Pain in your neck, back, shoulders or forearms? Try trigger point massage.

Trigger points are dense spots of hyperirritable tissue in skeletal muscle. They can refer pain away from the site of origin and be caused by repetitive microtrauma, muscle strain, stress and anxiety.

Long hours spent in the practice room in a fixed playing posture doing the repetitive tasks of playing one’s instrument leaves musicians susceptible to developing trigger points in the neck, upper back, shoulder, and forearm. Trigger points can cause pain, stiffness, and restrict the freedom of movement we all desire in our playing. Below are some strategies for self massage to reduce trigger points.

Finding Trigger Points

Trigger points feel like “knots” or dense wads of tissue in the muscle and they are painful when poked. They can be commonly found at the base of the skull, about half way between the neck and the shoulder, between the shoulder blades and at the lateral side (palm up, thumb side) of the elbow. As a clarinet player I’ve also found them in the webbing of my right thumb.

Ischemic Compression Technique

There are several different self-release strategies for trigger points. My personal favorite is the ischemic compression technique.

For trigger points between the shoulder blades, place a golf ball or tennis between your back and a wall to apply pressure. For the neck and forearm pinch the trigger point between thumb and fingers.

Step 1: Locate the trigger and put pressure on until it hurts

Step 2: Release pressure just enough so that the pain stops and hold here for 10-20 seconds. This should not be painful!

Step 3: Increase pressure to stay just under the pain threshold.

Repeat steps 2-3 until you feel the trigger melt away under your fingers. This process will take about 2 minutes and should not be painful. As you hold pressure on the area, you will be able to gradually increase the pressure without it being painful until you are giving a lot of force and the trigger seems to “melt” away.

(Trigger Point Therapy - Ischemic Compression Technique, n.d.)

References

Häggström, Mikael (2014). "Medical gallery of Mikael Häggström 2014". WikiJournal of Medicine 1 (2). DOI:10.15347/wjm/2014.008. ISSN 2002-4436. Public Domain.

Trigger Point Therapy—Ischemic Compression Technique. (n.d.). Niel Asher Education. Retrieved December 29, 2020, from https://www.nielasher.com/blogs/video-blog/trigger-point-therapy-ischemic-compression-technique