A good playing posture is the first condition for the development of playing skills. No matter what kind of musical instrument you are learning, playing posture is the most fundamental lesson. The posture seems to be simple, and most beginners do not pay much attention to it. However, if you do not develop a good playing posture from the beginning, it will not only be unsightly, but more importantly, it will affect the performance of your playing skills, and you will suffer from occupational diseases in serious cases.

There are three types of erhu playing: flat-legged, framed-legged, and standing.

Flat-legged

Generally, the flat-leg style is adopted, that is, sitting on a stool or a chair with no support of the right height, the legs are naturally flat, the heels are naturally on the ground, the thigh and the calf are basically perpendicular to each other, the thigh forms a plane, and the piano tube is placed on the left leg. The flat-legged posture can keep the player's body stable all the time, which is conducive to the full play of the performance of the instrument. This position is generally used in ensemble, unison, accompaniment and other occasions.

stand-up

It means that after the player sits on a stool or chair of suitable height, the left leg is placed on the right leg, and the piano tube is still placed at the root of the left leg. Because the leg type increases the contact surface between the violin barrel and the body, it helps the violin body to remain relatively stable, thereby reducing the burden of the left hand holding the violin and facilitating the full play of playing skills. This position is generally used in solo situations.

standing

It refers to placing the left foot on a slightly higher stool, chair or stone, etc., while the right foot is still upright on the ground. The standing style is not limited by the environment, seat and other conditions, but the standing style can only be used for piano practice occasionally, and this position is generally not used in performances.

Regardless of whether it is a flat-leg type, a stand-up type, or a standing type, the guitar barrel should be placed on the plane of the left leg close to the abdomen, and one end of the skin should be slightly deflected to the right and forward, and the body should be basically stable. In order to facilitate finger movement, the piano bar can be slightly inclined to the left front, but it should not be too much, or it will be crooked and shaken.

When playing, the upper body should be naturally relaxed, the left and right shoulders should be basically balanced, the head should be upright, the face should be expressive, and the body may swing slightly and rhythmically according to the feelings of the music and the needs of the performance, but it must not be exaggerated or excessive. That kind of hunched over, shaking his head. Or the expression is too tense, causing the unnatural phenomenon of shrugging, grinning, and head tilting.

hand gesture

The left hand holds the piano with a "tiger's mouth" and rides on the piano bar, the thumb is slightly bent, and it should not be lifted up vertically, nor should it be bent down to squeeze the piano bar tightly. The palm should be suspended, and the contact area between the tiger's mouth and the piano rod should be minimized, which is conducive to the accuracy of finger pressing, and also conducive to the agility of changing the handle or practicing other skills. The entire left hand should be relaxed, and the forearm should hang down naturally, forming an angle of about 45 degrees with the piano bar. When some beginners hold the piano, they tend to raise their arms so high that the entire left hand almost forms a plane with the shoulders, which is not only unsightly, but also the arm is in a stiff state, which is very passive and rigid when pressing the strings and changing the handle, and it is difficult to improve the fingering technique.

The shape of the hand holding the bow in the right is similar to "holding chopsticks", and the basic principles are also somewhat similar. The entire right hand should neither be tense nor slack. The specific hand shape for holding the bow is: the wrist is naturally flat, the palm is turned to the left, the five fingers are slightly bent, the index finger and thumb are pinching the bow shaft at the root of the bow, the middle finger and ring finger are juxtaposed between the bow hair and the bow shaft, and the little finger is placed on the bow. underside of the hair. The thumb and index finger mainly pull the bow to run left and right, and master the balance of the entire bow. The middle finger mainly pulls the outer string of the bow rod, and the ring finger mainly buckles the bow hair and pulls the inner string.

