This ebook, An Alexander Technique Approach to Mandolin Technique, is published on this website in a PDF format. It is very detailed and practical, and it will give you the physical tools you need to take the limits off of your ability to create the accurate mandolin technique you want without sacrificing your body.
This ebook is also for sale on all AMAZON websites in a KINDLE format.
Located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, U.S.A. (MOVEMENT THERAPY)
THIS MAY BE THE MOST IMPORTANT ARTICLE I’VE EVER WRITTEN FOR THE MANDOLIN PLAYER, AND QUITE POSSIBLY THE MOST IMPORTANT ARTICLE I WILL EVER WRITE FOR THE MANDOLIN PLAYER.
I want to look at why the mandolin player, when offered a chance to be free of all technique and posture problems on the mandolin, doesn’t jump at the chance. Here’s the answer.
IF YOU COULD PLAY EVERYTHING YOU WANTED ON THE MANDOLIN WITH EXTRAORDINARY EASE, THEN WHAT WOULD THERE BE TO LIVE FOR, GIVEN THAT PLAYING THE MANDOLIN IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN YOUR LIFE?
Let me say it a different way. If you had no more problems to solve on the mandolin, could you handle such a unique situation psychologically and emotionally and continue to play the mandolin?
In my mid-twenties I discovered the book NEW PATHWAYS TO PIANO TECHNIQUE by Luigi Bonpensiere. It said if you trusted your hands and played with absolute abandon, you couldn’t miss. I experienced this on the guitar.
I finally had what I always wanted on the guitar. I had already created a really complete guitar technique, and now I had extraordinary accuracy through faith, so I didn’t have to get angry at myself anymore when I played the guitar.
What did I do? I quit playing the guitar. Why? Because I couldn’t handle what had been the most important goal in my life – striving for effortless “perfection” on the guitar. Simply, I found it and couldn’t handle it.
As I’m writing this, I realize all of the above has come together just in the last couple of weeks in my awareness. It finally explains why performing mandolin players who come to me in physical trouble don’t always continue with their Alexander Technique sessions.
I show them their potential on the mandolin; that they can truly solve all of their problems on the instrument, and many don’t come back. This really puzzled me, until I had the epiphany that most, if not all, humans give meaning to their lives by living in a steady state of problems that are TOO IMPORTANT TO BE SOLVED.
(At this point I want to give credit to my brother, Alan, for helping me in a discussion we were having. He helped me see this.)
IF WHAT I’VE JUST WRITTEN IS TRUE ABOUT YOUR MANDOLIN PLAYING, THEN WHAT DO YOU DO? DO YOU SEE THE TRUTH OF WHAT I’VE JUST WRITTEN, AND CONSCIOUSLY DECIDE TO NOT SOLVE ALL OF YOUR PROBLEMS ON THE MANDOLIN, THUS GIVING YOURSELF SOMETHING TO LIVE FOR?
I really don’t like the idea that you’d have to live your life with artificial limitations on what you could do on the mandolin to give meaning and purpose to your life. In fact, I’m not sure you could consciously do such a thing without feeling more and more conflicted over not solving all of your problems on the mandolin, knowing you could.
Here’s the obvious question. COULD YOU LIVE A LIFE WITH MEANING, IF THE MANDOLIN WAS SOMETHING YOU DID EVERY DAY, AND IT TRULY WAS EFFORTLESS?
There are 5 solutions to being able to psychologically and emotionally be at peace on the mandolin after solving all of your problems on the mandolin. YOU CAN FOCUS ON NON-MANDOLIN OLD PROBLEMS THAT SEEM UNSOLVABLE, CREATE NEW PROBLEMS THAT MAY OR MAY NOT EVER GET SOLVED, WORK ON BOTH OLD AND NEW PROBLEMS, SOLVE PROBLEMS AND KEEP CREATING NEW ONES, OR YOU CAN BECOME ENLIGHTENED.
By definition a mandolin player who truly realizes that life has meaning and purpose and joy without problems is enlightened. Why not let the mandolin be the place in your life where you solve most if not all your problems playing the mandolin?
In other words, why not let the mandolin be the place that you come to as an enlightened being with no problems, and let the rest of your life be where you create and solve or not solve your problems?
This allows the mandolin to be the most important thing in your life artistically, creatively, and spiritually; a place where you truly get to play in pure joy, peace, bliss, and ease.
