Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2007-01-29 14:26
Work on lightening your finger pressure on the keys. If your oboe is properly regulated, you can close the keys with almost no pressure, and less than you're probably using. Work to find the absolute minimum pressure you can use and still have the note speak properly. At first, your fingers may jump around, but slow practice soon brings them under control again, with everything working easier.
It sometimes helps to imagine that only your fingernails are moving.
Gonzalo Ruizgoes farther and says to reverse your muscle effort. That is, when a finger is down, it should be completely relaxed. The only muscle effort you use is to raise a finger. Top lower a finger, you relax and let it drop by gravity.
It takes a while to learn this. Do it on very slow scale passages. Also, Gonzalo is principally a baroque oboist, and the instrument has not keys to move or springs to overcome. On the modern oboe, you of course have to use as little downward effort. But the idea has helped me greatly on the modern oboe and clarinet.
Ken Shaw
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