Hanon again
Sonarrat Citalis
One thing I heard in this group is that if you get into Hanon, if you don't keep
your ability up with the strength-building exercises it will decrease with great
speed. To this I say keep at it longer. It's like brushing your teeth, skip a
day and that can make all the difference. In time, it will build muscle - my
forearms and fingers are far thicker than they used to be - so the results will
stick. Think of a regular workout, where you do warmups, then exercise, then do
a cool-down period so that the lactic acid isn't allowed to build up. Fingers
burning? Push through it. The hands are just like any other part of the body,
just more and more delicate moving parts.
2¢,
-Snrrt Ctls, yr fthfl srvnt.
Jim Trousdale
them in rhythms. Hanon is good if you can't get you fingers to move. It is
good for beginning adults also.
Sonarrat Citalis <sona...@postmark.net> wrote in message
news:H5Sq6.2179$54....@www.newsranger.com...
Deepak Subburam
I recently started trying the Hanon exercises and play the first two of
them. I notice that my left forearm and wrist (roughly) ache when I play
from the right to the left. I always thought that it was because I was doing
something wrong, but your posts make me think it might be simply because the
muscles are not strong enough and are straining, that it is normal and with
time it will go away. Is that true?
How should good, normal muscle ache feel as opposed to simple bad pain that
would lead to injury?
Deepak
Sonarrat Citalis <sona...@postmark.net> wrote in message
news:H5Sq6.2179$54....@www.newsranger.com...
ex-P.F.C. Wintergreen
news:991h9d$2mi$1...@nntp.Stanford.EDU...
> Hey Jeff!
>
> I recently started trying the Hanon exercises and play the first two of
> them. I notice that my left forearm and wrist (roughly) ache when I play
> from the right to the left. I always thought that it was because I was
doing
> something wrong, but your posts make me think it might be simply because
the
> muscles are not strong enough and are straining, that it is normal and
with
> time it will go away. Is that true?
>
> How should good, normal muscle ache feel as opposed to simple bad pain
that
> would lead to injury?
I've used Hanon for a long time, and have found it to be very beneficial. I
had the pain you are referring to, but I wouldn't let it get too out of
hand. If the pain gets to be too much, quit, and move on to your
repertoire. Unlike many in this group, I rather like Hanon. It was
frustrating to learn all those exercises, but once you master them, you're a
bad ass.
TS Eliot
Jim Trousdale
pain. If it hurts, stop and play something else. I think you don't have to
know why, just stop.
Sonarrat Citalis
>"Deepak Subburam" <subb...@stanford.edu> wrote in message
>news:991h9d$2mi$1...@nntp.Stanford.EDU...
>> Hey Jeff!
Piggybacking this message because Newsranger never got the original.
>> I recently started trying the Hanon exercises and play the first two of
>> them. I notice that my left forearm and wrist (roughly) ache when I play
>> from the right to the left. I always thought that it was because I was doing
>> something wrong, but your posts make me think it might be simply because the
>> muscles are not strong enough and are straining, that it is normal and with
>> time it will go away. Is that true?
Yes. Keep at it and effort will go -way- down.
>> How should good, normal muscle ache feel as opposed to simple bad pain that
>> would lead to injury?
"Feel the burn." But don't stop when it burns! Stop when the burning does,
otherwise you've got lactic acid in your muscles and they'll be ruined. As long
as you keep your hands moving it shouldn't be a problem.
>I've used Hanon for a long time, and have found it to be very beneficial. I
>had the pain you are referring to, but I wouldn't let it get too out of
>hand. If the pain gets to be too much, quit, and move on to your
>repertoire. Unlike many in this group, I rather like Hanon. It was
>frustrating to learn all those exercises, but once you master them, you're a
>bad ass.
The only one that still gives me trouble is the legato scales in thirds. I
can't for the life of me get those right.
-Snrrt Ctls, yr fthfl srvnt.
Dragon Code: DC2.Mfps+D Gm L12f T2c Phlwlt Sku Cpi+/wh:wh,ebl++ Bic/wa A17
Fr Ni M O+ H $- F---! R+++! Ac~ J(r++v--) U! I V---! Q---! Tc++ Df+++!
Sonarrat Citalis
>
>Without answering any of your questions I can tell you, don't play through
>pain. If it hurts, stop and play something else. I think you don't have to
>know why, just stop.
No, don't just STOP! If your muscles feel like they're burning, that's lactic
acid. Maybe this is why Hanon has been so vilified - wussy pianists stop when
it starts to hurt and thus they ruin their muscles.
-Snrrt Ctls, yr fthfl srvnt.
Dragon Code: DC2.Mfps+D Gm L12f T2c Phlwlt Sku Cpi+/wh:wh,ebl++ Bic/wa A17
Carl Tait
<subb...@stanford.edu> wrote:
>
>I recently started trying the Hanon exercises and play the first two of
>them. I notice that my left forearm and wrist (roughly) ache when I play
>from the right to the left. I always thought that it was because I was doing
>something wrong,
If your forearm and wrist are hurting in Hanon 1 and 2, you're *definitely*
doing something wrong. As a guess (and it's only a guess), I'd say you're
probably trying to play with a locked wrist, leaving your poor fingers to
do all the work. This can cause pain all the way up to the elbow.
Relax your wrist, letting the weight of the hand "walk" from finger to
finger. Let the notes overlap very slightly to make the weight transfer
easier -- think of what your feet and legs do when you're walking. Also,
make sure that each finger is aligned with the forearm when it plays:
make small side-to-side adjustments of the wrist as you go. If the finger
isn't lined up at the moment of attack, a lot of the force will be lost.
>How should good, normal muscle ache feel as opposed to simple bad pain that
>would lead to injury?
There is no "good, normal muscle ache" in piano playing.
--
Carl Tait
IBM T. J. Watson Research Center
Hawthorne, NY 10532
Jim Trousdale
playing if it hurts. Many careers have been ruined by playing through pain
and not stopping and going on to something else. Magazine after magazine
have articles of injury caused by not knowing when to stop.news:9M5t6.862$94....@www.newsranger.com...
