Playing Chords

Dear Sonia!! Thank you so much for asking and great news! An in-depth course on the Suite No.3 with Richard O'Neill is our upcoming new release and should be live on tonebase within the next few days!! 

Generally, I think it is challenging to give a definitive answer to your question regarding rolling vs splitting, simply because it depends on a few factors, what stylistic choices inform your choice between one or the other, because both approaches definitely have their place, but depend on context. 

Regarding crunchiness! That oftentimes relates to the initial attack/preparation of the bow on the string. Our initial instinct is oftentimes: seeing a chord -> preparing our body and mind for extra effort/force/attack and that oftentimes can leads to unwanted results in terms of sound quality, or articulation, expression. So one way to approach a nice, intentional sound when it comes to double stops, is simply playing two open strings and trying to understand just how much, how little bow pressure do I need in different areas of the bow to achieve the sound I want when playing on two strings? 

And always keeping in mind, whether the chord is rolled (1+1+1+1 division), or split up (mostly 2+2 division).. it is really just a vey quick succession of nice sounding notes with an elegant, quick, but soft string crossing between them. Of course, with some movements in the Suite 3 having quite complex chords in quick succession this can appear challenging, but taking the time while practicing to organize, prepare both left hand and bow for nice sounding individual notes (rolling) or pairs of notes (2+2) is absolutely worth it. To bring this to a natural, organic tempo, the left hand and bow preparation will still remain the same, but over time you will be able to do it faster and faster and eventually, will become second nature.