ABSTRACT
Demetrios Constantine Dounis, a Greek-born concert violinist, mandolin player, conductor, and medical doctor, developed “an organized, unified approach to violin technique, which included a development of the mind and its observational capacities.” Dounis’s students were professional violinists and other performers seeking a solution to their specific playing problems. Dounis distinguished between shifting used in slow and in fast playing. To release pressure from the fingers, in slow ascending shifts, the left wrist flexes inward, while in slow descending shifts, it flexes outward. The finger motion in vibrato is initiated by the fingertip, through repeated down (depress) and up (release) pulsating motions: “This motion, performed in isolation, develops the sensitivity of the fingers to the strings and develops awareness to the origin of the vibrato.” The years during and after World War II witnessed a rise in the number and influence of women violin soloists with Italian Gioconda de Vito, Polish Ida Haendel, and American Guila Bustabo occupying prominent places.
