My obsession with improving my bow arm continues. And Casorti (mentioned and linked to in a post I made last week) has revealed a secret to me, which I will share with you.
That sentence about keeping the arm lower than the stick is a little bit different from the advice he gives in the beginning of the book, where he says, in item number six, to keep the
elbow below the height of the stick:
This thought has been, as they say, a game changer for me. My arm, which is shaped like a stick when fully extended, is easy to see with my eyes, and also easy to "see" with my inner vision, so my attention can get to it immediately. My elbow, being a joint that is often in motion, feels farther away: it takes more of my visual imagination to figure out where it is in space, so adjusting it can come too late for a given musical "situation."
And then I started to think about the inside of an old-school toilet tank.
If the tightness or looseness of the screw that attaches the floating ball mechanism to the tank is incorrect, making the angle of the "stick" a little too acute or obtuse, the toilet runs. If it is correct, allowing the stick that attaches to the ball to let it float to the best place, it doesn't run. I have somehow been able to connect this image with my bow arm very quickly, and make corrections mid stroke. Just keeping my mind in the toilet, I guess.
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