 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: The Dad
Date: 2000-11-12 16:02
Do any of you maintain a physical fitness routine that you feel improves you clarinet playing, or does anyone do specific exercises that enhances your playing.
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Author: Bill
Date: 2000-11-12 16:18
I jog regularly. I have no wind problems playing, and I attribute this to jogging. I did have a counting problem when I started playing. I count different rhythm patterns as I jog, and this helped.
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Author: Todd
Date: 2000-11-12 16:39
I do cardio or aerobic workouts such as running, biking, elliptical trainers, etc., and feel this helps me as well. I make sure that as I'm working out I take deep breaths to completely fill the lungs, and then completely exhale all of the air out to use my full lung capacity.
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Author: Nick Conner
Date: 2000-11-12 17:35
I'm on the swim team at my high school, and I find being in shape really helps with support, and ability to keep the air speed going. Also, when I swim I always have some music going on in my head, and it helps me a lot to hear the music and intervals then when I'm not playing and fix it later. We also do breath control sets in swimming that help with breath control on clarinet. It also helps me learn to focus, which carries over onto clarinet.
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Author: ron b.
Date: 2000-11-13 17:20
The Dad,
I don't maintain a *regular* fitness program but I'd like to offer my thought(s) on the subject.
You mention something that's very important, yet often glossed over in passing or overlooked altogether as related to music making. Let me quickly say that I know some teachers advise their music students to be as physically fit as they can be. However, many don't.
The better shape you're in, the easier you'll handle physical activities. No great mental effort required to figure that one out.
For older folks, like myself, walking is an exercise that requires minimal effort, requires no additional 'outfitting'; it's inexpensive, almost all-weather and the 'return' in feeling good is phenomenal. When you feel good = you play (or do anything else) better than when you don't. Of course, not smoking etc. will do wonders for your attitude too.
My wife (a 'cellist) and I enjoy biking as well as walking - not as excercise (as such); rather, as a fun activity.
Been there.
ron b.
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Author: Jeff Gegner
Date: 2000-11-13 18:56
Some of my friends(guitar players, what do they know) think I'm nuts taking up the clarinet. They say it doesn't fit with what I look like. I am very active, sailing, shooting, golf, music. I work out at least twice a week. My friends consider me big and strong,( I have a 54" chest and can bench press more than my weight). They say I look a little odd with the horn sticking out of my face considering my size. I guess they think I should play the tuba or something. I have learned to play a few other instruments, not expert but well enough for me. The clarinet by far is both the funnest to learn while also being the most exasperating.
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Author: Lelia
Date: 2000-11-14 13:21
I used to stay fit by running, until I overdid the mileage so much I wrecked my knees. Now (age 52), I do a lot of walking, a minimum of about two miles per day. Since I never learned to drive a car, the walking keeps me in reasonable condition and gets the errands done.
IMHO, the most important aspect of conditioning for any wind player is, *don't smoke*. Having lost a chain-smoking aunt to emphysema and a chain-smoking uncle to lung cancer, I'm a little bit cracked on that subject. The uncle who died of lung cancer in his early 60s was a semi-professional musician. He played trumpet and had a gorgeous singing voice, and probably would have gone into music professionally, if smoking hadn't wrecked his breath control in young adulthood. He had to give up the trumpet by the time he was in his early 30s.
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Author: Jerry Carroll
Date: 2000-11-15 06:09
I have an article from the LosAngeles Times "Brain comes alive to sound of music" sub titled "finding offers hope for variety of cures. Some of the findings : the cerebellum grows as a result of the constant practice of the virtuoso motor skills needed to play an instrument...The brain responds directly to harmony; checked by a medical PET scanner to monitor changes in neural activity neuroscientists at McGill discovered that different parts of the brain involved in emotion re activated depending on whether the music is pleasant or dissonant suggesting different emotions are represented in different parts of the brain. Further, the brain actually grows in response to musical training the way a muscle responds to exercise. Researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Med Center in Boston discovered that male musicians have significantly larger brains than men who have not had extensive musical training. Overall, music seems to involve the brain at almost every level.Even allowing for cultural differences in musical tastes, the researchers found evidence of music's remarkable power to affect neural activity no matter where they looked in the brain, from primitive regions found in all animals to more recently evolved regions thought to be distinctively human. "We find that harmony, melody and rhythm had distinct patterns of brain activity. They involved both the right and left sides of the brain" So get back to the horn and practice, practice, practice! JERCARR@att.net
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Author: Aaron
Date: 2000-11-17 01:51
I found that Yoga really helped with my playing. The ability to relax, calm yourself, and focous with no distractions really helped. Also many breathing techniques are available from yoga to increase breath support. I learned some fo them from Jim Meyer of the St. Louis Symphony.
Also taking Judo, or any other martial arts training can greatly help playing. Playing well, or getting to that next level is just as much a mental thing. And by doing any exercise, be it jogging, strength, Yoga, etc. It helps your body and mind work as one to beter focous and work efficently. It may sound like a bunch of new age crap, but it is really effective for many people. It has helped me and many of my students.
There is the story that I remember from Jim of the principal horn player for the MGM orchestra. He recorded most all the big epic film scores, the swashbuckling, yo-ho-ho type things. So Big great swppeing, screaming horn lines. Well he did yoga for many years and followed it vigoursly everyday. Well he finally got around to retiring at the young age of 85!!!! It is one case to show tha as long as the body and mind are fit it can function as well as needed.
Just a few of my thoughts.
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