Transcribing a piece of music from one medium to another is like translating a book from one language to another.

There’re so many variables to consider and decisions to make.

In translation, for example, you have to make decisions on how best to convey the meaning of the original, and usually this would involve picking the right word or words out of a number of possibilities.

The same is true for transcribing to the guitar.

Many times, there’re an array of possibilities as to choice of key, register, not to mention the revoicing of chords to make them playable on the guitar.

The most important consideration for me, however, when I transcribe a work is:

Can the piece stand alone?

Does it sound like it was written for the guitar?

Does it play like a guitar piece?

Fidelity to the original is a big consideration, but fidelity more in spirit than in details. In other words, I don’t try to adhere rigidly to what’s in the original.

So there’s a lot of thought put into each transcription.

But why transcribe at all?

The answer lies in a comment Brouwer made in one of his interviews.

In the interview, Brouwer said something to the effect that he was jealous of all the repertoire of the other instruments and he wanted to rectify the situation for the guitar.

Which is what he has done. He has filled the gap in our repertoire with his compositions.

But that still doesn’t change the situation when it comes to music from the past.

The fact is, the great masterpieces of the past are unique pieces, each one of them.

They can never be replicated.

There will never be another Toccata and Fugue, or any of the nocturnes from Chopin or for that matter, Asturias or Granada.

In the same way that there will never be another Recuerdos de la Alhambra, which is why it has so often been adapted and transcribed for other instruments too.

If we want to partake of the great artistic creations of the past, we can’t just sit down and write new compositions in the hope that they will match those creations.

It’s like someone saying, I’m going to sit down and paint another “Mona Lisa.’

The best thing we can do is to take these masterpieces and adapt them or ‘transcribe’ them as is commonly known.

We have to be selective of course. Not everything will transfer well to the guitar.

So the first thing I do when considering a piece for transcription is to try to hear it in my head as a guitar piece.

If it sounds good and doable, then transcribing is just a matter of trying to replicate that sound in my head and notating it down.

For me, transcribing is a very personal and creative process. It’s almost as if you’re a co-creator with the composer.

Almost as if Bach or Chopin asked you, “Hey, could you try to play this on the guitar?”

And because they’re such pragmatic musicians, they would take your advice and allow you to make the necessary modifications in their score to make the piece playable on the guitar.

Which leads me to my next point.

There’s so much that goes into the process of making a piece of music work on the guitar it’s a little disappointing when someone comes along and take your transcription, and change a few things here and there, maybe some fingerings or change of register, and call it their own, without giving any credit.

Of course, if they have made substantial changes or if it bears no relationship to your work, it’s a different matter.

In academic circles, the word is plagiarism which is, of course, a form of dishonesty.

People have asked me if I worry about all the file sharing of my work and I tell them, no, I’m not concerned about it at all.

We live in a digital world and that’s the way it is.

What I’m more concerned about is thievery at a more elemental level, which is to steal your ideas and work without giving any credit.

I have, in my possession, many translations of poems from different languages.

And so far I have not seen anyone take someone else’s work almost verbatim, and maybe change a word here or there, and call it their own work.

Unfortunately, those high standards of scholarship and professional integrity don’t seem to apply in the guitar world.

Interestingly enough, my Chopin CD was released 20 years ago and so far, no one has as yet tried to ‘transcribe’ the lesser-known works on that CD (‘lesser-known’ as in never before played on the guitar).

Maybe, I suspect, because they’re waiting for me to publish the scores.

Going back to the Brouwer’s comment, yes, I too am jealous of the repertoire of the other instruments, especially the piano.

And that’s why I transcribe.

Because I also want to experience the thrill organists experience when they play the Toccata and Fugue, and be able to recreate the heartbreak and sensual beauty of the Chopin nocturnes on the guitar too.

In fact, I think some of them sound better on guitar than on piano, IMHO of course.

I just discovered this recording of Rey De La Torre and it was a revelation.

I had mentioned elsewhere that I don’t listen to classical guitarists any more, at least not since the technicians and the ‘tone-meisters’ took over.

Rey De La Torre’s recording hacks back to a time when the guitar was still full of poetry and mystery.

Listen to El Testamen, the fluid phrasing and the singing line.

Listen especially to the accompaniment—there’s a beautiful lilt in the rhythm. That’s because he plays it in a one-feel as opposed to a three-feel.

You will notice there is none of the persistent insistence on the metrical beat.

