Friday 28 June 2013

How To Play a Tango

This is not really a quote, but I'm including it anyway.  Junior Quartet [with no viola].  They'd played a piece I'd arranged for them, a tango.  It was okay, but not very tango-like.

Me: How could you play this more like a tango?
Violin 1 does a sharp breath in through her nose, stands up very straight with her bow in her mouth like it is a rose, and starts doing tango-style steps around her chair.
Violin 2 sees that, and puts her bow in her mouth as well, and does similar moves.
Cello then puts her bow in her mouth and dances with her cello with ballroom dancing-style moves.

I try not to laugh too much as I can see a potential disaster.
Me: Um... Okay.  Bows out of mouths.  So that's how we could act a tango.  How does that work in playing a tango?
Violin 1 [taking out her bow, sitting down]: Ooh!  Like this-
She sits down, her back over-arched, and does strong full bows with her bow in the air, sharply inhaling and exhaling with every stroke, and a slight torso movement side to side.

Me: Exactly.

The great thing about this quartet is that, although they are not very focused for very long, they work hard when they are switched on, and they practice!  Once we've discussed how to make something better, they then do it and (usually) remember for the next time.

No comments:

Post a Comment