Leopold Auer strips away the mystique that shrouds struggling violinists in the belief of a supernatural method of achieving musical success. He reveals that it is perseverance and repeated practice that has allowed such great masters as Heifetz and Elman to render their instruments submissive. In Violin Playing As I Teach It, he lays out his mechanics of teaching violin technique, as well as his philosophies of style, phrasing, and musicality.

In publishing this book on the art of violin playing, I should scarcely presume to lay claim to having made any novel discoveries with regard to the subject in question. I have merely endeavored to present my own personal opinions — the fruit of my own experience as a violinist and a teacher of violin — in the hope of interesting those to whom the subject itself voices an appeal. Three great violin masters of the nineteenth century, Baillot, De Bériot and Spohr, were the first to set forth theoretically the principles underlying the art of violin playing. Various authorities of our own day have enlarged upon and developed these theories along the lines laid down by the masters of the past, and have, in addition, undertaken to demonstrate, in scientific fashion, the essentials of the more recent evolutions of their art. They have extended this theory of violin playing to include a careful analysis of the physical elements of the art, treating their subject from the physical point of view, and supporting their deductions by anatomical tables showing, to the very least detail, the structure of the hand and arm. And by means of photographic reproductions, they have been able to show us the most authoritative poses, taken from life, to demonstrate how the bow should be held, which finger should press down the stick, how the left hand should be employed to hold the violin, and so on. What more could be done to guide the pupil and facilitate his task?

Yet the most essential factor, if the observance of these carefully formulated principles is to show any practical results, has hitherto been largely overlooked. This factor is the mental one. By no means enough stress has ever been laid on the importance of mental work, on the activity of the brain which must control that of the fingers. And yet, unless one is capable of hard mental labor and prolonged concentration, it is a waste of time to undertake the complicated task of mastering an instrument as difficult as the violin. It would seem then that — in view of the many books dealing specifically with the violin and violin playing, a whole technical bibliography augmented by a rich collection of pictorial illustrations — all possibility of failure in this particular direction might have disappeared. We are wont to take for granted, even in observing a student who has received his training at a school of no particular reputation, that he knows how to handle the instrument satisfactorily, since, after all, everything that can be said on that subject has been said over and over again; all details of procedure have been minutely laid down, and all that the conscientious student needs to do is to follow them in order to attain perfection! Yet this entire body of practical exposition has been productive of only meager results. The great majority of violin students — most of whom show but slight interest in theoretical explanations — may be said to be quite uneducated, violinistically speaking. And I know from my own long years of experience as a violin teacher in Europe, and more recently in this country, that this is true.

 

Leopold Auer is the author not only the author of Violin Playing As I Teach It, but also My Long Life in Music, Graded Course of Violin, and Maia Bang Violin Method. He also edited The Complete Sonatas for Violin and Piano, and other sheet music.

 

Violin Playing as I Teach It (World Digital Library Edition) by Leopold Auer
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