Alexander Technique

Oh, my aching back! I thought I’d never escape the regular reoccurrence of my severe and sharp back pain. I was one of those individuals who would always put his back ‘out.’ I have spent more time in the offices of Chiropractors as I have in Dentist’s, Doctor’s and Optometrist’s combined.

First of all, let me be clear that Chiropractors do wonderful work. Any therapy that uses the body’s natural resources to heal itself in lieu of drugs is okay with me. Before I discovered the Alexander Technique (www.alexandertech.org) Chiropractors (and to a lesser degree, Osteopaths) were my lifelines to back pain relief. But that was therapy, to make a distinction between therapy and education. The Alexander Technique is an education.

Despite years of practicing martial arts I was never able to translate the good postural lessons I received into my daily life patterns. I would put my back out at the most unexpected times. A few times I lifted heavy objects, like a mover’s box of CDs without bending my knees. I deserved it. But then, one time, my back just popped when I was handed a 7-month-old baby over a dinner table – ping! I was laid up for a month after that! My back pain was so chronic it developed into full-blown sciatica in the 80s. I needed months of chiropractic therapy and I used a cane briefly.

During a trip to London in 1992 I was in Foyles bookshop in Tottenham Court road, and a miraculous thing happened. I was idly looking through a book and another book slipped off the table and onto my foot, causing a little pain. The book was about the Alexander Technique. I was then recovering from another bout of back injury and I was even contemplating surgery for a ruptured disk. I had heard about this technique but I carefully avoided it over the years, for reasons I won’t go into right now. But this new pain in my foot was obviously meant to tell me something (“Wake up, dummy.”).

I bought the book and read it on the plane journey home. What I quickly learned was that I might not actually have a bad back. I read that we do some horrible unconscious things to ourselves as we move through the day that creates a bad back. This confirmed a suspicion I had for many years – that I had a very strong back but I kept doing stupid things that would put it ‘out’ (of alignment). The founder of the technique, Frederic Mathias Alexander, came to the same conclusion about the loss of his voice over a hundred years earlier (it took him nine years to figure it out). As I read more I came to the conclusion that F.M. Alexander was a great thinker and discovered something incredible. I had to find an Alexander Technique teacher as soon as I got home to New York.

One of my great comforts is massage and I was seeing Rhonda Care for several years (Rhonda is now an acupuncturist). I asked Rhonda if she knew of any Alexander teachers and she referred me to Martha Bernard, who also turned out to be a professional operatic soprano and also taught voice.

I booked my first lesson with Martha immediately and I was soon initiated into the joys of inhibiting my habits and leading my head upwards, one sunny, summer afternoon. I couldn’t believe how effective just one lesson was. I was walking on air afterwards. Martha was a wonderful teacher who was encouraging, compassionate and extremely precise. It was obvious that she totally embraced the technique and spent many years in personal study. After six lessons with Martha I knew clearly what I had been doing wrong all my life to get that bad back, and I was well on my way to never having a bad back again. After twenty or so lessons I turned to Martha and said, “I have to learn how to teach this! Everybody has got to learn this!” Her first reaction was to discourage me, she said it would take a very long time to train as a teacher, that most are deceived at first, thinking it’s very easy. But I had already learned that nothing is easy to learn, both as a musician and a dabbler in the martial arts, so I was prepared for the worst. Martha recommended the training school run by her teacher, Thomas Lemens (www.ati-net.com). It is called The Institute for The Alexander Technique, or IFAT.

A week later I was in the town of Katonah, New York, meeting Thomas Lemens and being interviewed. I was accepted. Ordinarily there is a long waiting period. A new September term was about to start, and had been fully booked up. But just a week earlier a new student had an automobile accident and had to cancel, sadly for her. I was to take her place. From the beginning of that term my life would never be the same again.

It was the beginning of a four-year course. Classes were Monday to Friday and started at 8 a.m. and ended at 11 a.m. The total course time was 2400 hours. 1600 hours was normal to qualify for a degree in any other school, but Thomas felt that even after 4 years you were just really beginning to understand the subtleties. My morning started at 6 a.m., when the alarm went off. I drove for nearly an hour to Katonah. There weren’t any breaks in the three hour classes. We also had to study singing, dressage and anatomy. After school I drove to New York City to work as a record producer.

One of my students. The first photo was at the start of her first lesson and the second was after her first lesson. Notice how she is leaning back in the first photo, in a attempt at good posture. In the second photo her back is much straighter, her head is properly oriented in the upward direction (her head is slightly jutting out in the first photo).

I spent the first year only being worked on by other, more senior students and two lessons a morning by Thomas. Every so often we had very long weekend seminars. I wasn’t allowed to touch another student until the second year. Needless to say, my back was becoming as strong as an oak tree and as flexible as bamboo. There was a certain amount of pain involved but it was all in my legs. This is necessary for a teacher’s stamina but those who just want to learn the technique often get a taste of this too. But what’s wrong with having strong legs? Fortunately, years of Tai Chi made me used to this kind of workout. In fact, many Alexander Teachers are also proficient in Tai Chi; they seem to go hand in hand.

In the fourth year we did intern work, which is teaching volunteers from outside of the school. Some of my students were still in high school, some were musicians and one an architect; their ages ranged from 13 to 82. After I graduated I began a private practice and taught many others. I still teach today, but to a limited amount of people since I am primarily a record producer, which takes up most of my time.

Many websites are dedicated to the technique and there are some great books on the subject. F.M. Alexander wrote some wonderful books and they are all available. Unfortunately all written information on the technique will only serve as an introduction. It can’t be learned from a book, you must have one-on-one lessons from a qualified teacher. But the product of Alexander lessons is certain knowledge of how to use your mind to guide your body, to use yourself in a logical, systematic and economical way and to undo bad motor and postural habits. In other words, you learn how to avoid self-injury and how to have a healthier way of life. In other, other words: kiss your bad back goodbye!