Violinist in Balance

New chin rests:
Wolf Music Products will finance and produce a series of chin rests which will incorporate adjustments which we found useful during the research. The series of chin rests are designed to suit different body types and can be used as a set by teachers and schools, or individually by professionals and amateurs.
* They will be available in 2007. See www.wolfproducts.com. Development of the prototypes is supported by the OC&W (Dutch Ministry of Education), through the Impuls project, overseen by Stichting Handicap en Studie.

New shoulder rests:
We are happy to hear of the announcement of a new shoulder rest being made in America based on the principles of the Alexander Technique. www.portabene.com

**The researcher and the HKU will not be making any profit on the chin rest series or the shoulder rests mentioned above. Our wish is to make them available to our students and teachers, and to the general public.

Funding:
The research was funded by the research department of the Utrecht School for the Arts, Faculty of Music, with a matching grant from the Stichting Student en Gezondheid of the Katholieke Universiteit Brabant, Postbus 90153, 5000 LE Tilburg, the Netherlands. Many thanks for making this research possible, and for supporting research based at music conservatories.

Special Thanks:
Special thanks to the memory of Willy Wolf, who by the example of his inventive mind and compassionate attention to our students helped us on the road to discovery.

Thanks also to the memory of Isaak Vigdorchik who made me my first custom made chin rest in New York in 1980.

Special thanks and love to my father, Professor Edwin F. Taylor, who played editing ping-pong with me across the ocean throughout the whole long process of writing this website.

Alexander Technique
The Utrecht Alexander Technique Institute for Musicians provides lessons in the Alexander Technique to students at the Utrecht School for the Arts, Faculty of Music. Teachers of this institute supported this research through their work. Contact person: criss.taylor@muziek.hku.nl

Equipment credits:
Custom and hand made chin rests and shoulder rests:
All custom and hand made chin rests and shoulder rests for this research were made by Servaas Franssen, www.chinup.nl Mr. Franssen also designed and made the Chin Rest Testing Kit used in the project, and made all skilled alterations to commercial equipment that were required during the project.

Stores:
Commercial equipment and advice provided by:

Some equipment provided by Johnson Strings, Boston, MA, USA. www.johnsonstrings.com.

Commercially Produced Equipment:
Commercially produced equipment purchased for this project was produced by:

Anatomy drawings
Thanks to David Gorman for permission to use his illustration of the neck muscles from The Body Moveable, 5th edition, by Gorman (after Richer). www.learningmethods.com/bodymove.htm

The illustration of m. pectoralis major (the chest muscle) came from: Bohn Stafleu van Loghum, Spieren, 3e druk, by Kendall, ISBN: 9031327301, page number 73. www.bsl.nl Thanks for permission to use this illustration.

Text exerpts:
The texts for the Musician-stories section of this website were condensed from recorded interviews of the students participating in the research. The students interviewed each other at the end of the research school year using a list of questions devised by the researcher and the students themselves. Additional materials were extracted from reports written by the students halfway through the research school year. The finished pages, including all photos, were seen by the students, and edited according to their recommendations when necessary. The musicians gave their written approval for the final versions of the Musician-stories.

Many thanks to the Menuhin heirs, and especially Gerard Menuhin for allowing us to use the letters between his father, Yehudi Menuhin, and the Wolf company.

Also thanks to Willy Wolf for sharing these letters with us, and for the permission given by Robert Wolf and by Arthur Wolf to include excerpts from his letter of January 14, 1999 to Lord Menuhin.

Information on jaw and skull disorders in teenage violinists taken from: “Les effets du jeu du violon sur les dimensions faciales et la fréquence des dysfonctionnements temporo-mandibulaire chez les adolescents,” by Outi Kovero, DDS, PhD, Institut d’ontologie, University of Helsinki, Finland, from the magazine “Médecin des Arts,” issue number 10, 1999-26.