Wohlfahrt 60 Studies op.45 No. 32 Allegro

This is a very simple etude.

It is to improve a very important stroke, Detache, and the third position.

In addition, with 21 variations of bowing presented, one can develop a beginning bowing technique.

Detache

Detache is the most basic, but also the important bow stroke for violin playing. It is simple, but a sophisticated detache stroke is very beautiful. Whether you want to play Bach, Mozart or anything else, you need the detache stroke.

When you use detache strokes, each stroke has to produce an even sound; it should not make crescendo nor diminuendo during the stroke and maintain the same volume and the same quality of sound.

The same thing can be said when one changes the direction of the bow, down to up or up to down. One has to be careful not to accent the beginning of downbows, and also not to diminuendo when one is using the tip of the bow.

For detache strokes, it is better to use the middle part of the bow or the upper half of the bow. As you get closer to the tip of the bow, the bow becomes lighter, so you must maintain good contact between the bow and the strings. If you can maintain good contact, you can prevent the bow slide toward the fingerboard, as well as losing the sound and create diminuendo.

You can use the lower part of the bow for detache, however it is not suitable since it is heavier. Eventually one needs to aquire the technique to be able to play detache even at the frog, however, at the beginning, it is better to concentrate on improving the quality of detache at the middle/upper half.

Bowing variations

I always have my students work on all 21 variations on this etude, even though I assigne them for one section.

One of my students, who I met while he was studying toward the end of Kayser etudes, struggled a bit when we got to Kreuzer etudes no. 2 with all the bowing variations, since it was the first time for him to work on this kind of exercise.

It was rare for me to see a student who struggled with these variations even though he plays difficult concertos. However, there are different aspects in violin playing, so I found it is important to experience many different areas while one is studying.

This type of variations of bowing can be seen in Wohlfahrt 60 studies op. 45 no.1 and no.5, which is  the first time for my students to encounter them. As I mentioned, I do not use the whole etude (however No.5 is short, so the whole may be used), since there are so many etudes that one should be exposed to after Wohlfahrt: https://dearstudentsdotblog.wordpress.com/2020/02/23/violin-etudes-2/, however, by introducing this type of exercises sooner makes students work on them smoothly without struggling or being surprised when they reach Wohlfahrt no.32 or even Kayser, Kreuzer level.

In order to improve the intonation

Now, back to Wohlfahrt No. 32.  There is a section where one needs to more carefully work on the intonation.

In order to understand and get the intonation right, please refer to the recording below. The recording is from m.25 to m.40.

A = 441, quarter note = 55

It is not perfect ^^; … but it can be helpful.