Follow-Ups to Answer from Expert David

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LJR wrote at 2007-07-31 05:32:47
To do a good vibrato that's easy to control, regardless of whether you use hand, wrist or arm, there's just one magic little word: "back."



Whichever technique you use, you actually want to pull your finger "back" repeatedly, while keeping the fingertip on the note being played.  This will give you the exact effect you're looking for in a good vibrato--modulation of the pitch.



When your finger rolls back (toward the scroll) on the note being played, its pitch will drop slightly, and when it comes back toward you (when you release the "back" pull), it goes back to proper pitch.  Our brains tend to lock onto the higher of the two pitches, so it comes out sounding more like the proper note is simply getting louder and softer, repeatedly and quickly...at least, as quickly as you do your vibrato.



To get some practice, just hold your fingering hand (the one that actually does the string action) in front of you, with the palm facing toward you.  You'll have your elbow bent, and your fingers should be pointing straight up, with your wrist and fingers perfectly aligned with your forearm.



Now, just practice moving either your wrist or your whole arm back away from you and brining it back toward you repeatedly.  Practice doing this at various speeds, increasing the frequency and length of time you do it as you go along.  Believe me, doing vibrato a lot can tire your wrist and/or your arm very quickly if you don't practice this.



Then, when you start playing the instrument, remember the way you pulled your wrist or arm away from you over and over.  Do this while your finger is on a string, and you'll notice that, this time, you needn't actually pull your wrist or arm back toward you before pulling it away from you again.  When you relax your wrist or your arm from the backward pull, it will come back toward you naturally from the tension in your finger.



I've actually found that an arm vibrato can give you the broadest range of vibrato strength, as long as you learn to control it very precisely, because it can give you large, lingering vibratos, or tiny little light vibratos, and everything in between, whereas wrist and finger vibratos seriously limit this dynamic.  Of course, the arm's a bit too massive to twitch extremely fast, so when you need an exceptionally quick vibrato, wrist and/or finger movement will be better, though this vibrato won't be as noticeable.  However, this kind of vibrato is usually played on such short notes that most people won't notice whether you used one or not.



But, whatever the case, you'll also need to learn to press your finger against the string/fingerboard a bit harder when using a vibrato to help keep your fingertip from slipping and going truly off pitch.  With all the other little specifics you have to keep in mind when playing, it's likely to take you quite some time to get this bit down, too.  Most of the time, you want a light press on the strings to better facilitate shifting your hand up and down the length of the neck, but if you keep this same light touch when using a vibrato, you'll shift all over the place when you need to stay on the same note, and, well, just try it, and you'll see what I mean. ;)



Just don't get discouraged.  Mastering vibrato can be almost as tricky as mastering the bow, but it takes very little time to develop an acceptable vibrato that will still manage to add life and depth to your music.

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