His playing if full of rubato, but if you conduct to it, you’ll find that the pulse is always there.

That is the true art of phrasing.

As I said, there’s no great skill in playing in time, all you need is a metronome, but to play with poetry, that’s a whole other thing.

The rest of the recording is equally amazing in its lyricism and poetry. My thanks to the uploader Serioso Serioso for making this recording available.

One more old essay I wrote for a graduate research class with Dr. Deanna Bush at NTSU (now UNT).

—

AMÉRIQUES: MUSIC FOR A NEW WORLD

“I dream of instruments obedient to my thought and which with their contribution of a whole new world of unsuspected sounds, will lend themselves to the exigencies of my inner rhythm.”

Edgard Varese, June 1917, New York 

Edgard Varese, dreamer and “sound-magician” was a Romantic artist in the true sense of the word. As a composer, he straddled the old and the new more than any other composer of this century. In his compositions, one can glean the influences of Debussy, Richard Strauss, and Stravinsky and see the seeds of the avant-garde of the 60s, notably Ligeti and Stockhausen.

In his lectures and writings, Varese constantly alluded to the theme of liberation and of a new world of sound. To him, the old concepts of melody or interplay of melodies were no longer valid. Instead, he envisaged a music that will “flow as a river flows” and only the “movement of sound masses, of shifting planes, will be clearly perceived.” In this regard, he revealed himself to be a greater radical than Schoenberg or even Boulez. The latter two composers were still preoccupied with the micro-structure of music—the melody, the counterpoint, the harmony, whereas Varese was more interested in the macro-structure, the forest rather than the leaves, so to speak.

In 1915, at the age of 32, Varese decided to cut his ties with the old world and strike out for the new. He arrived in New York with eighty dollars in his pocket, a score of “Bourgogne,” his only composition which he felt worthy enough to salvage (and which he later destroyed) and a burning idealism. This move was to prove pivotal to Varese’s art. It was as if Europe, with all its established institutions and traditions had rendered him sterile and impotent. For it was in New York that the germ of a new composition took root. Working in his apartment, he was especially mesmerized by the sound of “the lonely foghorns, the shrill peremptory whistles the whole river symphony . . .” emanating from the Hudson River nearby. He decided to title it “Amériques” because the word “America meant all discoveries, all adventures.” It symbolizes “new worlds on this planet, in outer space, and in the minds of man…”

“Amériques” was completed in 1922 and given its premiere by the Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted by Stokowski on April 9, 1926. The initial reaction to the piece was hisses and boos from a normally staid and self-contained audience. On April 13, Stokowski performed the piece in New York which caused a reviewer to comment caustically on the boos and hisses that broke out again after “Mr. Stokowski finished Edgard Varese’s symphonic genuflection to the Fire Department and the Pneumatic Riveters’ Union.”

What was it about “Amériques” that could elicit such a controversial reception? First of all, the work is massive in scope and conception. The original version called for one hundred and forty two instruments including twenty one percussion instruments which include, among other things, two sirens. Although it has been analyzed to be in sonata form, there is little to warrant that label. Indeed it would be far easier to understand the work in the context of Varese’s own words; “The entire work will be a melodic totality. The entire work will flow as the river flows.” Later, he would define his concept of form as the result of a process, rather than a preconceived pattern to be slavishly followed.

Although “Amériques” looks to the future with its masses of colliding sound, of shifting timbres rather than harmony, it nevertheless remains solidly rooted in the established tradition of western music. There are echoes of Debussy’s “Prelude a l’apres-midi d’un faune” in the opening alto flute motif. There are references to Stravinsky’s “La Sacre du Printemps” in the violent bursts of sound-blocks and to the “Five Orchestral Pieces” of Schoenberg in its orchestration. However the work still remains unique in its primitivism, its sheer power and energy, in the slow and inexorable climb to the final climax.

One of music’s greatest pioneers, Varese fortunately lived long enough to enjoy world wide recognition. He died on November 7, 1965 at the age of eighty-two, in time to see the wonders of his “new world” realized, both in the advent of the space age and in the electronic revolution which has produced new instruments capable of more than anything he had ever dreamt of.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bloch, David. “The Music of Edgard Varese.” (Ph.d. dissertation, University of Washington, 1973)

Boretz, Benjamin, and Edward Cone. Perspectives on American Composers. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1971

Peyser, Joan. The New Music. New York: Delacorte Press, 1971, p.125-161.