Carl Tait
>
>Don't just stop playing Hanon if it hurts, stop playing whatever you're
>playing if it hurts. Many careers have been ruined by playing through pain
>and not stopping and going on to something else. Magazine after magazine
>have articles of injury caused by not knowing when to stop.
Not to mention the pianists whose careers have been wrecked by the
insanity of "playing through pain": Gary Graffman and Leon Fleisher
are perhaps the best known. Fleisher is now playing again after
several surgeries and several agonizing decades; Graffman's right
hand appears to have been permanently ruined.
The lucky ones like Richard Goode "only" get tendonitis, which is
unbelievably painful and can last for a year or more. On top of
that, the scarred tendons are thicker than they were, so recurrence
is not uncommon. (Goode has had tendonitis at least twice.)
Adding to an already scary subject, pain is often the *second*
symptom and may well mean that damage has already been done. If
you simply feel muscle fatigue that resembles carrying a heavy
load around for awhile, just stop playing and you should be fine.
However, if you've already gone through a stage where your hands
"feel funny" during or after playing, and *then* you get pain
that doesn't stop when you stop playing, see a doctor immediately.
robertandrews
>I always thought that it was because I was doing something wrong, but your
posts make me think it might be simply because the muscles are not strong
enough and are straining, that it is normal and with time it will go away.
There are two different points of view expressed here: one that says stop &
rest when you feel pain, the other says play through it. But there's a
problem with the "no pain, no gain" approach -- it means that all technical
progress relies on pain. Each time you play technical exercises, you won't
feel like you're making progress unless you feel pain. I don't think that
approach leads to enjoyable practice.
Let's compare piano playing with singing. Would you take the advice of a
singing teacher who said "sing through the strain"? Don't you prefer
listening to singers who sound effortless? For great musicians & athletes,
performance seems like second nature. That's because they are internally
very relaxed, even when exerting themselves to the fullest.
If you practice with pain, you'll play music with pain. I suggest you
occasionally meditate or take a hot bath before you practice Hanon. If you
ever come home slightly drunk, try playing some Hanon & notice the
differences (if any) in the way you play.
I'm willing to bet you're playing a little too fast. Beginners should play
Hanon slowly & evenly. You can also try varying the tone from legato to
staccato. If you feel actual pain, stop or go on to another piece. When
the pain is gone, try Hanon again.
greg presley
through
> >pain. If it hurts, stop and play something else. I think you don't have
to
> >know why, just stop.
>
> No, don't just STOP! If your muscles feel like they're burning, that's
lactic
> acid. Maybe this is why Hanon has been so vilified - wussy pianists stop
when
> it starts to hurt and thus they ruin their muscles.
>
> -Snrrt Ctls, yr fthfl srvnt.
Please disregard this post, which is dangerous advice. Playing the piano is
nothing like body-building. It is much more analagous to walking, an
activity in which the legs merely catch a shift of weight and the muscles
work minimally to support the bones -= that's all there is to it!.Even an
out-of-shape person can walk for an hour without being sore, because it is
not a muscle-building/breaking type of activity. If you understand the
concept of shifting the weight of the forearm from finger to finger, you
will never experience pain when playing the piano. Until you understand that
concept, you are endangering the health of your playing apparatus,
especially when playing something like Hanon, which is mind-numbing enough
that you might not even be paying attention to the sensations your fingers
are trying desperately to send to your brain. Greg
J e r
I'd like more onfo on the concept of shifting weight of the forearm from
finger to finger. Is there a book or video that describes it?
AW mentions a "pull" and Barbara LIster-Sink in Freeing the Caged Bird talks
of a "freely falling forearm". Are these all different methods or just
different words describing the same physical action?
Regards, J e r
jwelte...@cfl.rr.com
My teacher tells me to stop whenever I detect tension of any kind
while playing Hannon. He says I can permenantly damage my fingers,
wrists or arms. I drop my arms and shake the tension out or slow way
down while playing and that works. I only practice them 1/2 hour
every other day and have been practicing Hannon for 4 months but I
still manage to improve every week. I'm able to play most all of them
at 60 bmp and a few up to 108 bmp. I think that learning to play them
in a relaxed manner actually increases my speed. I'm still very new
to piano (been playing for 13 months) and I realize theses numbers are
quite low but I expect to be up to 108 by the end of the year without
injury.
Deepak Subburam
opinion. I am saving this thread :) so I can later use your comments to
observe and watch what I might be doing wrong. This week is the last week of
term and I have three more exams, one lab report and one paper due.... :(
Deepak
Jim Trousdale
"Controversial" is a red flag. Should you not look into this and find out
why before its too late? If you found out, after months and months of
practice, that it was the wrong material for you it would be regretful.
<jwelte...@cfl.rr.com> wrote in message
news:3ab6a564.42817024@news-server...
greg presley
nearly hang straight down from your shoulder). Now "walk" your fingers like
people do when they're telling a joke about someone walking. Your fingers
should make loud thunks on the desk top, with very little effort to lift
them. If you are "normal" you probably used your index finger and the middle
finger. Try walking the 3rd and 4th fingers, and the 4th and 5th fingers.
Hold onto the sensation of your heavy arm making your fingers give a healthy
thunk as they walk. It should all feel very natural. Now transfer to the
piano bench. Your forearm is in a different position relative to your
fingers but you can still utilize the forearm weight and transfer it from
note to note. If you can't remember the sensation, stand up again and walk
your fingers again. Shorter fingers might have to rock a little bit to
accept the weight from a longer finger. That's ok. That's really all there
is to it. When seated at the piano, your wrist will give a little bit with
every single note that you play, because it acts a bit as a shock-absorber
in this process. That too is ok. As long as your "neutral" position is to
have a more or less level wrist, you need only return to that after every
note that you play. The louder you need to play a note or chord, the higher
the wrist you start with, and snap downward (this may be the "pull" that
you have read about). (More downward distance equals more possible use of
gravity). The softer you need to play, the less this little "jog" of the
wrist actually takes place. Still, you are using gravity to assist the
downward motion of the fingers. Good luck, Greg
(PS a demonstration is worth a thousand words, but I don't know how to do
that for you over the computer)
"J e r" <mil...@prodigy.net> wrote in message
news:995mno$5fns$1...@newssvr06-en0.news.prodigy.com...
