This book does an excellent job of describing some crucial technical skills needed to understand how to play the cello efficiently. It's focus on specifics, especially when it comes to the circular nature of the bodies motions, is excellent.

The writing regarding "playing without pain" is unfortunately incorrect. There is no need to be afraid of playing the cello. For those cellists who are experiencing pain that is attributed to "over playing" or "tendinitis," I highly recommend John E. Sarno's book "Healing Back Pain" or "The Mindbody Prescription." These types of pains are purely psychogenic, and have no physical origin. "New Directions" is spreading misinformation regarding the causes of muscle skeletal pain.

I can speak from experience: I suffered from RSI for 2.5 years, and I thought it was because of the cello. I tried desperately to apply the technique in this book to "solve" the problem. It had no effect on my pain level, but it did help me think of how my body moves. I recovered from RSI in 2 days after reading "The Mindbody Prescription" by John Sarno. Sarno even mentions cellists in his books!

Read "New Directions" for the technique ideas and ignore the unsupported claims about pain syndromes. If you want to heal your RSI, read John Sarno's books.

I strongly recommend this fine book to all cellists and all cello teachers who in general have not got a clue about ANATOMY. After having suffered several tendinitis and excrutiating back pain I found immediate relief following Mr Sazer's recommandations.

Author is a cellist who has practical suggestions for prevention and amelioration of symptoms related to posture and technique. The line illustrations are useful. Relaxation issues are discussed in relation to repetitive stress conditions. This book can be useful for beginners and professionals alike.

This book is well written and easy to read, but as a beginning cello player, it ended up being more confusing than helpful. The suggestions made in the book seem like logical contradictions to traditional instruction, but when trying to learn the basics from all of the cello teachers I tried, they were irritated by alternate methods described in the book. I think the major problem is that instead of posing the "new directions" as alternate methods to an old system and explaining the initial reasons for the old methods coming about thereby allowing the reader to choose for herself, it just discards traditional methodology altogether.

Este libro es muy �til para la gente que se sienta mal o sufre dolores al tocar. Te explica c�mo hacer para tocar libremente y sin dolor.

Este libro es muy útil para la gente que se sienta mal o sufre dolores al tocar. Te explica cómo hacer para tocar libremente y sin dolor.

So, after 30 years of semi-professional recording and performance, my back is getting pretty tweaky. Plus, I was starting to get some repetitive stress injury after a dense season. My doc said I may have to quit. Well, this book is totally revolutionary. It gives many many ideas about how to reposition myself while playing; things I'd never thought of. I am back playing. I have many ideas still to incorporate, but I already feel much better. I now require my students to get this book. Everyone is excited about these ideas. This is, I repeat, revolutionary, and should be required for those of you who want to play without pain for many years. I deducted one star because there is just so much information, that it looks a little overwhelming. It would probably have been better to do two books. But, since it's not, take a look at it.