Of course, the middle and ring fingers are placed between the shaft and the bow hair, just for the general case. If you play fast bows, broken bows and other bowing skills on the outer strings for a long time, it is better to temporarily withdraw the closed ring finger, and the right hand of the whole bow appears more flexible and free. However, there are some beginners who, regardless of the specific situation, are accustomed to leaving only the middle finger or ring finger between the bow shaft and the bow hair when holding the bow, and the inner and outer strings are all done with this finger. There are obvious traces of such a string change, and the pronunciation is blunt. Although some beginners insert their middle and ring fingers between the shaft and the bow hair. However, the bow holder has been moved closer to the middle of the bow, which greatly wastes the fully usable bow. According to the principle of leverage, the shorter the power arm, the harder it is to pull up. Moving the bow holding point to the left is equivalent to shortening the power arm, which hinders the full play of the erhu playing technique.

When practicing the piano, you should also pay attention to developing good playing habits. When performing, the movements should be agile and accurate, the manners should be full and neat, and the expressions should be natural and generous, and efforts should be made to help the audience understand the content of the music through the performer's skilled performance movements and appropriate facial expressions, so that the performer's sound and the audience's Heart sounds resonate. But don't make a fool of yourself, or lean back and forth unconsciously, and you are moody.

(bow)

Bowing is one of the main means to transform the timbre of the erhu and reveal the content of the music. When carrying the bow, the movements must be coordinated, the hand shape is natural, the movement has a track, and the bow must be active. The bow should be in a straight line.

Bowing is a key training item for the basic skills of erhu playing. The length, short, fast, slow, light, heavy, slow, rapid, and even depression, yang, pause, and setback of the erhu qin sound depends to a large extent on the right hand of the bow. Therefore, bowing is one of the main means to transform the timbre of the erhu and reveal the content of the music. However, some beginners don't pay much attention to the bow movement, thinking that pulling the erhu mainly relies on the fingers of the left hand. Once the fingers are pressed, the tune can be pulled out. The forearm is used to drive the bow to swing left and right; some even the forearm and wrist are basically deadlocked when carrying the bow, and the big arm makes a large movement to drive the bow to push and pull irregularly on the qin barrel. Both of these two forms of bowing only depend on the local movements of the right hand, which causes tension and stiffness in other parts, making the bowing movement shaky and trembling. Even if the left hand is more proficient in pressing the strings, the sound will still be indistinct.

In order to make the erhu sound beautiful and unified, the right hand of the bow must be coordinated, the hand shape is natural, the movement has a track, and the bow must be active. The bow should be straight and the running trace left by the bow hair on the barrel is basically a straight line; at this time, the wiping force of the bow hair is adapted to the vibration of the string, the pronunciation is natural, round and smooth, and the bow runs "one line" , it looks simple, but it is not very easy to do. In terms of bowing, the correct bow movement should be: the upper arm takes the shoulder joint as the axis, slightly rotates outward, the elbow moves slightly forward to the right, and the forearm, under the control of the upper arm, drives the wrist to move forward. Make a uniform motion to the right. With the slow movement of the bow, the distance between the point of the bow hair and the point of holding the bow gradually widens, the wrist gradually bulges to the right, and the fingers gradually straighten. In this way, the right hand pulls the bow smoothly from the root to the tip of the bow under the coordinated action of all connected parts (the end close to the bow holding point is called the "bow root", and the end opposite to the bow holding point is called the "bow tip"). ).

If you then turn to pushing the bow, the bowing procedure is exactly the opposite of the drawing bow. The specific actions are: the upper arm rotates slightly inward, the elbow moves slightly parallel to the left front, and the wrist pulls the bow to move at a constant speed from right to left under the action of the upper arm and forearm. As the wiping point gradually approaches the bow-holding point, the angle formed by the upper arm and the forearm gradually becomes smaller (the right half of the bow is stabilized at a right angle), the wrist is gradually straightened, and the fingers are gradually bent. On the surface, the pushing and pulling of the bow seems to be the alternating flexion and extension of the wrist and the fingers, but it is actually the joint action of the right shoulder joint, the upper arm, the elbow, the forearm, the wrist joint, the wrist, and the fingers.