Varese, Lousie. Varese, Looking-Glass Diary, Vol. I: 1883-1928. New York: .W. Norton & Company, 1972

—Denton, Feb 12, 1987

This is the last of the class assignments I did for Dr. Bush at UNT. My final project for the course was a paper titled “Slurring Practices in Baroque Guitar and Lute Music” which was later published in Soundboard magazine in 1987.

—

BACH AND THE BAROQUE LUTE

Among the musical instruments listed in the specificatio of Johann Sebastian Bach’s estate, made after his death in 1750, were two Lautenwerk(e) (lute-harpsichord) and a lute. This has given rise to much conjecture as to whether Bach himself played the lute.[i] We may never be able to satisfactorily resolve the question. However, judging from the information in the specificatio, we can infer that he was well acquainted with the lute. We know that at least two of his students, J. L. Krebs and R. Straube, played the lute and composed for it.[ii] We also know that Bach was personally acquainted with Silvius L. Weiss, the foremost lutenist of his time.[iii]

More importantly, however, we know that he composed a small body of works for the instrument. As early as 1727, Bach had already used the lute in two compositions: St. John Passion and the Trauer-Ode.[iv] There is general consensus that the lute parts are authentic. Their relative simplicity and the idiomatic writing speak for themselves.

In examining Bach’s solo lute works, we encounter a more complex problem. Although there is mention of three lute partitas in Breitkopf’s catalog of 1761, they have been presumed lost. Schweitzer however believed that the lute partitas still survive today as keyboard arrangements of the lute originals.[v] They form part of seven compositions now designated by the Neue Bach Ausgabe as lute compositions. None of these compositions were written in tablature but in normal two-stave notation. However, contemporary intabulated versions of some of these works survive today and we shall examine them first. They are as follows:

1. Suite in G minor, BWV 995. (This is an adaptation of the Cello Suite in C minor BWV 1011.)
2. Partita in C minor, BWV 997
3. Prelude in C minor, BWV 999
4. Fugue in G minor, BWV 1000

A detailed examination of these works reveals one common feature; they are all essentially arrangements of the Bach autograph versions. In the case of the Suite in G minor, which, interestingly enough, even bears the direction Pour la Luth in the autograph, octave adjustments have to be repeatedly made to accommodate the low G. The lowest note on the standard baroque lute is A. The texture of all these works is extremely light and well suited to the lute. In particular, the Prelude in C minor and the Prelude of the Partita in C minor contain some excellent lute writing.

The rest of Bach’s lute compositions include:

5. Suite in E minor, BWV 995
6. Prelude, Fugue and Allegro in E flat major, BWV 998
7. Suite in E major, BWV 1006 (an adaptation of the third Partita for solo violin BWV 1006)

All three of these compositions have generated a great deal of controversy over their intended instrumentation. Many lutenists regard them as being unplayable on the lute citing the main reasons as being:

1. The technical difficulties in executing these pieces are practically insurmountable, given their thick texture. As an example, the Gigue from the Suite in E minor is so dense at times with three part counterpoint that it is physically impossible to execute on the lute at tempo.
2. The keys make them doubly suspect. The baroque lute is tuned in D minor in the following manner:[vi]

A, Bb, C, D, E, F, G, A, d, f, a, d’, f’

Would Bach, who was for all intent and purposes a practical man and a highly experienced composer, compose works that are physically impossible to execute on the instrument they are intended?

Whatever the conclusion, it is safe to assume that Bach had more than a cursory interest in the lute. He may indeed have written works specifically for the lute. He may even have been a competent lutenist. However, being a practical man, and realizing the fiendish difficulties in mastering the baroque lute, he may have sought to side-step the problem by designing the Lautenwerk—a pseudo-lute.

In composing for the instrument, he may have deliberately composed works with the lute in mind, but which were intended to be played on the Lautenwerk instead, in other words, pseudo lute music for a pseudo lute.

NOTES

[i] Albert Schweitzer, J. S. Bach, trans. Ernest Newman, (New York, 1958), v. I, 344; Philipp Spitta, Johann Sebastian Bach, trans. Clara Bell and J. A. Fuller Maitland, (New York, 1951), v. III, 166-167.

[ii] Karl Geiringer, Johann Sebastian Bach, (New York, 1966), 310-311.

[iii] Ibid.

[iv] Charles S. Terry, Bach’s Orchestra, Oxford University Press, (London, 1932), 143.