Carl Tait
>
>Try this, Jer. Stand up near a surface like a desk.(So that your arm can
>nearly hang straight down from your shoulder). Now "walk" your fingers like
>people do when they're telling a joke about someone walking. Your fingers
>should make loud thunks on the desk top, with very little effort to lift
>them. If you are "normal" you probably used your index finger and the middle
>finger. Try walking the 3rd and 4th fingers, and the 4th and 5th fingers.
>Hold onto the sensation of your heavy arm making your fingers give a healthy
Good description, Greg -- and anyone who tries this may well wonder how
they lived with the effort of pure finger action for so long....
One question, though: do you really want to release the weight of the
forearm in *all* playing? This came up in a post last week, and I
mentioned that I found simple hand weight to be enough in most cases --
balancing the weight on the fulcrum of the knuckles with a loose wrist.
The forearm is gently and effortlessly supported by the very strong
muscles of the upper arm, without releasing its weight all the way
down into the fingers.
Now there certainly *are* cases where you want to use forearm weight,
especially in full-toned forte passages. But in general, I think it's
too much tonnage to drag around, especially in rapid passagework at
mezzo-forte or below. Chopin Op. 10/2 becomes even more intractable
if one is trying to readjust the heavy forearm weight while playing.
>[...] The louder you need to play a note or chord, the higher
>the wrist you start with, and snap downward (this may be the "pull" that
>you have read about).
I think the Abby Whiteside "pull" is generated primarily from the upper
arm -- a sort of tugging motion used in pieces like Chopin Op. 10/7.
It seems advisable to combine such a motion with a grasp at the
fingertips, but I don't remember if AW specifically says that.
>(More downward distance equals more possible use of gravity).
I believe that's Lister-Sink's "freely falling forearm," a.k.a.
dropping or landing.
But in case we get distracted on these interesting technical side issues,
it's worth pointing out we *emphatically* agree that the body-building
school of piano playing is fundamentally misguided (and I know of no major
pianist or teacher who advocates such an approach). "No pain, no gain"
is the single worst piece of advice one could give to a pianist, leading
to an enormous, unnecessary amount of physical exertion and possible
permanent damage to the hands.
Carl Tait
<subb...@stanford.edu> wrote:
>
>Thanks all for your opinions. Especially Carl and Greg who gave a differing
>opinion. I am saving this thread :) so I can later use your comments to
>observe and watch what I might be doing wrong.
Glad this discussion was of some interest, but one more quick point --
I didn't mean to convey the impression that simply practicing Hanon will
cripple you for life. I merely find these exercises stupendously boring
and essentially useless. Practice should never be dull for the pianist,
regardless of how it sounds to a listener. I've been known to practice
a C major scale for an hour with high intensity because I was paying
extremely close attention to the behavior of each finger (especially
the thumb).
The issue that Greg and I (and several other posters) found so horrifying
was the notion of "playing through the pain" -- in *anything* at the piano,
not just Hanon. If I were asked to summarize the most important idea in
piano playing in three words, it would be this: "Pain is bad."
Sonarrat Citalis
<robert...@hotmail.com> scratched into my forehead in
<Qdct6.1761$pP2.2...@paloalto-snr1.gtei.net>:
>If you practice with pain, you'll play music with pain. I suggest you
>occasionally meditate or take a hot bath before you practice Hanon. If you
>ever come home slightly drunk, try playing some Hanon & notice the
>differences (if any) in the way you play.
I've found just the opposite. If I practice until it hurts, even to
the point that I feel sick, that is the point at which normal pieces
feel completely natural. Even the contortions of the Rach 3 Concerto
feel easier after imbuing the keys with your fingerprint for an hour.
--
-Sonarrat Citalis, musical drakkitten.
Wing brother of ChocoboKick, Kerowyn Silverdrake,
Rowan, Ninereeds, Asrai, Hespa, and perhaps others.
J e r
Using the method you describe, where should the elbow be positioned relative
to the keyboard? Above, level or below?
Ms. Lister-Sink said the forearm-wrist-hand should look like a Roman arch
with the wrist its apex. Its hard to see in the video, but it looks like her
elbow is below the keys certainly not above which would destroy the arch. My
guess is that the elbow and finger tips are level which says the bench
height should be adjusted to position my elbow at the same height as the
keys when my arm is dropped at my side.
For those who think feeling pain is good, Ms. Lister-Sink has produced the
video to teach piano technique free of pain.
Thanks Greg for the explanation. Well done.
Regards, J e r
jwelte...@cfl.rr.com
wrote:
>May I ask you a question? As you must know by now, Hanon is controversial.
>"Controversial" is a red flag. Should you not look into this and find out
>why before its too late? If you found out, after months and months of
>practice, that it was the wrong material for you it would be regretful.
To be honest, I'm so new that I didn't know it was so controversial
and I never considered that it might be a waste of time. So here's my
immediate response and reasoning in suport of what I'm doing:
My teacher is having me learn the first 20 exercises for the purpose
of increasing velocity. It's one of my weaknesses. I enjoy the
exercies and I think it's helping. At this early point in my "career"
I believe there is very little I can do on the piano that would be a
waste of my time anyway. I play them a few times a week, it's not a
central focus.
Note: He tells me to slow down whenever I feel tension or pain and if
that doesn't work than to stop the exercise if that doesn't work.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On a general note to the group concerning muscle tension this is what
he said about "playing through the pain": (Note that he used to work
out during his college days and has a black belt in some karate so I
believe he knows how to build muscles)
He explained to me today that building muscles (say in your calves or
pecks or biceps) is very different than improving your piano skills.
The muscles in your forearm used in piano playing are surrounded by a
sheath. If your muscle get's swollen it can irritate the sheath which
itself can become swollen. The result of that may be tendonitis
which, when left untreated can cause carple tunnel problems and can
result in sugery. The swelling may not go down without oral
medication like cortisone either.
He gives me the example of a college professor who assigned 4 students
the Hannon exercises and provided no supervision. After a few months
the students, unknown to each other, began having so much pain that
one by one they saw a doctor. The result was that all four had to
quit using their hands for anyting for 6-8 weeks (they were in braces)
and 3 of them had tendonitis, one required carple sugery (always a BIG
deal with pianists). They sued the university and the professor was
dismissed.