A coordinated bow does not mean that the basic requirements of pronunciation have been met. With this external bowing action, although the bowing route is "one line", the frictional force of the bow hair on the strings is also constantly changing due to the constant change of the distance between the point where the bow hair brushes the string and the point where the bow is held. Therefore, it is possible that the pronunciation of the root of the bow is cloudy and harsh, and the pronunciation of the tip of the bow is light and dull. Therefore, we should also pay attention to controlling the internal wiping strength, that is, adjust the wiping strength of the bow hair at any time according to the distance between the bow hair wiping point and the bow holding point. When the wiping point moves to the bow tip, it gradually increases Gradually reduce the wiping strength as you approach the root of the bow. In this way, the pronunciation of each bow drawn or pushed is consistent, round and full.

(change bow)

When changing bows, you should be active, the transition between pushing and pulling should be natural and smooth, and a certain contrast should be formed in terms of timbre and strength, and should be carried out in accordance with the corresponding rules.

Another key to carrying a bow is to change the bow. Changing bows is a transition between pushing and pulling. It should not only transition naturally and smoothly, but also form a certain contrast in terms of timbre and strength. In order to achieve such a requirement, it is necessary to strive for the initiative of changing the bow, so that every "push" or "pull" conversion action appears calm and prepared. Specifically, when the bow is still running smoothly, the right hand of the entire bow should be prepared and prepared for the upcoming bow change; when changing the bow, the wrist and fingers are naturally driven by the forearm. The bow turned smoothly. If the bow change is passive, there will be a clear gap in the pronunciation of the erhu.

There are certain rules for changing bows. If you don’t change the bow where you should change the bow, it will make the bouncy tune lack vitality; if you abuse the bow in the place where you shouldn’t change the bow, it will make the melody appear smooth and smooth. Fragmented. Lose the string effect. Generally speaking, if the tuplet "⌒" in the music is not a lining or dragging cavity of more than four beats, no matter how densely the notes covered by "⌒" are and how large the span of the range is, it should generally be treated as a bow. No changeable bow split (this is especially true for notes extended with a tie "⌒" as specified duration); if the note head is not covered by "⌒", no matter how short the note duration is, it should be one note per note Bow, not a bow to play several notes without an arc on the head. In order to gain the initiative to change the bow, you must have a certain rhythm concept in your mind. Although changing bows is not necessarily carried out in a square rhythm (except for fast bows), the bows between these tones often constitute a certain rhythm pattern.

Where to use the draw bow and where to use the push bow, you should fully consider and make a preliminary estimate before you play. According to the common habit of the performers, most of the bows at the beginning of a piece of music are drawn bows, and most of the bows at the end are drawn bows. Push and pull the bow sequence to make appropriate adjustments. If the total number of push and pull times in each passage or phrase is an even number, it is just in line with the bowing rule of "pulling the bow, pushing the bow and closing"; if it is an odd number, then adjust the odd number to an even number, otherwise push and pull the bow There will be a "pulling" phenomenon in the sequence. Changing strings and fast bows When changing strings, attention should be paid to the mutual coordination of wrist strength and finger strength. Quick bow is usually used to deal with fast-melody music, and it is one of the basic means to improve the expressive power of erhu.

A string change is when the bow hair rubs one string instead of rubbing the other. There are only two situations to change the strings: one is to change the strings when the bow is changed, and the other is to change the strings while the bow is running. These two kinds of string changes require the timing of the notes to be deducted, and the transition is natural. For beginners, because the action of changing strings is one-sidedly dependent on finger strength and insufficient wrist strength, the finger force is passive in changing strings. When changing the strings, there is often a sudden stop, or the strings are slammed, and the problem of changing strings in a fast melody is still prominent. Therefore, the mutual coordination of wrist strength and finger strength is very necessary for changing strings.