[v] Schweitzer, loc. cit.

[vi] See Foreword, Stefan Lundgren, Johann Sebastian Bach Samtliche Lautenwerke, Lundgren Musik-Ed., (Munchen, 1984).

BIBLIOGRAPHY

(Coming soon.)

March 20, 1987

This is an essay I wrote for Dr. Bush’s research class at UNT which I had posted on my other blog. I thought it might be of interest for readers of this blog also.

The essay is a little sketchy—I finished most of these assignments in one evening, some of them in the early dawn hours.

So it’s just a graduate school assignment.

But I still think the idea behind the paper is good, to try to use information theory and apply them in music analysis.

—

STRUCTURE AND ORIGINALITY IN THE FIRST MOVEMENT PIANO SONATA OP. 31 NO. 2 BY L. VAN BEETHOVEN

“Structures are equivalent to mental forms. The more structured a message is, the more intelligible it is, the more redundant it is, the less originality it has.”

Abraham Moles

Music can be defined as a sonic message, a finite ordered set of elements drawn from a repertoire of symbols and assembled in a structure defined by the listener. It can be perceived on several structural levels; the macro-structure, the intermediate structure, and the micro-structure. However, structure presupposes redundancy. It creates forseeability. The success of a composer is therefore highly dependent on the way he balances the elements of redundancy inherent in structure against those of originality.

The concept of originality is tightly bound up with that of periodicity. Periodicity in the sonic message is manifested on different levels. First, on the purely acoustic level as rhythm and pitch, and second, on a higher level, it denotes continuity. The repetition of any sonic event, object, cell, or melodic phrase results in periodicity, and decreases its originality.

In 1802, when Beethoven composed piano sonata op. 31 no. 2, he was still too much of a classicist to attempt to tamper with the macro-structure, the form. Beethoven was primarily interested in the intermediate level, the basic punctuations defining and delineating the form. This comprises the basic parameters of music, the melodic, the harmonic, the rhythmic, and the textural.

The exposition of a classical sonata is defined mainly by two elements: (i) two contrasting themes, (ii) two contrasting keys. In Op. 31, No. 2, however, on the purely aural level, one can identify not less than five motivic ideas.

Ex. 1. Motivic ideas. L. v. Beethoven, Op. 31, No.2 1st movement

Contrary to the textbook formula, the principal and second themes are closely related motivically while the rest of the themes are quite unrelated motivically or texturally. The old cliché about unity in diversity seems appropriate here. None of the ideas are overworked. Each seems to contrast perfectly with its preceding idea.

In the development, there are two departures from the norm. First, the use of the largo idea creates an immediate sense of ambiguity in the formal structure and secondly, the exclusive use of “fringe” material from the exposition. This is carried into the recapitulation. The reappearance of the largo idea and the extension “con expressione e semplice” is a masterstroke. As well as creating more ambiguity, it also shows how, by constantly doing the unexpected, Beethoven is increasing the originality element. However, this is never at the expense of overloading the piece with excess information. Each new piece of information is carefully selected to negate any earlier redundancy. The diversity of the elements is never so great that it causes unintelligibility, and the repetition never so insistent that it results in boredom.

Melody is not the only element on the intermediate structural level that punctuates the form. However, it remains more pronounced than the other parameters. Harmonically, Beethoven does not produce any great surprises. In measure 161, he does use an enharmonic common tone to effect an abrupt modulation. Although by no means revolutionary, it does create an element of surprise, originality factor again.

Beethoven uses dynamics mainly to reinforce the other elements. In measure 32 and other similar measures, he reinforces the tonal accent, in measures 55-68, the rhythmic accent (syncopation), and in measure 103, the harmonic accent.

Finally, brief mention should be made of the use of textural variety to contribute to the degree of originality in the overall structure. This occurs at the end of the exposition (measures 87-96) to demarcate the sections.

There has been much debate as to what constitutes a major work as opposed to the ordinary, the mediocre. It is my contention that a great work has, among its many qualities, one of perfect balance, between structure and originality, between formulae and inspiration. And this is what makes Op. 31 No. 2 such a compelling work.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Kohs, Ellis. Musical Form. Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston, 1976, p. 261-289.

Moles, Abraham. Information Theory and Esthetic Perception, translated by Joel Cohen, University of Illinois Press, Urbana, Chicago, and London, 1968.

