1. Shifting from the Ground Up: Creative Approaches to Shifting With Ease, presented by Rebecca Henry (Peabody Institute) and Ching-Yi Lin(Western Kentucky University).
Article written by Claire Allen on violinist.com
A Deep Dive into Left Hand Technique at the 2024 ASTA/SAA Conference
“In addition to informative slides and live demonstrations with a student, the presenters had a detailed outline of their shifting method. It was thorough, detailed, and went through every step needed to go from not shifting to shifting successfully. I was affirmed by hearing several things that I do in my own teaching - and also realized some of the steps I need to do slightly differently with some students or spend more time on.
Henry and Lin shared that one of the most important aspects of developing a shifting technique is starting to build the physical motions from Day 1 of violin or viola studies. They pointed out that teaching the motion separate from the need to play in tune or play in a position in a certain amount of time is essential for creating a free and easy technique. For beginner students, they do exercises that involve sliding up and down the neck of the instrument in rest position, and tapping over the "high dot" (a sticker placed on the octave harmonic) in both rest and playing position.
Some other early shifting exercises they shared included finding the half-string octave harmonic, going between it and first position, and finding first and second fingers in third position as 4ths and 5ths. I also really enjoyed seeing demonstrations and videos of exercises that included alternating playing regular notes in first position and then shifting up to harmonics in a sort of improvisation - another great way to connect students to shifting as a creative motion and not as a stressful thing.
When shifting to higher positions, the presenters stressed the importance of coordinating the motion as the player comes around the shoulder of the violin - both swinging the arm under and bringing the thumb into the curve of the neck. How much they come under depends on the size of the hand and the length of the thumb, so this will vary, but they shared several exercises both for isolating this motion as well as stitching it together into one seamless shift from first position up to seventh and beyond.
There was so much information packed into this session (and so many people packed into a relatively small presentation room) that I left feeling slightly overwhelmed, but empowered to go home and continue working on shifting both in my own playing and with my students.”