Low Arc

This is my current keyword list. It's a 3x5 card that I have taped to the wall across from where I practice. In this post, I'd like to address the first keyword: low arc.

Any one mallet-head, moving between any two keys, makes an "arc" through space. And the height of that arc is important.

In the image above (and you can click on it to see a larger version), I have moved my left hand "down" (1) a sixth; that is, first I struck A2 and then I struck C1. (Play example.) The arc of my mallet-head could have followed the red, yellow, or green lines (or some other path through space.) As any of my friends will tell you (since I all too frequently whine to them about it), my left hand has been a thorn in my side for years. Well, lately I've been letting my focus drift more frequently to my LH's arc. And I've been noticing that by simply paying the arc some attention, other aspects of my LH's deficiencies are beginning to fall into place (cf. Feldenkrais; awareness.)

Sory Diabate has superlative technique. Just look at how low he keeps his LH. The height of the arc, of course, relates inextricably to the height of the . . . whatever that's called: the lift, the recoil, the upstroke, and I've heard of snare drum teachers having students play under tables, so that they are forced to control their upstroke—and in so doing, they learn to generate power in their attack, without needing to lift their sticks up above their heads. I described this to Sory once and he thought it was a great idea; we even implemented it for a while. In fact, come to think of it, I've found that in high-tempo music, for movements of a sixth or greater, trying to follow a yellow or a red arc can be downright impossible. If one of the goals in instrument technique generally, is economy of motion, obviously the green arc is the way to go. Anyway, all I'm saying is, insofar as technique is concerned, lately I've been aiming for a low arc. It's something I'm paying attention to, and that attention is doing some good.


1. In the conception of some—though not all—bala- (and other West African xylophone-) players, A2-C1 would actually be an "upward" movement since for those players, the terms "low" and "high," and "up" and "down" refer not to pitch, but to the physical characteristics of the instrument. On that conception, the lower-pitched notes are called "high" notes because they are physically higher up on the trapezoidal keyboard. Here, I am referring to a movement from the higher-pitched A2 to the lower-pitched C1, so for me, that's a "downward" movement.