Schwejda, Donald. An Investigation of the Analytical Techniques used by Rudolph Reti in The Thematic Process in Music, Ph.D. dissertation, Indiana University, 1967.

I stopped listening to guitar players over thirty years ago, except for Leo Brouwer, whom I still get excited over every time I discover a new video of his.

Let’s take an analogy like movies.

To take the trouble to go to a movie theater to watch a movie, a movie has to fulfill a few requirements for me.

First, it must have a compelling story.

Second, it must have good acting—acting that makes the story come alive and believable.

Third, it must provide sufficient contrasts and spellbinding scenes; scenes that make you want to keep on watching.

Fourth, it must be so powerful, it transports me to another world, in other words, I find myself getting lost in the movie.

These are the basic requirements for a good movie.

I’ve gone to some movies where the action is so plodding, I left in the middle.

Or when the acting was so bad, I resolved never to watch another movie by the actor or actors again.

But how about production quality?

There was a movie years ago that quickly attained cult status—the Blair Witch Project.

The movie was low budget, shot apparently with a home camcorder, and the cinematography was so bad, I had to turn my eyes from the screen quite a few times because the scenes were jerking so hard.

But the story line and suspense was so compelling, it kept me glued to my seat—so production quality didn’t matter.

When I listen to music, the same is true.

To me, a good performance has to be compelling on these same terms.

There must be sufficient forward motion and unexpected contrasts to keep me engaged.

There must be enough variety in tone and presentation to make me want to listen more.

And most importantly, it must have those special moments—called moments of ecstasy by Gould—that make my heart just want to melt.

These are moments of magic which I hear all the time in Brouwer’s playing, as well as Glenn Gould’s.

Above all, there must be a sense that the performer is trying to reach me and create a special experience for me, and that he’s not there just to show me what a great player he is, or what a beautiful tone he can produce.

So yes, in general, I don’t find many guitar players very compelling.

Of course, I’m not there ticking off each of these criteria as I listen to each player.

Just like a movie, you know instinctively when a movie is not worthwhile watching.

When I was young, most of the pianos I came across were cheap pianos with some generic sounding names.

I never grew to like the piano for that reason.

They all had a muffled mellow tone as if they had a cold and the notes would not come out clearly.

I never heard a good piano until I went to New Zealand and that was when I realized that the piano is an incredibly beautiful instrument.

I realized that good pianos do not have that muffled tone; instead they have a beautiful ringing sound.

Their bass have a kind of energy in its deep resonance and the trebles a clear sparkling sound.

And then I discovered the playing of Glenn Gould.

The first recordings of Gould that I heard were his Mozart sonatas and I was instantly captivated.

It was not just his clear sparkling tones that drew me to him but the energy and the aliveness in his phrasing.

Classical music became alive and contemporary under his fingers as opposed to just some serious historical thing that one has to play correctly and with reverence.

That was why I loved the classical guitar in those days too.

There was incredible energy and excitement and expression in the playing of John Williams and Julian Bream and Segovia.

John Williams was my favorite player.

I loved his early recordings, especially the Paul Myers albums—the clarity and excitement in his playing is still unmatched today.

When he started getting into the close-miking in the mid-seventies with Michael Stavrou, I remember being quite disappointed when I first heard them.

Especially the Ponce and the Barrios albums from that period.

Gone was the energy and the power and the spatial depth. Instead they sounded flat and two dimensional. I found them so boring and uninspiring I never bought another recording of his.

And then I discovered the Vox/Turnabout recordings of Manuel Barrueco.

The word was electrifying—the playing, the interpretation and miking technique all came together to create what I consider the gold standard in classical guitar playing and recording.

For years after that I tried to find out more about the miking technique behind the sound and the sound engineer David Hancock who came up with it.

Then Barrueco started recording for EMI/Germany and I remember having the same disappointment when I first heard his Albeniz and his Sor.

Gone again was the energy and excitement—everything sounded so clinical and mechanical and two-dimensional.

I remember buying those CDs and just giving them away.

Back to the subject of cheap pianos.

I’m not sure when the change in guitar playing came about but I think it has to do with two British guitarists—John Taylor and David Russell.

The former had come up with a book that was like a manifesto for a different kind of guitar playing and the latter had applied the theories and principles in that book.

Suddenly the sound of the guitar has to become gentrified.

You must eliminate the natural percussiveness because it was considered noisy and uncouth.

