Violin Video Lesson: How to Shift on the Violin

Hi, and welcome to Virtual Sheeting Music.com's Meet the Expert. My name is William Fitzpatrick and I am the Henri Temianka professor of violin at the Hall-Musco Conservatory of Music which is located at Chapman University. I am as well Director of MusiShare at Irvine, California.

Okay, let's talk a bit about shifting or shifts. First, why don't we look at the possibilities? Let's see, we could shift from one finger to the same finger. We could shift from one finger to another finger. And we could shift from a higher finger to a lower finger, which will either be with the same finger or another. In these examples there are constants, which make up the choreography of the shift. You could have the weight, or pressure if you wish, of the shift, and the speed pattern used in the shift.

So let's talk about the weight distribution of the shift. I believe the following to be true in pretty much all of those possibilities, which is the pattern of distribution is more, less, more. More weight, less weight, more weight. So when the finger is down, there is more weight; when it's released, less weight, then down again, so more weight.

Now, the amount of weight while the finger is down is totally dependent on the nature or character of the passage being played. This is true as well with speed. In talking about the speed, one observes that the general movement of the gesture is slow, fast, and slow. One could even say more, less, more. Slow, fast, slow.

Looking at these two items along with the movement of the elbow and subsequently the wrist will help us to discover the choreography of the gesture.

There is one final observation concerning the use of the elbow in getting around the instrument. When you're going from a lower position to a higher position and staying there, the elbow must go under the violin. When you go and return to the original starting position, the elbow stays where it is.

For example, when you go from an E on the A string to the harmonic E found above, and come back and keep playing, the elbow stays put. An example for this is The Third Movement of Sara Santa's Zigeunerweisen.

The elbows stay put. In that same passage, however, we go up on the E string and we stay there. So the difference being for one I had to come back; the elbow stayed where it was, and the elbow had to go under the violin.

Well that's it for this video. If you have any questions, comments, or special requests please feel free to post them. See you next time.

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