Heavy Arm and Shoulder posture

[sapdoog]

Hey Jamie and everyone,

I have a question about The Heavy Arm. When doing The Clamp excercise, it says to bring pressure down to the string by firming your fingers and slightly squeezing your thumb. When I was practicing the string push downs, i'd try to avoid squeezing my thumb because after practicing I noticed my thumb would be in a lot of pain especially at the middle joint.

Something i've now come to realize was because I think I was applying more pressure from my thumb than fingers, so I just worked on it by using only my fingers. The question I have is when applying The Heavy Arm, am I supposed to clamp the strings down first and then apply the heavy arm? Or is it a gradual application as I am in the process of clamping the string down? The first one I imagine as a sort of "glue" to hold the string down in place, and the other is like a slow sinking stone towards the bottom of a pond. I was just wondering which one is the most efficient for economy of motion and less amount of tension.

The first one seems like the one that is advocated in the book, but the second way is what feels most natural for me. I think because of how I practiced using only my fingers and not thumb. Also, would anyone happen to know of ways to deepen their shoulder posture? When I first started, I worked on my right arm first and am now working on my left arm. However, I think doing that allowed me to relax one side of my body while the other was sympathetically tensing without my knowing of it. I thought I was relaxing both sides but when I tried applying both together, I could tell when I focused on one arm, tension would be rising in the other. I've been working on deepening that this past week by just doing the floating arm all aboard going up the frets towards the head and consciously focusing on my right arm to keep it relaxed. What exactly are the correct sensations that should be felt? I remember reading that Jamie said she tells her students to imagine they are waterfalls. That has helped a lot. Sometimes I imagine there are weights on them holding them down. Lol. I

've recently come across The Alexander Technique through another thread on this forum and how you can use your head to direct upwards and have been applying that. Imagining myself as a puppet with my arms dangling at the sides from their sockets. I was wondering what exactly should the shoulders be doing? Should I be slightly pulling them back a little? My natural tendency is to slump forward. Also, when moving up the frets towards the head of the guitar, should the movement be coming from the forearm mainly as what is directing it up? I had the problem of tensing my shoulder upwards as I did that and am working on fixing that. Now i'm noticing other muscles tense in sympathy to the one being consciously fixed. As I fix one thing, it seems like other problems pop up too. But each time it gets closer and closer to how it should be.

Right now, I feel slight pains in the back of my shoulder kind of by the upper socket. I'm not sure if that is from sitting up straight and pulling my shoulder back, but that was something I needed clarification on. I know some muscles need to be tense but just wanna make sure they're the right ones. This post has a lot of questions and I don't really expect them all to be answered, but any help would be greatly appreciated. Many thanks in advance.

- Chayne

[Jamie]

The question I have is when applying The Heavy Arm, am I supposed to clamp the strings down first and then apply the heavy arm? Or is it a gradual application as I am in the process of clamping the string down?

You must be able to do either one. I use both ways depending on the playing context. It falls under the general, all-important concept of "pressure management" while playing.

I've been working on deepening that this past week by just doing the floating arm all aboard going up the frets towards the head and consciously focusing on my right arm to keep it relaxed.

Yes, do that, but focus primarily on the tongue, jaw and neck, then down the shoulders.

As I fix one thing, it seems like other problems pop up too. But each time it gets closer and closer to how it should be.

That is how the process proceeds.



- Chayne[/quote]