Instead you must try to imitate the sound of a piano and minimize the attack—in other words; the preferred sound is a mellow muffled tone, which is the cheap piano tone I had detested so much.

And whatever you do, never overplay, stay within the safe boundaries.

And that’s what you hear most of the time these days in guitar concerts—an hour or two of endless soft mellow tinkling on stage and little else.

Interestingly enough, this timid and safe approach to guitar is only reflected in less mature players.

When Jason Vieaux came to Del Mar a few years ago, I was blown away by his playing and the great variety in his tone colors. Instead of sounding like some cheap upright piano, he sounded like a great grand piano.

He was definitely not laboring under some artificial standards that some pedagogue somewhere had laid down about tone.

That’s the difference, I guess, between a student and an artist.

Students are always afraid they’d break some rules and they’re always trying to do things correctly and looking for approval.

Artists have a whole different agenda and that is to breathe life into the music and give it its fullest expression.

An old post from November 10, 2013 which I unpublished for some reason. Decided to repost it.

When we think rhythm, we tend to think of beats and pulses and metronomes and foot tapping.

But those are just ways to define a beat.

They’re not rhythm in themselves.

Rhythm is much more than just keeping time, rhythm expresses the character of a piece.

For example, what distinguishes one style of music from another? Say, jazz from flamenco?

It’s in their rhythms.

Every style of music has its peculiar rhythmic characteristics and its these characteristics that give it life and define it.

You hear Joe Pass and you know straightaway that you’re listening to jazz.

Or you hear Paco de Lucia and you know straightaway that you’re listening to flamenco.

There’s no mistaking the two.

(True, there’re other things that distinguishes one style from another, tonal characteristics, for example, but that’s another discussion altogether.)

Rhythm also defines a player.

What makes one player’s playing exciting and full of life and energy while another’s may seem lifeless and bland?

It’s in their rhythms.

One’s playing may be full of rhythmic inflections and swing while another may be mechanical and follow the beat rigidly.

When I first started to play jazz, I bought all the jazz books I could find and memorized all the licks in them but somehow I could never get that jazz feel.

It didn’t sound like jazz at all.

It took me a year of complete immersion in the hallways and ensemble rooms of Berklee before I could feel the swing and play it convincingly.

The same thing with Bach.

When I first started to record my Bach CD, I thought, great, I would just roll the tape and I would have the CD done in two sessions.

Big mistake.

After listening back to those first few sessions, I had to go back on the drawing board and relearn how to play Bach all over again.

And the same thing with Chopin.

In each of these ventures, I learned I had to get into the spirit of the style, to experience their inner energy, the tensions and resolutions within their rhythms, feel the nuances and their infinite variations before I was able to ‘speak’ it convincingly in my playing.

Yes, in a way, it’s much like learning to speak a language.

You have to understand all the inflections and nuances and the rhythms of a language before you can speak it convincingly, like a native.

If you’ve ever called up one of those phone helplines, you’ve probably had to listen to those automated messages giving you those endless options.

What’s the one thing that strikes you about all these robomessages?

Flat, lifeless, monotonous voice.

And that’s what happens if you don’t express the rhythmic character of a piece.

Flat, lifeless, and mechanical playing.

Sure, a listener will still hear all the notes and they may even feel a strong rhythm in your playing, but it will be as exciting and uplifting an experience as listening to an automated phone message.

I found these notes among my papers. They were written, I think, around 2007. They eventually formed the basis of the AOV.

The Principles: A Short Preview

1. The basis of all virtuoso movements is a light touch. A light touch is the essence of all efficient motion [because it utilizes minimal energy].

2. In initiating an action, start from a position of rest, which is a state of soft body.

3. All actions generate tension; release this tension at the points of action and return to a state of soft body.

4. Pace your actions by synchronizing them to an inner pulse. Do not rush towards the beats. Wait for them to arrive and gently execute your actions lightly on the beat.

5. Maintain stability and balance each action with a counter force. Drive your action towards the counter force, allow that force to neutralize the action and keep you in stability.

6. Anticipate every move. Be in a state of constant readiness for the next moment.

7. Internalize your actions and let the unconscious mind take over your execution. Most physical actions are too complex for the conscious mind.

8. Link your actions together. Let each action drive you to the next. As you complete one action, capture the energy from that action and redirect it to the next, creating a chain of actions, each action powered by the previous action.

9. And tap into the power of everything around you. There is power in the strings. Feel the snap as you release each string and use that energy to drive you to the next action.