Health and Wellness Resources

The AVS Health and Wellness Committee has collected the following list of resources for anyone who might be concerned about injury, avoiding injury, treatment options (places and professionals), healing, and long-term maintenance. The Health and Wellness Committee invites users to propose additions to the lists below. The entries are grouped as web links, videos, and selected books and articles.

The AVS disclaims any responsibility for the content, information, or the privacy and security policies on the websites listed below, and does not exert any editorial or other control over those sites. The content below is not intended to be used for medical diagnosis or treatment or as a substitute for professional medical advice. The AVS does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or timeliness of any information presented in the resources listed below.

Web Links to Clinics, Workshops, Programs, Services and Techniques

Michael Kimber – Finding a Healthy Setup on Violin and Viola

Performing Arts Medicine Association

The Center for the Performing Artist at Weill Cornell Medical College

Brigham and Women’s Hospital Performing Arts Clinic

The Actors Fund Performing Artists Medical Clinic

Cleveland Clinic Center for Performing Artists

Virginia Mason Clinic for Performing Artists

Houston Methodist Center for Performing Arts Medicine

Performing Artist’ Health Clinic

Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago Performing Arts Medicine

Good Shepherd Performing Arts Rehabilitation Center

Performing Arts Occupational Therapy

University of Michigan Performing Arts Injury Clinic

Texas Center for Music & Medicine

The Feldenkrais Method

The Complete Guide to the Alexander Technique

Alice Brandfonbrener  – “Things Are Seldom What They Seem”

Proformavision:  Kathleen Riley teaches a workshop on physiologic monitoring to enhance musical performance using biofeedback and MIDI

Why is there a Substance Abuse Problem among the Artists Community?

Smoking and Artistry – Why Artists Smoke

RehabCenter.net

 

Selected Books posted on Amazon

Indirect Procedures: A Musician’s Guide to the Alexander Technique by Pedro de Alcantara (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997)

The New Rules of Posture: How to Sit Stand, and Move in the Modern Worldby Mary Bond

What Every Musician Needs to Know About the Body: The Application of Body Mapping to Music by Barbara Conable and Benjamin Conable

Fit as a fiddle : the musician’s guide to playing healthy by William Dawson

The Breathing Book:  Good Health and Vitality Through Essential Breath Work by Donna Farhi

Playing Less Hurt: An Injury Prevention Guide for Musicians by Janet Horvath (Paperback – Apr 15, 2010)

Playing and Teaching the Viola, Chapter 3, section VI, by Jeff Irvine:  Injuries: Prevention and Cure.

What Every Violinist Needs To Know About the Body  by Jennifer Johnson

The Musician’s Way: A Guide to Practice, Performance, and Wellness by Gerald Klickstein (Paperback – Sep 3, 2009)

You Are Your Instrument: the Definitive Musician’s Guide to Practice and Performance by Julie Lyonn Lieberman (Jun 1, 1997)

The musician’s survival manual: a guide to preventing and treating injuries in instrumentalists by Richard Norris

The Athletic Musician: A Guide to Playing Without Pain by Barbara Paull and Christine Harrison (Paperback – Feb 18, 1999)

Deepening Musical Performance Through Movement by Alexandra Pierce

The musician’s body: a maintenance manual for peak performance by Jaume Rosset I Llobet

The biology of musical performance and performance-related injury by Alan H. D. Watson

Articles appearing in past issues of The Journal of the American Viola Society

JAVS 27/1, p 61Spring 2011Lana AvisHealthy Habits: A Prescription for Comprehensive Musicianship
JAVS 27/1, p 19Spring 2011Hillary HerndonHealthy Bow, Healthy Sounds
JAVS 21/1, p 15Spring 2005Susan DuboisMartial Arts vs. the Big brown Bear
JAVS 20/2, p 15Fall 2004Rita PorfirisPreparing Berio’s Sequenza
JAVS 20/1, p 45Spring 2004Karen RitscherPressure! Or Producing Prodigious Power?
JAVS 19 online, p 10 Summer 2003Barry GreenView from the Middle
JAVS 18/2–3, p 852002Victoria
Voronyansky
Ways to Improve Your Practice through Better Understanding of Physical Demands
JAVS 18/2–3, p 632002Robert DewThe Coordinated Action, Part 2: Instinctive Responses
JAVS 18/1, p 512002Robert DewIn response to Instinct—Karen Tuttle’s Insights into the Coordinated Action—Its Mechanisms, Articulation, and Prerequisites
JAVS 17/1, p 252001Heidi CastlemanThe Basics Revisited: Artistic Distinctions “Your Primary Instrument: You and Your Body
JAVS 16/3, p 492000Dan WhitmanA Thumb’s Decline: To Fuse or Not to Fuse
JAVS 15/3, p 291999Ralph Fielding and Joan FirraThe Athletic Musician: A Review
JAVS 14/2, p 311998Christine RutledgeThe Art and Value of Warming Up
JAVS 14/1, p 511998Don EhrlichCuring the Collapsing Finger
JAVS 12/2, p 291996Janette S. CaputoMusic Is Like Breathing
JAVS 6/1, p 161990Darrel Barnes A Practical Approach to Viola Technique
JAVS 5/3, p 271989Don EhrlichPreventing Ulnar Problems
JAVS 5/3, p 251989Steven AnsellMusical Maladies
JAVS 5/2, p 31989Don EhrlichPreventing Injury
JAVS 3/2, p 11987Bernard FleshlerDamaging Decibels