He's had a couple students come to him with such problems, one even
had sugery scheduled. He could see instantly that she was really
messing herself up by playing with teeth grinding, jaw gripping
force/tension.
Again, I'm very new and by no means an expert but I have seen in my
own playing that I can play faster if all superfleous tension and
movement is gone, not to mention pain!
Sonarrat Citalis
forehead:
<snip>
>He gives me the example of a college professor who assigned 4 students
>the Hannon exercises and provided no supervision. After a few months
>the students, unknown to each other, began having so much pain that
>one by one they saw a doctor. The result was that all four had to
>quit using their hands for anyting for 6-8 weeks (they were in braces)
>and 3 of them had tendonitis, one required carple sugery (always a BIG
>deal with pianists). They sued the university and the professor was
>dismissed.
That sound you just heard was my copy of The Virtuoso Pianist being shoved
forcefully into the fireplace. After reading some of the comments here I had
stopped using it for a while, but this clinches it. Thank you for explaining
about the sheath. If what you described had happened to me, it would have
absolutely destroyed me. School is why I get up in the morning, but the piano
is why I'm still alive by the time the day is over. My hands are strong enough
now that I can do without Hanon, so out it goes. From here on out, I'll warm up
by playing some Chopin or Alkan Etudes - slowly - and then practicing my
favorite classics, which I usually do at full speed and full tilt when I can get
away with it. Thank you again, you may have just saved my life.
-Snrrt Ctls, yr fthfl srvnt.
Dragon Code: DC2.Mfps+D Gm L12f T2c Phlwlt Sku Cpi+/wh:wh,ebl++ Bic/wa A17
greg presley
> Good description, Greg -- and anyone who tries this may well wonder how
> they lived with the effort of pure finger action for so long....
>
> One question, though: do you really want to release the weight of the
> forearm in *all* playing? This came up in a post last week, and I
> mentioned that I found simple hand weight to be enough in most cases --
> balancing the weight on the fulcrum of the knuckles with a loose wrist.
> The forearm is gently and effortlessly supported by the very strong
> muscles of the upper arm, without releasing its weight all the way
> down into the fingers.
>
> Now there certainly *are* cases where you want to use forearm weight,
> especially in full-toned forte passages. But in general, I think it's
> too much tonnage to drag around, especially in rapid passagework at
> mezzo-forte or below. Chopin Op. 10/2 becomes even more intractable
> if one is trying to readjust the heavy forearm weight while playing.
No I really don't drag around forearm weight all the time. But I find that
if beginners use all this weight, they will more easily find the balance
point in faster and/or softer music where just the weight of the hand
suffices.If they try to make a subtle distinction before they have connected
to the sensations that the fingers are sending them, they sometimes shift
entirely over to finger playing and completely lose that shift of weight
concept.It's hard to get them to find it again. You are right however, that
there are gradations in the amount of weight actually being shifted. At a
certain point in musical training it is really the needs of the music,
especially the dynamic ranges, that dictate what the arms and fingers will
do, and sometimes concentrating on the music instead of the technical
approach will get good technical stuff happening. I so much appreciated
your saying the other day that most technique is mental. Truer words were
never spoken! Figuring out where you're going, how to get there efficiently,
how to let gravity and momentum assist you, and how to understand the
choreography of the hands, how they are shifting relative to the black keys,
and finding ways to minimize those kind of shifts can make a huge difference
in learning difficult pieces.
Greg
Carl Tait
>
>No I really don't drag around forearm weight all the time. But I find that
>if beginners use all this weight, they will more easily find the balance
>point in faster and/or softer music where just the weight of the hand
>suffices.
Aha, I see; that makes good sense.
>[...] I so much appreciated
>your saying the other day that most technique is mental. Truer words were
>never spoken! Figuring out where you're going, how to get there efficiently,
>how to let gravity and momentum assist you, and how to understand the
>choreography of the hands, how they are shifting relative to the black keys,
>and finding ways to minimize those kind of shifts can make a huge difference
>in learning difficult pieces.
Sounds like we're really on the same wavelength about technique.
By any chance, did you ever study with John Perry or one of his students?
I've worked with his pupils Steve Hall (intermittently) and Phillip Kawin
(regularly for the past two years), and these sorts of ideas come up all
the time in their teaching.
Carl Tait
>
>Using the method you describe, where should the elbow be positioned relative
>to the keyboard? Above, level or below?
Level, at least for me. But keep in mind I like to extend my arms slightly
while playing (better upper-arm control and better keyboard mobility), so
if I were to put my elbows at my sides, they'd be a little below the level
of the keyboard.
Deepak Subburam
top and replicating that feeling on the keyboard. I think I see what you
mean by shifting the forearm weight from key to key, but just wanted to
confirm with you!
So let's say I am playing a scale. The weight of my forearm (at least
partially) is supported through the finger that is pressing down on the key,
and is smoothly transferred to the next finger that plays the next key. Is
that correct?
I tried it and felt the difference, especially with my left hand - the
contrast is less less striking for my right hand, which I suspect grew into
this technique subconsciously sometime recently. My left hand did feel more
comfortable and at ease with this. However, it also felt like it had more
inertia and like I couldn't play as fast - though when I tried, I
surprisingly could.
I tried to distinguish between hand weight and forearm weight, like Carl
mentioned, ("balancing the weight on the fulcrum of the knuckles with a
loose wrist") but couldn't quite make the distinction. All I could
differentiate was between "less weight" and "more weight" by controlling how
much I used my upper arm/shoulders to lift up my forearm. I couldn't feel
where my hand started and forearm ended :) I don't know if my arm being
rather light had anything to do with it.
I tried to exaggerate "finger playing" by playing without any weight at all,
and it also felt a little alien to me - so I must not have been playing with
fingers alone in the past :) This is the first time I am consciously
observing how I press down on keys, and it is a little confusing. Anyway,
what I did notice with pure "finger playing" was that my fingers tended to
leave contact with the keys, and when they landed on them to hit the notes,
there's an audible thwack of the sound of the finger hitting the key. I've
heard the sound in other beginning students' playing before, and I think
I've occasionally done it myself as well, and now I know if I hear it again
to direct the person to this thread :)
Thanks again Greg and Carl!
