Posts Tagged ‘Banjo Technique’

This ebook, An Alexander Technique Approach to Banjo 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 an extraordinarily accurate and kind banjo performance.
This ebook is also for sale on all AMAZON websites in a KINDLE format.
Located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, U.S.A. (MOVEMENT THERAPY)
Opposition is an Alexander Technique concept that is about the physical relationships within one’s body, and your relationship to what you are doing. It is a concept put into practice that teaches you how not to collapse into your body and how not to collapse into what you’re doing.
Applied to the banjo, it means you don’t collapse into the banjo as you play the banjo or pull the banjo into your body. If you observe a 1,000 banjo players, you will see most of them not in a truly effortless postural upright balance to the banjo. They are usually collapsing downward to the instrument and their hands, or arching away from the banjo, even as their heads are pulling toward the instrument.
The internal aspect of opposition means that as you collapse downward into the banjo, it means you’re head is closer to your hands and your legs, as you look down and pull your head down to see what you’re doing, which means you’re skeleton is not in opposition posturally and between your joints.
The psychological component of this is that you are trying to get your head closer to what you’re doing, to get control of your banjo playing. You unconsciously are attempting to be more accurate by being very close to what you are doing. It is actually physicalizing fear posturally, because you’re afraid of making a mistake.
Most of us learned to do this when we learned to read and write in school, attempting to read or write well for a good grade, with our heads two inches away from the book or paper. You also learned to do this when you were a beginner on the banjo, attempting to get it right.
WHEN YOU ALLOW YOURSELF TO STAND OR SIT FULLY UPRIGHT WITH THE BANJO WITH BALANCED POSTURE AND YOUR HEAD RELEASING UPWARD, YOU ARE IN CONTROL OF YOUR BODY, TECHNIQUE, AND SELF, AND YOU WILL ULTIMATELY BE IN GREATER CONTROL OF THE BANJO.
Opposition is an extraordinary concept, that when put into practice, allows you to use your body against the banjo in such a balanced way, that you are able to do the least amount of work necessary to play the banjo with effortless coordination.
Being in opposition to the banjo is also a physicalizing of how you want your relationship to be to the banjo. What I mean, is if you are pulling downward and into the banjo, then you are not conscious in the moment of how you are using your body. In other words, your desire to play the banjo well is shaping your posture and your technique, and you are not in control.
When you consciously choose your posture and your technique and remain conscious of how you want to be in relationship to the banjo, then you are choosing also how you want to feel about the banjo. This means as you stand or sit fully upright with the banjo, aware of your head, neck, and torso balanced upward and flowing upward instead of into the banjo, and you send your hands and arms to the banjo instead of pulling the banjo into your body, then you aren’t playing with tunnel vision.
Tunnel vision leads to tunnel posture, which means as you play the banjo without opposition, your technique and posture is being forced on you, because you are trying to get the music right. Rather than you choosing to stand or sit up and balanced and watching it unfold in the moment, you are using excess tension and poor posture to try as hard as you can to play well.
IT IS AN AMAZING FEELING WHEN YOU PLAY THE BANJO MAKING ALL OF THE POSTURAL AND TECHNIQUE DECISIONS, RATHER THAN THE BANJO AND MUSIC FORCING YOU TO SACRIFICE YOUR BODY, BECAUSE YOU HAVE BEEN TRYING TO GET WHAT YOU WANT OUT OF THE BANJO AT ANY COST.