Klarinet Archive - Posting 000206.txt from 2002/08

From: Richard Bush <rbushidioglot@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] Throat F and F# fingerings
Date: Fri, 23 Aug 2002 02:44:30 -0400

Dear Bill,
With all due respect:

William Wright wrote:

> <><> Richard Bush wrote:
> I think this discussion in turning into
> bunk. When all of you took up a woodwind instrument you understood it
> would take
> two hands to do it. It also takes two
> hands to wash dishes. Both hands are
> connected to the same brain, so what's
> the problem?
>
>
>
> Every player has an upper limit for both speed and precision. Whatever
> a particular person's limits are, they can play better if they don't
> waste resources which otherwise would help them achieve their best.

I propose that most of us never achieve
nor come close to realizing our best. We
just don't push the envelope that far.
I'm the first one guilty of that.

>
> Clearly a player may want to perform extra work in order to achieve a
> certain sound, but that's not what I (at least) am discussing.
>
> To be blunt about it, I can't afford to waste a portion of my
> concentration. I need every bit of it to play easy music.
>
> The statement about "connected to the same brain" is a drastic
> oversimplification.

Why is that? The collective motor skills
we learn to play an instrument are
groups, very large and sophisticated
clumps of motor vocabulary. Maybe you
subscribe to Joni Mitchell's song,
"Twisted," where two heads are better
than one.

>
> Two hands must somehow (however indirectly) communicate with and
> influence each other on appropriate occasions in order to remain
> synchronized. This conflict between parallel and serial requires extra
> cycles while information travels back and forth, and while predictions
> are made based on this information. and finally while the decisions are
> coded/transmitted/decoded. Predictions inevitably include errors.
> Other things being equal, less predicting (conscious or subconscious)
> means less error, which means better playing.

To the above I say: practice. Don't
intellectualize the conflict, just learn
the pattern.

>
> To be absolutely ridiculous about it, since my feet and hands are
> connected to the same brain, I should have no problem tap dancing while
> playing because my fingers will know without effort or delay the effect
> of each foot movement as it happens.

There's no reason why you couldn't
become good at playing the clarinet and
tap dancing at the same time. You just
haven't practiced doing that long enough
to become good at it.

>
> Cheers,
> Bill
>
>
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>
>
>

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