Deepak
greg presley
> >Using the method you describe, where should the elbow be positioned
relative
> >to the keyboard? Above, level or below?
>
> Level, at least for me. But keep in mind I like to extend my arms
slightly
> while playing (better upper-arm control and better keyboard mobility), so
> if I were to put my elbows at my sides, they'd be a little below the level
> of the keyboard.
There is also the option (which I prefer) of leaving the elbows to the side
but putting quite a bit of air under the armpits - in other words, the
elbows float about 8-9 inches from the side of the body (at least if you are
relatively thin). This elbow position also necessitates rethinking the
position of the hand at the keyboard itself, since a straight line from the
elbow to the third finger means in practical terms, that the 4th and 5th
fingers will be very deep into the black keys most of the time -sometimes
nearly to the fall board, and the thumb will usually play very close to the
edge of the white keys. This feels and looks quite odd at first, but when it
becomes comfortable, allows for a great deal of freedom and ease at the
keyboard. Greg
greg presley
"Carl Tait" <cdtait@DELETE_ME.us.ibm.com> wrote >
> Sounds like we're really on the same wavelength about technique.
> By any chance, did you ever study with John Perry or one of his students?
> I've worked with his pupils Steve Hall (intermittently) and Phillip Kawin
> (regularly for the past two years), and these sorts of ideas come up all
> the time in their teaching.
No, but in the course of teaching piano, particularly in the past 5 years or
so, I have had to be ever more analytical about what I do that works in
order to communicate it better to students. (Prior to that, I worked for
nearly 20 years improvising for modern dancers and playing classical
repertory, but not teaching piano). Some of my teachers were also pretty
analytical about technique, and I credit them with 32 very active musical
years with no injuries. However, I have known many of John Perry's students.
He must be an amazing teacher, judging by the great playing ability of his
students. I also am a close friend of an advanced Taubman disciple, so I try
to glean what makes sense to me out of her approach. Greg
Carl Tait
<subb...@stanford.edu> wrote:
>
>I couldn't feel where my hand started and forearm ended :)
Thanks for posting the results of your experiements! A comment
on the above: if your hand and forearm feel glued together,
your wrist is probably still a bit stiff (not at all uncommon).
Try to avoid actively mashing the hand down from the wrist;
it's really not necessary. Just get a firm grasp on the key
from the fingertip to the knuckle -- making sure each segment
(phalanx) of the finger is propped up like a flying buttress --
and use the finger *alone* to support the weight. The knuckle is
the center point of balance, and should rise visibly as a result.
Also, make sure your whole finger stays slightly open, *not* in
an extremely tight arc as if you were typing. It shouldn't feel
like the nail of the finger is being pulled away from its bed,
but instead pressed gently *into* the bed.
To test yourself, play a single note and try to move your wrist
up and down using your other hand. This should require no effort
if your wrist is pliable. Repeat for every finger until you're
sure each one is supporting the weight properly.
Jim Trousdale
are playing passage work (many single notes) one cannot think of weight
shifting. The "weight theory), I believe, has been discredited. The term
"weight" implies no control over the drop. Impossible except in slow
passages. If you don't mean "no control" we should find another term. In
playing, for example, Chopin's Minute Waltz, can we even think about weight
transfer between notes. I believe the term weight should be discarded. What
we do is really keep as tension free as possible, not any more tension than
you need to play a passage, relaxed back through wrists, curved fingers. We
should not delude ourselves with the discredited term 'weight".
Carl Tait <cdtait@DELETE_ME.us.ibm.com> wrote in message
news:3ab73f9b....@news.newsguy.com...
greg presley
we achieve the best in anything physical through awareness. The conscious
intellectual mind interferes with many of the signals that our nerves are
sending to our brains all the time. (Too much information, as the saying
goes). But if we can spend some time on those sensations, we actually are
helping to reinforce good habits and to discover bad habits and correct them
before they endanger us. And this would be as true in skiing, tennis, or
golf, as it is in piano. Our hard work is not in building muscles, but in
developing awareness - which might be mentally fatiguing but not physically
fatiguing. Greg
"Deepak Subburam" <subb...@stanford.edu> wrote >
> So let's say I am playing a scale. The weight of my forearm (at least
> partially) is supported through the finger that is pressing down on the
key,
> and is smoothly transferred to the next finger that plays the next key. Is
> that correct?
Yes, that's correct.
Another sensation to begin to pay attention to, is the sensation of your
non-playing fingers lightly resting on the key tops. This resting prevents
certain bad habits, such as curling up the non-working fingers. A great
friend of mine talks about playing the piano with paws, not claws. Visualize
a big dog or a big bear playing the piano - and how soft would be the whole
bottom side of the hand and fingers. Now visualize a cat ready to attack
something playing the piano. How tight and tense all the fingers and the
underside of the hand are in this image. There is a lot of give possible in
the joints, knuckle, wrist, etc. of the hand. The hand can be strong, and
even one finger can temporarily stiffen to accept some weight, without the
whole unit of the hand being maintained in an attitude of tension.
Carl Tait
>
>Those considering the subject of "weight" when they are playing. When you
>are playing passage work (many single notes) one cannot think of weight
>shifting.
Hmm -- by that reasoning, you don't have to think about weight when
you're running, only when you're walking. I definitely think in terms
of weight shifting even when playing very rapid passagework -- though
less weight is necessary (as Greg and I discussed), and other factors
such as forearm rotation become equally important.
>The "weight theory), I believe, has been discredited.
Only in the sense of using nothing *except* weight to play -- i.e.,
mindless pounds falling on inert fingers. The *concept* of weight
remains an essential part of piano technique.
>The term "weight" implies no control over the drop.
No, not at all. It implies that one should *include* gravity in one's
arsenal of technical tools, not that one should use it exclusively.
Also, weight is not restricted to "dropping" -- in fact, the pure drop
is comparatively rare.
>Impossible except in slow passages. If you don't mean "no control"
>we should find another term.
I don't know anyone who uses it in the sense of "no control":
the fingers actively direct the weight into the keys even when
dropping from the forearm. Furthermore, shifting weight from finger
to finger in a melodic passage allows a far *greater* degree of
tonal control than finger action alone.
