The Hinge

[Libre]

Is this a well kept secret, or does everybody know about this and just never mention it?
THE HINGE.
You use it when you need to play a note on the 1st string, and immediatelty after that, you need to place a full bar in the same position, or another postion. You play the first string note with a hinge. It involves stopping the string not with the fingertip, but with the fleshy part of the first joint of the first finger, which is straight and at an angle to the fretboard. As soon as you need the full bar, the finger just "hinges" into the fretboard, into the bar position. It minimizes movement, and facilitates many fingerings. I use it quite often. You can even catch a note on the second string with it.
Is this something others do? I learned it from that great teacher you've heard me mention before, Jerry Willard. I never see it indicated in published arrangements, or in method books like Pumping Nylon, or Aaron Shearer, or Noad. That's why I wonder if everybody knows about it.

[daniel711]

Yup....my teacher refers to it as a "hinge bar", and she even writes it on the music. I'm working on the Bach 998 Fugue, and this has come up for the first time. It's quite difficult, but so is the whole piece! It is just one more tool to use in achieving legato playing - along with slides, guide fingers, pivot fingers, etc...

[Libre]

Dan -
Could you elaborate on the "pivot finger"? I could use a few more tricks in my tool chest as well.

[brian richardson]

i use it also. i was looking over some music from school and
it was written a few places. happened more with bach.
echo of daniel :twisted:

[daniel711]

Marc - I don't have a specific music example (I'm at work), but a pivot finger is nothing more than making a change where all but one finger must move. Making sure to hold down that one finger makes the change much smoother. You'd be surprised how often we don't identify "pivot" fingers, and release all the fingers during the change. That's all...

[Libre]

So you're at work? Don't tell me you're ignoring really important things like the forum so you can do your job! How irresponsible!
HEHEHE
Anyway, OH! SO that's what you mean by pivot finger. Yeah - I use that method whenever I can.

[Tomas-Lobos]

I was taught that technique by my first guitar teacher, Chuck Biel. When it's needed nothing else works quite as well.

[KBurke]

There is a good illustration and discussion of this technique in the second book of Parkening's method.

[APERTURE]

The hinge bar is used in 'Bianco Fiore' - one of the first classical pieces I learned as taught by Fred Hand on his 'Seven Easy Pieces' video. So... as I was playing last night I was watching for it and I found it in Adelita (really just a half bar, though). There is a 'reverse hinge' (I just made that up) in Sor's Study #2 - near the end you play an F major 7th bar chord, but your hand has to be up first to allow the open 1st e string and then the hand closes down on the full bar. Looks like the hinge is no secret.

[selma600]

well, that's a great job of trying to explain it, but the "hinge" is just one of those things that makes having a teacher who can SHOW you things like that great. And, yes, it is a terribly useful technique.
Thanks for making people aware of it...some folks might have not learned it.
And kudos again for trying to explain it....

[John_c]

I use it in the last few measures of Bach's Bouree...there is a part where the F# on the first string is followed by a bar across the entire second fret. David Oakes, a teacher at MI in California showed me that one. Made that particular measure about ten times easier.

Thanks for bringing it to the forum's attention Libre,
JC

[Jubilee Valence]

Dan -
Could you elaborate on the "pivot finger"? I could use a few more tricks in my tool chest as well......when "improvising"(the fast stuff...)--I use what I've always called "the pivot"(along with the "anchor"--similar to the hinge...)--it allows one to negotiate the entire fretboard-"notewise"-with speed & precision,...same with chording-both full & partial; the "i" works the best as the pivot for that blurring speed;--pivot...move(anchor)...pivot...move..="blur"!!....that was THE closest gaurded speed secret until (I've recently noticed...) it was published -rightly so, I'll add-on Frank Koonce's main website...as a reference; in passing;--Jubi-dubi-du!!!! :twisted: :twisted: :twisted: p.s."adjacent string" runs only...ya' gotta go to TK or Rex'ie or Faya for the "string jumpin' " stuff (a la maestro Paul Gilbert)--THAT gets "scary"-OR- in maestro Gilbert's terminology...."TERRIFYING"....Hasta!