The Spohr fingering principles as manifested in his Violinschule

• Main Author: Shaw, Annien
• Other Authors: Sandmeier, Rebekka
• Format: Doctoral Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: Faculty of Humanities 2020
• Subjects: Music
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/11427/30859

In 1832 the violinist, composer and pedagogue, Louis Spohr, published a treatise on violin technique entitled Violinschule von Louis Spohr. Of Spohr’s many publications, his treatise on violin technique has remained his most notable published work. This thesis determines the fingering principles implicit in Louis Spohr’s treatise that would manifest themselves in a violinist if his Violinschule were applied as a tutor. The opening chapter briefly summarises the development of violin fingering and the external factors that impact on such techniques. A background sketch of Louis Spohr’s career references the influences on him as a violinist, as well as his invention of the chin rest in approximately 1820. The Violinschule is then analysed to derive fingering principles ranging from the rudimentary to advanced expressive fingering. The principles (or rules) are manifested in the order of the skills and techniques a student would acquire through practising the exercises provided in the Violinschule. The retrieved principles are then sorted into a table of categorised rules. By applying the table of rules to the Theme and Variation exercise (No. 66) in the Violinschule, the underlying hierarchy of certain rules is revealed. The stylistic use of expressive fingering is highlighted in a chapter on performance and style. The influence of Spohr’s chin rest on his own fingering development is investigated in a brief chapter by comparing the fingering rules to works by Spohr composed before 1820. The table of rules is then applied to a comparison of five editions of Louis Spohr’s Violin Concerto No. 9, as presented in the Violinschule, edited by himself, his student (Ferdinand David) and his student’s students (Henry Schradieck and Friedrich Hermann), tracking the relevance of his fingering rules through the lineage of teacher to student. The study concludes that Spohr’s role in the development of violin fingering was not as significant as originally thought, nor did it have the expected or long-lasting results. Furthermore, his invention of the chin rest had no direct impact on his own fingering methods or those of his students.