>In playing, for example, Chopin's Minute Waltz, can we even think about
>weight transfer between notes.
Yes, absolutely -- as long as you're talking about the simple weight of
the hand, not the whole forearm. Of course you'll also be using actively
grasping fingers and other parts of the mechanism as well, but gravity
definitely plays a role.
A fundamental problem in describing efficient piano technique is that
so many things are going on at the same time. The "pure weight" approach
advocated by Breithaupt (if I'm remembering my piano history correctly)
was a response to the "pure finger" approach of the Hanonesque school.
Neither side is entirely right or wrong; both weight *and* fingers are
important. When used properly, weight can take over much (but not all)
of the work previously delegated to the fingers.
"Pure weight" players (if there are any) play easily but sluggishly.
"Pure finger" players (of which there are thousands if not millions)
work like maniacs, produce half the volume with twice the effort,
and all too often end up with tendonitis and ruined hands.
>I believe the term weight should be discarded. What
>we do is really keep as tension free as possible, not any more tension than
>you need to play a passage, relaxed back through wrists, curved fingers. We
>should not delude ourselves with the discredited term 'weight".
Again, "weight" is most assuredly *not* a discredited term, except in
the restricted sense of trying to play everything with weight *alone*.
greg presley
"Jim Trousdale" <jim...@san.rr.com> wrote in message
news:Gmqu6.128813$GV2.30...@typhoon.san.rr.com...
> Those considering the subject of "weight" when they are playing. When you
> are playing passage work (many single notes) one cannot think of weight
> shifting. The "weight theory), I believe, has been discredited. The term
> "weight" implies no control over the drop. Impossible except in slow
> passages. If you don't mean "no control" we should find another term. In
> playing, for example, Chopin's Minute Waltz, can we even think about
weight
> transfer between notes. I believe the term weight should be discarded.
What
> we do is really keep as tension free as possible, not any more tension
than
> you need to play a passage, relaxed back through wrists, curved fingers.
I had a teacher who advocated teaching using the terms freedom and control
rather than weight and relaxation. You say potato, I say potahto. There is
really no good terminology to describe what happens in the physical
apparatus when a skilled pianist is playing fast passage work, but I can say
with absolute authority that the person who is using all finger motions
without any awareness of gravity (or its resultant effect which we call
weight) is going to finish the minute waltz or any other fast piece with a
hand and forearm that feel tight and tense, if not painful. Once the
sensation of weight and shift of weight are fully integrated into a
pianist's repertory of technique, other big muscle groups, such as the
deltoids of the back, and the triceps of the upper arm, will support enough
of the arm to keep heavy weight out of the fingers - but this is not
something we really even have to be conscious of, because the necessity of
moving fast is going to bring these muscle groups into play. Again, by
analogy, walking, jogging, running, and sprinting, are all on a continuum of
a basic activity which involves shift of weight. We could not possibly
control all the individual muscles which contribute to this activity, but we
can tell the body to move faster, and it will figure out the most efficient
way. However, from slowest to fastest, this activity still is using shift of
weight, although other factors come into play. If we tried on the other hand
to walk using shift of weight, then told the body that it had to try to run
by kicking up the legs and using only the muscles of the calf to push off
for each consecutive step, disaster would be the end result.
Greg
Deepak Subburam
excited :)
When I posted my first results previously, I still had not properly grasped
this new (for me)paradigm of piano playing. The eye opener came when I was
experimenting again today and accidentally trilled with my "wrist" instead
of my fingers like I always do. The sensation felt very different, and at
the same time, my hand looked elegant while doing the trill - like a
competent pianist's :) I then applied that to the rest of my playing, and
really noticed what 'walking with fingers' meant. In my previous
experimenting yesterday, while I was shifting the weight of my hand/forearm
from finger to finger, I was still consciously flexing and bending the
fingers down onto the keys.
Suddenly my hands looked different and the keyboard felt very different. It
feels somewhat sluggish, and I have to play rather slowly to avoid slipping
into my previous finger-typing style. But it *is* more enjoyable and
comfortable. And after half an hour or so, I noticed it getting better.
I should have waited till I spend more time on it before posting my results
again - but I was too excited :) I think my piano playing is going to
experience a sudden discrete jump these couple weeks! I agree with Greg - I
don't really think some important group of muscles that need training are
involved, it's more like a new way of doing things that I need to get used
to. So hopefully this is not going to be an uphill task for me. I think what
went wrong with me was that I am very used to typing at the keyboard and
naturally took that to the piano!
> Try to avoid actively mashing the hand down from the wrist;
> it's really not necessary. Just get a firm grasp on the key
> from the fingertip to the knuckle -- making sure each segment
> (phalanx) of the finger is propped up like a flying buttress --
> and use the finger *alone* to support the weight. The knuckle is
> the center point of balance, and should rise visibly as a result.
I *think* I am doing it right now - I notice my wrist moving quite a bit
more (not large swinging motions but subtler swayings) than before. However
I don't quite understand getting a 'grasp on the key from the fingertip to
the knuckle' and using the finger alone to support the weight. I can't think
what else can support the weight besides the finger. My wrist does feel
pliable - so I think I am doing it right. However my knuckle is not
prominently jutting out - what feels more prominent and important to me is
the second joint from the finger tip.
Thanks again Carl+Greg - if not for you I do not know when I would have
wised up!
Deepak
D DeBerry
describe that in a little more detail?
Thanks,
David
On Wed, 21 Mar 2001 19:53:33 -0800, "Deepak Subburam"
<subb...@stanford.edu> wrote:
Martin J. Paton
Citalis) wrote:
>I've found just the opposite. If I practice until it hurts, even to
>the point that I feel sick, that is the point at which normal pieces
>feel completely natural. Even the contortions of the Rach 3 Concerto
>feel easier after imbuing the keys with your fingerprint for an hour.
You will be having a very short musical career then.
Nick Mackenzie
muscle and tendon soreness. My physical therapist said it's because these
had not been stressed in decades. What worked for me was to slow down and
play more forecefully then stop shortly after the pain started. After
following this regime for a few months the pain is nearly gone and I can
play much faster and longer. Now if I could just touch my toes....
