Klarinet Archive - Posting 000364.txt from 1995/06

From: niethamer@-----.BITNET
Subj: Re: Glissandos
Date: Fri, 16 Jun 1995 22:53:37 -0400

On Thu, 15 Jun 1995, Nichelle Crocker wrote:

>
> Let me first explain the origins of my frustration about learning glissandos
> which was where this discussion began. I had been experimenting with the
> technique on my own with little success, and needed to learn to do it
> fairly quickly for a piece I was playing. I went to several clarinetists
> asking them to teach it to me, and even spent an entire one hour lesson with
> a clarinetist who did it superbly but somehow couldn't communicate to me
> how it was done. Then I sat down with a freshman at the university who
> quite simply said something about the position of my tongue. That was all
> I needed. I learned it almost immediately. Sometimes we need specific
> details.

Joe Allard left me with a wonderful anecdote about the learning process,
which came to mind while reading the above paragraph. He studied golf
avidly during his summers in New Hampshire, and took a weekly lesson with
a local pro. The pro was attempting (without success) to correct some
technical flaw in Allard's swing, and tried every explanation and
demonstration that he knew - no luck. Later in the year, during a round
of golf with a friend, Allard watched the friend swing and had a
revelation. The following summer he eagerly showed the pro his
"discovery", to which the somewhat exasperated pro replied "That's what I
tried to show you all last summer!"

Moral? - you never know (either as a teacher or student) when the light
may dawn, and what the trigger may be.

> The things I do well intuitively are not the things I spend the majority of
> my time studying with my teacher. My lessons are spent dealing with problems,
> musical, technical, or whatever, that I don't naturally compensate for.
[snip]
> But the things that do not come to me naturally I need a little help
> with. And I need someone
> who can explain, demonstrate, and describe to me what I need to do.

Well, yes, that's usually the way, and it may explain why very talented
players often aren't the best teachers. They've had fewer things to work
out in their student days, and haven't had to analyze them very much.

Until the student understands what a teacher has to offer, that student
can't get much benefit from that teacher, no matter how verbally adept
the teacher may be, no matter how committed to the student s/he may be,
no matter how good a player s/he may be. It's a two way street. I would
often ask Allard about teaching materials, and he would dismiss the
question with the answer that "if the student and teacher are a good
match the materials don't matter". May be an overstatement, but the point
of view has some value.

=========================
David Niethamer
niethamer@-----.edu
dbnclar1@-----.com
=========================