
Yesterday, I suppose as a consequence of spending last weekend with Dr. Sahrmann, I watched the performance with different eyes. Many of the cellists had their bowing arms in scapular internal rotation - less so for the ones that had longer arms, or had the cello held in closer between their legs. I noticed the bass players' bowing arms were all in scapular depression as they reached down to their thighs to bow. They tended not to have as much scapular internal rotation however as they stood on the righthand corner of the instrument rather than directly behind it. Several of the cellists have a habit of translating their cervical spine forward on the downbeat during more robust parts of the piece. The violin players were in varying degrees of side bending of the cervical spine to hold their instrument in place. There is one violin player we can see very well from our seats that I have had my eye on all season. She seems from my perspective to have a very nice playing posture, and her movements are small and efficient to get the job done. Of all the string players, I noticed that some accomplish vibrato with shoulder rotation (one cellist in particular is a good example of that), and some do it more with pronation/supination of the forearm. Fascinating stuff - and that was just the musicians I could see! Imagine if I had a birds-eye view!
What kind of movement to you secretly watch when you're out?