Jim Trousdale
uncontrolled drop and the very word itself seems to me to mean
gravity/weight drop. Pressure is a better word as the finger must push to
play. No push, no play. In the end the action must be with the finger
accompanied by only the tension needed to push. No more tension than needed
to press the key. Fingers can't be relaxed but from the wrists up we can.news:3aba41fd....@news.newsguy.com...
Martin J. Paton
Yes - I would agree. Playing when your arm feels like it's going to
fall off is going to do a lot of damage to you - which might not be
immediately noticeable.
Jim Trousdale
(stiff) and most of the others are adopted by us mere mortals because we are
trying to find out why we don't play better so we grasp a "system" hoping
that will do the trick. I maintain systems are futile. Common sense we must
use. Curved fingers, align arm and hand, relax as much as the passage will
allow, sit right slightly bent and that's it. Systems take up so much of our
time and thought' Some feel that by using weight that will solve our
problems and we don't have to practice as much. Poppy cock (forgive me). We
must practice alot to get noticeably better. If a system really had it after
all these years, everybody would be doing it. I have spent a lifetime trying
to solve my piano problems and the only thing that works is more practice
and loose arms and wrists (and I do it for a living). I enjoyed your
comments.news:3aba41fd....@news.newsguy.com...
Michael Haslam
Is it possible to play a piano-like keyboard ;-) either without gravity (eg
in outer space) or 'against' gravity (eg upside down)?
MJHaslam
Carl Tait
"Deepak Subburam" <subb...@stanford.edu> wrote:
>
>I don't quite understand getting a 'grasp on the key from the fingertip to
>the knuckle' and using the finger alone to support the weight. I can't think
>what else can support the weight besides the finger.
The most common problem is tightening up somewhere between the elbow and
knuckles, which supports the weight but reduces the force at the fingertip.
>My wrist does feel
>pliable - so I think I am doing it right. However my knuckle is not
>prominently jutting out - what feels more prominent and important
>to me is the second joint from the finger tip.
It sounds like you're not supporting the phalanx (segment of the finger)
just below the knuckle. Remember that there's not just one giant tendon
for the whole finger; each phalanx has its own pair of tendons. *All* of
the flexor (grasping) tendons must be active in order to support the finger.
Your hand should look and feel as if you're gently squeezing a rather large
and firm rubber ball.
Practice with your hand flat on a tabletop. When you have the finger grasp
correct, the arch of your hand will be pushed upwards and your whole hand
will be dragged forwards. Your wrist should not move vertically at all.
(On the piano, the wrist will stay even with the back of the hand.)
Sonarrat Citalis
<marti...@peghead.com> scratched into my forehead in
<67rmbt427edti2139...@4ax.com>:
>>I've found just the opposite. If I practice until it hurts, even to
>>the point that I feel sick, that is the point at which normal pieces
>>feel completely natural. Even the contortions of the Rach 3 Concerto
>>feel easier after imbuing the keys with your fingerprint for an hour.
>You will be having a very short musical career then.
On the contrary. I pulled out just two days ago after someone's
advice finally drilled it into my skull that I can't just pound the
piano forever without consequence. So now I've got the best of all
worlds - the benefits of Hanon training, agile and independent fingers
and the ability to play without killing myself.
Lest you think I'm just following my own ends, I really did think that
my methods could help someone. It was giving me dramatic results -
and if I had stuck with it, probably -too- dramatic, i.e. intense pain
and surgery. I don't play just to hear myself play. I make sure of
that by practicing on my dad's old iron piano, which is anywhere from
a third to a fifth out of tune. I want to take the neglected
literature and give it to the people - not just by playing it but by
explaining it, by giving some kind of common ground. I don't post
here just because I'm an egotistical prick who loves to upstage people
- ask the people who have received tapes on my dime. Now that this
paragraph is getting too egotistical, I'll just cut it off right here.
:>
--
-Jeff Jones and Sonarrat.
Martin J. Paton
Citalis) wrote:
>On the contrary. I pulled out just two days ago after someone's
>advice finally drilled it into my skull that I can't just pound the
>piano forever without consequence. So now I've got the best of all
>worlds - the benefits of Hanon training, agile and independent fingers
>and the ability to play without killing myself.
>:>
Just out of interest, what is this Hanon stuff all about?
I personally use Brahms, Dohyani and Czerny school of
velocity/dexterity. I find some of the Rachmaninoff Preludes and
Etudes-Tableaux to be fine exercises too ;)
Are they advanced exercises like Brahms, or are they simple pieces
that facilitate flexibility and movement?
Sonarrat Citalis
>>On the contrary. I pulled out just two days ago after someone's
>>advice finally drilled it into my skull that I can't just pound the
>>piano forever without consequence. So now I've got the best of all
>>worlds - the benefits of Hanon training, agile and independent fingers
>>and the ability to play without killing myself.
>Just out of interest, what is this Hanon stuff all about?
>I personally use Brahms, Dohyani and Czerny school of
>velocity/dexterity. I find some of the Rachmaninoff Preludes and
>Etudes-Tableaux to be fine exercises too ;)
I own the Brahms and Czerny sets. I've seen the Dohnanyi set but
haven't bought it yet. I too think the Rachmaninoff exercises are
good, but I'd also recommend the six Moments Musicaux.
>Are they advanced exercises like Brahms, or are they simple pieces
>that facilitate flexibility and movement?
31 are repetitive five-finger exercises that promote finger
independence. No. 31 is similar to a Czerny exercise. Then there are
exercises about turning the thumb under, scales, repeated notes,
slurs, scales in thirds, octaves and broken octaves, tremolos, and
stuph like that. The last set, the virtuoso exercises, I would
recommend you practice them until you can play them perfectly - once.
Ptnegun
>all these years, everybody would be doing it.
WOW! Well said. Is there anyone who wouldn't gladly pay thousands if there
were a guarantee in piano study? But it is my opinion that we all need to read
(study) anything we can get our hands on because one never knows when something
significantly positive may creep into our consciousness.
