, timing, etc. Or maybe it’s like riding a bike or swinging a golf club -- you do best when you don’t think about it.
I’’m not a highly skilled violinist, just a hack fiddler, and I wonder if more advanced players experience something similar.
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It is the same with me. I am concentrating on learning the notes, etc. After I know them and the sequence, bowing, etc, I tend to concentrate on clearing up the intonation, after that smoothing the bowing and trying to add dynamics. Probably the way my brain works, systematic.
Great topic.
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For what its worth, my intonation always goes out the window when I do a video, its a sort of stage fright I think. Tiredness always affects me as well, which isnt good because I sleep on average 3 to 4 hours a night and have done for years. Intonation is a constant battle I think.
Thing is if you can tell when you are out of tune it shows that your ears are good, its when you cant tell that there is a problem, in my opinion anyway, I have always said you can tell you are getting better when you can hear how bad you are.
One of the reasons I dont just do audio recordings is because I want the pressure of knowing people will see it in all its rawness, makes me play better, I think.
I was once told by an excellent player, never be happy with a bad note do it again over and over.
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I don’t think it is unusual to focus your attention on one thing at a time when you’re learning new music. As a matter of fact, I think it is quite normal.
I know that the piece I’m working on right now has some quick string crossings, and other things going on that I need to focus on my positioning of the bow. Because of that, I will take the left hand out of the equation, and play the passage on open strings (i.e., play the rhythms, moving the bow as if they left hand was playing the notes, but left hand does nothing). Once I’ve got the bow doing what I want it to do, I work the left hand back in.
stringy said
For what its worth, my intonation always goes out the window when I do a video, its a sort of stage fright I think. . . .
I think sometimes stress can result in tension in the left hand, which can affect finger placement.
Characterize people by their actions and you will never be fooled by their words.
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There's a comic Jewish curse: - "May your neighbour's child take up the violin!"
The violin's bad rep comes from the obvious intonation problems.
So from day 1 my philosophy of violin learning has been intonation, intonation, intonation. You have to intonate properly every note you ever play. Then it becomes habitual. Recording doesn't make my intonation worse - intonation makes my recording bad!
But technique helps and is crucial. It's important to realise that "position" refers to the hand's physical position. Get that right and steady, then you intonate with the fingers, not the hand. Warm up every day with Schradieck 1, major and minor.
Andrew
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