Sources of information and pedagogical literature.
Violin since 1820: Technique and performing practice
Sources of information and pedagogical literature.
Baillot's L'art du violon (Paris, 1834), perhaps the most influential violin treatise of the 19th century , easily surpasses in detail Baillot, Rode and Kreutzer's Méthode de violon (Paris, 1803), previously adopted by the Paris Conservatoire. Baillot's influence was perpetuated by his pupils Francois-Antoine Habeneck (Paris, c1835, incorporating extracts from Viotti's unfinished treatise), Delphin Alard (Ecole du violon, Paris, 1844) and Charles Dancla (Méthode élémentaire, Paris, 1855). The celebrated études of Rode, Kreutzer and Gaviniés helped to consolidate the teachings of the French violin school. The principal contributions of the Belgian school are Bériot's Méthode de violon (Paris, 1858) and Léonard's Méthode (Paris, 1877).
Karl Guhr's Über Paganinis Kunst die Violine zu spielen (Mainz, 1831) focusses on specific aspects of Paganini's performing style, while Spohr's Violinschule (Vienna, 1832) and David's Violinschule (Leipzig, 1863) are more comprehensive. The important three-volume Violinschule (Berlin, 1902–5) of Joachim appears to have been written largely by Joachim's pupil Andreas Moser.
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Nikolo Paganini |
Flesch attributed the development of technique and pedagogy in the late 19th century principally to Dont, Schradieck, Sauret and ŠevÄík, although the works of Kayser and Courvoisier are also noteworthy. Flesch's Kunst des Violin-Spiels (Berlin, 1923–8) is a synthesis of the techniques and artistic priorities of the principal schools of violin teaching in the 19th and early 20th centuries. His Urstudien (1911) also contributed to the systematic development of left-hand technique, and his Hohe Schule des Fingersatzes auf der Geige (first published in Italian, Milan, 1960) significantly loosened traditional concepts of fingering.
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Other notable 20th-century pedagogical literature includes Capet's Technique supérieure de l'archet (Paris, 1916), Auer's Violin Playing as I Teach it (New York, 1921), Demetrius Dounis's Künstlertechnik (Vienna, 1921), Elma and Erich Doflein's Geigenschulwerk (Mainz, 1931), Galamian's Principles of Violin Playing and Teaching (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1962) and various works by Menuhin and Bronstein. Kato Havas and Paul Rolland have focussed on developing relaxation, control and coordination. The ‘Suzuki method’ has revolutionized violin teaching in some areas, allowing pupils to develop artistic potential simultaneously with technical skills (see Suzuki, shin'ichi). However, most 20th-century sources are based on traditional methods; few account for the extended harmonic language, diversity of styles and the resultant technical and rhythmic demands of much contemporary music. Exceptions include Galamian and Neumann's Contemporary Violin Technique (New York, 1966) and Zukofsky's All-Interval Scale Book (New York, 1977), which are essentially modern approaches to scales and arpeggios, and study books by Hindemith, Adia Ghertzovici and Elizabeth Green.