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Customize Your Shoulder Rest – Quick Tip

Teacher: David Wallace

About Customize Your Shoulder Rest – Quick Tip:


 

Hi there, I’m Dr. David Wallace of myTalentForge.com and this is the Quick Tip of the week!

The Quick Tip of the week is to customize your shoulder rest. So that you adjust the instrument to your body, not your body to the instrument.

And you can do that using pink make-up sponges!

My viola teacher at Juilliard, Karen Tuttle, is the person who came up with this idea. And you can actually now buy these pads from SHARmusic.com, and various other places, but a drug store is good enough.

You can see right here, I need a little more height than this coon shoulder rest will give me.

My neck is pretty long, and without this, there’s a little extra space and I can only fill in that space if I squeeze. That’s going to hurt- that’s not going to be good for my playing long-term.

So, I take some rubber bands, put a sponge there, and now it just fits and floats comfortably. As a matter of fact, I need a little more space here, so I take the rubber bands and put it right there…

And I have the instrument fit my body rather than the other way around.

When I take the instrument away, I look just like I look when I’m standing normally.

So get yourself some pink make-up sponges, some rubber bands, and customize that shoulder rest.

And for more tips on ergonomic playing, check out myTalentForge.com’s Comfort With Your Instrument and Comfort With Your Bow Series.

That’s your tip of the week!

About David Wallace

Dr. David Wallace improvises solos like “Jimmy Page fronting Led Zeppelin” (New York Times). A composer, Texas-style fiddler, and musician fluent in classical, rock, jazz, CCM, and more, Doc Wallace chairs Berklee College of Music’s String Department. Previously, he enjoyed fourteen years as Juilliard professor, and seventeen years as New York Philharmonic Teaching Artist.

David is an internationally-touring musician; an award-winning composer; and a master teaching artist who has performed, consulted, and authored curricula for dozens of performing arts institutions, including Carnegie Hall, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the Tanglewood Music Festival.

David has also gained widespread acclaim for his ability to connect with audiences in diverse settings. His Berklee Press book, Engaging the Concert Audience: A Musician’s Guide to Interactive Performance, is widely considered “an invaluable manual for all musicians, classical or otherwise” (Symphony Magazine).  Never content to let music remain in the concert hall, David actively brings his artistry to venues like schools, hospitals, psychiatric facilities, homeless shelters, houses of worship, and prisons.

David performs and records with his Texas-style string band, The Doc Wallace Trio; classical flute-viola-harp trio Hat Trick; klezmer / world-fusion jam band, Yale Strom’s Broken Consort; and symphonic metal tour de force, The Chuck & David Show.  Watch videos of David’s electrifying performances on YouTube, and learn more at www.docwallacemusic.com.

Join Talent Forge and learn from David.

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