The bow holding point formed by the index finger and the thumb should be fixed no matter when the bow is drawn, pushed, changed or changed. When the bow is moved, the whole right hand takes the bow holding point as the axis, and the thumb and the index finger are related around the axis. sector rotation. In addition, you should develop the habit of consciously abiding by the symbols and markings in the practice of playing, and remember some common bowing symbols, otherwise the whole bowing sequence will appear chaotic and detrimental to the performance of the musical image. Except for the slurred symbols clearly marked in the score of Erhu practice, other symbols (including finger movement symbols) are only marked where necessary. For unmarked notes, it is necessary to infer from the playing symbols before and after, or refer to the playing symbols of the same melody before and after, and grasp the appropriate playing method according to people's common playing habits.

For music with dense tone patterns, compact rhythms and fast melody, the bowing method of one note and one bow is usually used. The fast bow is widely used in modern instrumental music and is a basic means to improve the expressive power of the erhu.

To play the fast bow, you must start with the slow bow first. Only by pulling the slow bow stably, flatly, straightly, and implicitly, can the muscles of the relevant parts of the right hand deepen the memory of the subtle movements of bowing priorities. To learn to play fast bows, these muscles can gradually adapt to the needs of fast bow movements, and then gradually increase the speed after pulling to a certain extent.

(transportation)

Finger movement refers to the various pressing movements of the left finger on the strings. It is an important part of the basic training of the erhu. The most important thing in playing a musical instrument is the cooperation of both hands, and the erhu is no exception. Only when the fingers of the left hand and the bow of the right hand cooperate with each other can a good tune be drawn.

Finger movement refers to the various pressing movements of the left finger on the strings. It is an important part of the basic training of the erhu. Since the erhu does not have keys or grade marks like the accordion and pipa, it relies on the left finger to touch different parts of the strings. Since the length of the strings determines the width of the pitch, the shorter the strings, the narrower the pitch. The distance between the fingers of each erhu is different, which brings more difficulties to the finger movement.

The correct way of finger movement depends on the correct posture of holding the piano. The first thing to pay attention to is the "45 degrees" of the three parts of the left hand: that is, the forearm and the left chest are about 45 degrees, the forearm and the piano bar are about 45 degrees, and The second and third sections of the fingers (counting from the fingers) and the strings (in the direction of the gold) form about 45 degrees. Specifically, the forearm should hang down properly, the elbow should sink down, and the forearm should not be raised horizontally. The tiger's mouth should be kept loose and natural, and the fingers should be bent slightly downward. The whole hand is in the shape of a loose half fist. The four chord fingers are "next to each other" with the strings, and they are all in the state of wanting to touch the strings. Such a hand shape creates favorable conditions for the left hand to touch the strings accurately and sharply; when the fingers touch the strings, they should be pressed with the part between the finger pads and the fingertips, and should be lightly placed on the strings. When you leave the string, you should return to the original position naturally and quickly. This kind of elastic fall together, on the surface, the fingers are moving, but in fact it is dominated by the "internal energy", which in turn originates from the whole harmonious and natural left hand holding the piano.

The mistakes that beginners tend to make when learning to press the strings are: the arms are raised too high, the tiger's mouth is pinching the piano rod too much, and the four pressing fingers are stretched straight and not curved. Some people use their knuckles to touch the strings when pressing the strings, instead of the balls of their fingers. Some people lift their fingers high when they leave the strings after pressing the strings. This kind of incorrect finger movement makes the whole string pressing action very stiff and slow and lacks elasticity. Even though the right hand is more proficient in bowing, the sound is still muddy and confusing. If the above incorrect movements are not overcome and allowed to develop, these problems will be consolidated. Even if one is determined to correct them, it is actually a little more difficult than learning and mastering a new technique. Therefore, in order to train the flexibility and accuracy of finger movement, we must first check whether the finger movement method is correct.

To train the accuracy of finger movement, on the one hand, the posture must be correct. The strength of the ear is the basic guarantee for obtaining the intonation of the strings. Even if there is a slight deviation in the finger spacing when pressing the string, the ear force can adjust the finger spacing to the accurate pressing position at this moment. Although the distance between the fingers of each sound area on the erhu is different, as long as you have practiced for a certain period of time, you can press the fingers on the ears under the domination of force, the corresponding finger distance will form an instinctive "conditioned reflex".