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)
I’m the mandolin player’s last resort for so many mandolin players who have come to me as Alexander Technique clients. If I can’t help the mandolin player, he or she feels they must either play with pain and struggle for the rest their performing lives or quit playing.
I can’t count the number of mandolin players who have come to me after seeing doctors, physical therapists, and/or other bodyworkers. The mandolin player in the first Alexander Technique session may spend fifteen to thirty minutes giving me the complete list of all of the diagnoses of his or her physical problems on the mandolin.
What is usually said and implied is, “This is what has happened to my body, and this is why I’ll never be able to do what I want to do on the mandolin, but I hope you can do something magical that will heal me.”
So, by the time the injured mandolin player has made it to me, usually he or she has tried medication for swelling or inflammation, has been told to stop playing to heal, has been given exercises to strengthen “weak” muscles, has had surgery suggested, or has been told to look for some other career.
Obviously, if the mandolin player has found his or her way to me, then the mandolin player has a least a glimmer of hope that there is a healing solution out there that works.
SO, THE DIAGNOSES ARE PRESENTED TO ME AS THE PIECES OF A PUZZLE, AND THE MANDOLIN PLAYER HOPES THAT I AM “THE ONE” WITH THE SOLUTION TO THE PROBLEM. THAT I AM “THE ONE” WHO CAN LOOK AT ALL OF THE DISPARATE PIECES OF THE PUZZLE, AND HELP THE MANDOLIN PLAYER REASSEMBLE HIM OR HERSELF IN WAY THAT MAKES MANDOLIN PLAYING WORK.
In a way I can, but only once the mandolin player lets go of the belief that the DIAGNOSES ARE THE SOLUTION. What do I mean?
The diagnoses of physical problems on the mandolin can cut two very different ways for the mandolin player. By the time many mandolin players come to me and give me his or her list of physical problems, they are saying to me please confirm that I am unhealable, so that I can get on with doing something else.
On the other hand many mandolin players who come to me, give me a list of physical problems and want me to do something magical to make things right. This is understandable, because almost all of the things offered out there for healing a mandolin player’s physical problems are passive/magical. What do I mean?
Surgery is the most obvious. Someone cuts you and repairs your body, and when you recover, you should be able to do what you want on the mandolin. But what if you never could do what you wanted on the mandolin?
This reminds me of the old joke where the patient asks the doctor at the end of the appointment if he’ll ever be able to play the mandolin again. The doctor says yes, and the patient replies, “But I never played the mandolin before.”
The closest thing out there in allopathic medicine to the Alexander Technique that has the mandolin player actually do something is physical therapy. Here’s why physical therapy rarely gets the performing mandolin player out of physical trouble.
The physical therapist has the mandolin player do general strengthening exercises to help the mandolin player. But these strengthening exercises don’t work, because they only increase strength and stamina in the most general sense, and don’t address the poor posture and elements of the mandolin player’s technique that cause the wear and tear and pain.
I want to return back to the title of this article. In its purest form the title restated says, “THE TRUTH SHALL MAKE YOU FREE.” The problem is, “Are you stating the truth when you diagnose physical problems on the mandolin?”
A better question is, “Does a diagnosis, in and of itself, lead you to take the steps necessary to solve your postural and technique problems on the mandolin that are damaging your body?” NO!
Here’s why. In many ways the diagnoses of your physical problems on the mandolin are only labeling, they may not be a call to action. It’s like being diagnosed with agoraphobia, fear of going outdoors, but never taking the steps literally to GO OUTDOORS.
If a mandolin player’s hands are diagnosed as hurting because of tendonitis in the elbows, how is this diagnosis going to make a difference, if the mandolin player doesn’t change a technique that causes tendonitis?
Let me state this much more clearly at the end of this article.
WE HAVE BEEN CONDITIONED IN TODAY’S WORLD TO FEEL AND BELIEVE THAT IF WE DIAGNOSE A PROBLEM, THEN THERE IS A SOLUTION THAT CAN BE DONE TO US TO HEAL US. THIS MEANS THAT WHEN A MANDOLIN PLAYER COMES TO ME TO STOP HURTING, HE OR SHE WANTS ME TO MAKE THEM MAGICALLY WELL OR TELL THEM IT IS TOO LATE.
In either case the diagnoses has been changed from a stating of the problem to being the actual solution itself. The diagnoses are ONLY a list of physical problems that is usually presented to the mandolin player as permanently debilitating or as a list of temporary physical problems.
IF YOU DON’T PURSUE A COURSE OF ACTION, and take a chance on a series of healing steps, then the diagnoses offer you nothing that tell you whether you can continue to play the mandolin or should move on!
