A few months ago we finally decided to buy a video camera to
capture our childrens' antics while they were still cute and funny
as opposed to when they became grown up and boring. While it seemed
a bit of a luxury at the time, in ten or fifteen years time I
am sure we will be glad we made the investment.
After a few weeks, I got the idea to set it up and take some shots
of my bassoon practice. The first thing I noticed was that the
quality of the live recorded sound was really quite reasonable
and certainly better than I expected. The reproduction of my tone
was pretty close to the live sound. The camera describes itself
as "digital" so perhaps that applies to the sound recording
as well as the visual.
The next thing I noticed was that when totally relaxed and rattling
off my Mozart Concerto from memory, I found that I was gently
swaying from one foot to the other obviously subconsciously choreographing
finger movement with body movement. I then remembered that when
I was unduly tense about a performance, my (standing) posture
had felt stilted and unnatural. In such circumstances it can be
hard to get one's playing in the "groove" that is possible
at home when relaxed. Deliberately remembering to generate this
natural body movement at times of performance stress is certainly
helping me to find this more natural flow in my playing.
It then occurred to me that the camera would surely be of use
to my students at their lessons. The first student to turn up
was the one who had looked really silly when she bowed to the
audience after a recent performance. It took little time at all,
with her in front of the camera to show her the problem and to
fix it. The next thing I pointed out to her was the way she tilted
her head quite markedly to one side and while this may not have
affected any aspect of her playing, it did look a little strange.
The next student had no real posture
problems. However I was able to show him how his fingers were
flying around high in the air as opposed to nice and close to
the keys. This student, like most others heard intonation weaknesses
of which he was unaware.
Another student had over time developed a habit of playing with
her reed angled about 25 degrees to the line of her lips. This
had felt perfectly natural to her and it only took the visual
image of the close-up of her embouchure to convince her that this
could be a problem. She remedied this within a week of practice
and admitted at the next lesson that she had noticed quite an
improvement in her tone and in her ability to control dynamics.
For the beginner student the advantage of the camera is to show
them how their embouchure looks from the side, something that
is impossible without a series of mirrors. Immediate corrections
can be made and the benefits hopefully remembered. Posture when
sitting, can be easily demonstrated not only in an effort to avoid
future back trouble, but of course to get the preferred angle
for the reed and in order to facilitate good breathing habits.
Most of my advanced students regularly come with a videotape to
record most of their lesson. Apart from perhaps some added concentration
in their performance at lessons, I think the real benefit comes
when they watch it played back at home. Not only do they get a
good idea how an audience (or examiners) might receive their performance,
they can perhaps better understand the comments I make. When they
play well, they should gain in confidence by witnessing the performance
as others would. I am also hoping that by listening to their own
performances in such an objective way, they will better develop
self analysis skills. It also allows them to monitor any areas
of concern such as excessive or ridiculous body movements, embouchure,
fingers and stage etiquette.