APRIL 12, 2026 – (Cont.) A few hours later, I summoned bow and Italian model from the case and warmed up—first with a dozen scales, then with a movement of a Bach partita, unaccompanied, as my favorite “etude.” Next, I re-established Dvořák on the piano music rack and re-positioned my iPhone to record my playing. Three minutes and change later, I listened to . . . “The best teacher in the world.”
He spoke unvarnished words. When his utterance, so concise and crystal clear, fell upon my eardrums, it manifested as a single word: Eureka!
His critique captured a bad habit, which I realized had marked my playing since dinosaurs bellowed across the earth. In the greater scheme of things, this bad habit is subtle, but most any string-player of adequate proficiency would know it instantly—just as I did—when attention is brought to the “quirk,” which evolved into habit.
By way of the most elementary background, stringed instruments (other than guitars) are unfretted; they have no raised lines across the fingerboard by which the performer can navigate intervals of the scale. Because the fingerboard is entirely smooth, the performer’s fingers must learn by practice, by pure muscle memory, exactly where to land to produce a pitch that is in tune. When thousands of notes—landings—must be managed, often at high rates of speed, playing in tune becomes a central aspect of proficient command of the instrument. And by the way, people with thin, narrow fingers must work extra hard at this, since their finger flesh covers less of the string and fingerboard and thus, must be more precise on the “landings.”
Much of this skill is ingrained during youth. I’ve heard it said that if a person doesn’t gain proficiency on the violin (viola, cello, bass) by age eight—10 at the outside—there is little hope of ever progressing much beyond a basic level, irrespective of native talent and work ethic. This reality parallels learning a foreign language: if one doesn’t master it before age 10 or 12, one will forever speak it with the accent imposed by one’s mother tongue.
The major challenge within the challenge of pitch (playing in tune), is making significant leaps on the fingerboard; that is, from a given note or finger placement in a “lower” position on the fingerboard, to a note or finger position in a “higher” position. Much of this navigation is established so early that it’s second nature. No special thought or focus is required. But many intervals are not so ingrained. They fall outside of one’s “hard drive” and must be practiced in the context of the given composition in which they occur. Eventually, these are downloaded onto one’s “temporary drive,” but for someone such as this writer/amateur, retrieval of “data” saved to the temporary drive is less than 100% reliable.
Over the years of focused practice, however, I’ve learned, realized, figured out, that much of the foregoing “pitch challenge” can be refined by adopting the aural equivalent of “eye-hand” coordination deployed by a batter when swinging at a baseball . . . pitch. That is, if I “listen” for and “hear” the pitch of the higher position note a nano-second before I land on it, somehow, my finger seems to be coordinated with my ear. I’m no longer guessing or relying entirely on muscle memory, but I’m availing myself of an invisible guide wire. This operation, however, requires laser focus concurrently with laser focus on numerous other details of performance, technical and musically (expression).
It’s all rather amazing when you think about it, but so are a million other things that the human brain can accomplish—or a bat or bird brain, for that matter, as the biological drones operated by their brains fly through a dense woods at 30 miles an hour without crashing. Life on planet earth. Where else in our galaxy—or beyond—do such wonders exist?
Okay, enough about playing without frets and flying through the woods without GPS.
Before describing the “bad habit,” as it relates to pitch, one other detail must be addressed: vibrato. This is the icing on all cakes of all classical violin (and other stringed instruments) playing other than Baroque music—especially when music of that era is performed on traditional (Baroque period) instruments. With certain exceptions,[1] music without vibrato is lifeless, expressionless. Vibrato is rare among most early student violinists. It’s taught and learned only after the student gains a fair degree of proficiency.[2]
Now enters the “bad habit” called to my attention by “the best teacher in the world”—i.e. listening to a recording of my playing. What leaped out at me were the cross-purposes of (a) playing in-tune, “sticking” every single finger landing on the fingerboard, and (b) using vibrato on every note for the entire duration of its sound. What I discovered through the recording was that I was placing priority on pitch at the expense of vibrato, when the two must be treated absolutely equally. This, I realized, was the overriding distinction between my rendition of the Dvořák and every single one of the many recordings that I’d heard online. Moreover, without addressing my many other deficiencies, this unequal treatment of pitch and vibrato is the most glaring difference between how I sound and how I want to sound, simply by breaking a decades-long habit.
Now that I’d experienced this breakthrough, I couldn’t wait to share my story with Dr. Goodman. The brief but significant session with “the best teacher in the world” had all but eclipsed my anxiety about the dimensions and effects of the medical instrument that he’d soon be wielding on my upper left arm. There was a spring to my steps as I walked from car to oncology.
“Eric! Good to see you!” he said as he entered the procedure room.
“Dr. Goodman!”[3] I told him about happenstance of my derm appointment, my distorted fears and the lesson with “the best teacher in the world.” He expressed immediate and unqualified agreement with the value of hearing yourself play. His enthusiastic endorsement—based on sessions with his own “best teacher in the world”—made me determined to multiply and expand my lessons.
It was way into the procedure prep—signing releases, joking with the assistant about my birthdate (“August 7, 1978”), removing my shirt (“Don’t look, or you’ll faint!” I told the still smiling assistant) and climbing onto the carving table—when I asked nonchalantly, “Oh, by the way, just checking. Will I be able to practice after this? Is there anything to be concerned about with regard to my up-coming gig at my college reunion?”
“No. You should be fine. There’s a small risk of infection, but this is not going to be very invasive.” What put me most at ease was the fact that Dr. Goodman didn’t ask, “Now tell me again, when is your reunion?”
Better yet, he said, “You’ll be practicing right after this appointment if you want to, and your gig will go just fine.”
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© 2026 by Eric Nilsson
[1] Notes within passages so fast, there’s no time for vibrato; rare occasions, when a “cold” note is called for, even when elongated, designated as senza vibrato, Italian for “without vibrato.”
[2] When I was on the cusp of learning vibrato, I remember, I discovered that I somewhat magically acquired the skill whenever I had to play in public—a student recital; in “talent contests” at school and, if you can believe it, in 4-H, where I went all the way to the Minnesota State Fair, won a blue ribbon—and as a result, all kinds of crazy engagements thereafter: the postal workers of Little Falls, Minnesota, for example, and the Lions Club of some town I’d never heard of and took my parents and me an hour and a half to get there by car.
[3]Though he’s at least a couple of decades my junior and I’ve been under his care for 15 years and despite our common interest in music and mutual connections in the local musical community, I still insist on calling him, “Dr. Goodman,” instead of his given name. He’s never said, “You can call me ‘Warren,’” but whenever he’s called (about a biopsy result), he announces himself as “Warren Goodman,” which I interpret as permission to dispense with “Dr.” But I’m old fashioned in this regard, just as I was at a young age when addressing my parents’ friends as “Mr. and Mrs.” no matter how close their familiarity. Just for the record, however, I don’t sit in judgment of people who don’t observe these formalities.