Patrick, who thinks this is one of the best discussions on this list in a long
while -- thanks Deepak (or whomever)
Carl Tait
>
>To continue; I actually think that most systems like "weight, James Ching
>(stiff) and most of the others are adopted by us mere mortals because we are
>trying to find out why we don't play better so we grasp a "system" hoping
>that will do the trick. I maintain systems are futile.
I completely agree that piano-playing "systems" are worthless -- but the
use of weight isn't a system. It's just one of many, many tools that make
up the package of piano technique.
The reason that Greg and I have been talking specifically about weight is
because it's something that many pianists -- even fairly advanced ones --
have never even thought about. It's like trying to teach a writer about
adjectives: there will be a period when a writer who has just discovered
the thrill of descriptors will write sentences like, "The big wonderful
black-and-white piano sat in the cramped, tiny, undersized corner."
Eventually, though, adjectives -- and weight, and other aspects of any
craft -- will become a balanced part of the artist's set of skills.
>Common sense we must
>use. Curved fingers, align arm and hand, relax as much as the passage will
>allow, sit right slightly bent and that's it.
Aha, the "Common Sense" system....
>Systems take up so much of our time and thought' Some feel that by using
>weight that will solve our problems
Nowhere near *all* of our problems, but quite a few of the hard ones.
I emphasize that I share your contempt for any "method" that claims
all piano problems can be cured with the use of one Super-Concept:
"The only thing that really matters is rotation [or relaxation,
or posture, or good dietary habits]!"
>and we don't have to practice as much.
On the passages where one was previously trying to manage with the fingers
what should have been handled by gravity, yes.
>Poppy cock (forgive me). We must practice alot to get noticeably better.
Practice is always necessary. But having a deep understanding of the
pianistic mechanism (of which weight is only one part) leads to faster and
more reliable solutions of technical problems, with much less physical effort.
>If a system really had it after all these years, everybody would be doing it.
Except that some excellent techniques are nontrivial to learn, and have
only minimal payoff for those at lower skill levels. People who only want to
play easy arragements of pop songs can get by with stiff, awkward technique.
And even advanced students usually require at least a few months before they
manage to wean themselves off of pure finger action.
>I have spent a lifetime trying to solve my piano problems and the only
>thing that works is more practice and loose arms and wrists
>(and I do it for a living). I enjoyed your comments.
I'm just realizing: if you're playing with "loose arms and wrists,"
you're using weight whether you believe it or not. But the problem
with many students is that simply telling them to play with a loose
wrist will have about as much effect as telling them to play like
Horowitz. As long as the fingers are hyperactive, the wrist is
going to keep stiffening up.
greg presley
"Michael Haslam" <mike...@dircon.co.uk> wrote in > >
> Is it possible to play a piano-like keyboard ;-) either without gravity
(eg
> in outer space) or 'against' gravity (eg upside down)?
>
> MJHaslam
In fact, yes. The accordion is a keyboard, and it is played on its side
(from the perspective of a pianist). But the action is much lighter than a
piano action, and all the dynamics are produced by the squeeze box, not by
how hard the keys are depressed. So the fact that gravity is not assisting
is not a big issue. In fact, harpsichordists and organists even more so, do
not find it necessary to incorporate a lot of shift of weight into their
techniques, because the actions of their instruments are so light in
comparison to the piano, and again dynamics are not produced by increased
pressure. Greg
>
>
>
greg presley
> To continue; I actually think that most systems like "weight, James Ching
> (stiff) and most of the others are adopted by us mere mortals because we
are
> trying to find out why we don't play better so we grasp a "system" hoping
> that will do the trick. I maintain systems are futile. Common sense we
must
> use.
I actually agree with you, Jim. There are some piano students for whom
proper technique came intuitively, and they don't need to ever hear the
words shift of weight or anything of the kind. However, many pianists start
their training with the notion that the fingers must do all the work, and
the wrists must be low, and the fingers lifted high, etc, etc. These are the
ones for whom a conscientious teacher has to find language to change
life long unproductive habits. My most common mantra is that we are training
awareness - not muscles - and the nerve connections between brain and
finger. If that is a system, then I must be guilty. Greg
greg presley
"Deepak Subburam" <subb...@stanford.edu> wrote in message
news:99f23p$ail$1...@nntp.Stanford.EDU...
> I think I am beginning to get this new technique and I am feeling rather
> excited :)
>
stages or plateaus. I hope you have a lot of fun in this plateau as you
become more and more aware of ways to play comfortably and without tension.
Then the next plateau will take place when your ease and confidence in your
playing apparatus begins to allow your ears to really participate fully in
the shaping of the music, which is, in the end, what it is ALL about. When
you are not concerned about how to get to the next note, but rather in how
you exactly you want that note to sound to communicate an emotion or a
musical idea to an audience, then you are making the transition from a
pianist to an artist. Good luck, Greg
Deepak Subburam
> describe that in a little more detail?
> Thanks,
> David
David,
I reproduce Greg's original post that can be found higher up in this thread,
in case your news server doesn't have it.
Regards,
Deepak
-------------------
Greg wrote:
Try this, Jer. Stand up near a surface like a desk.(So that your arm can
nearly hang straight down from your shoulder). Now "walk" your fingers like
people do when they're telling a joke about someone walking. Your fingers
should make loud thunks on the desk top, with very little effort to lift
them. If you are "normal" you probably used your index finger and the middle
finger. Try walking the 3rd and 4th fingers, and the 4th and 5th fingers.
Hold onto the sensation of your heavy arm making your fingers give a healthy
thunk as they walk. It should all feel very natural. Now transfer to the
piano bench. Your forearm is in a different position relative to your
fingers but you can still utilize the forearm weight and transfer it from
note to note. If you can't remember the sensation, stand up again and walk
your fingers again. Shorter fingers might have to rock a little bit to
accept the weight from a longer finger. That's ok. That's really all there
is to it. When seated at the piano, your wrist will give a little bit with
every single note that you play, because it acts a bit as a shock-absorber
in this process. That too is ok. As long as your "neutral" position is to
have a more or less level wrist, you need only return to that after every
note that you play. The louder you need to play a note or chord, the higher
the wrist you start with, and snap downward (this may be the "pull" that
you have read about). (More downward distance equals more possible use of
gravity). The softer you need to play, the less this little "jog" of the
wrist actually takes place. Still, you are using gravity to assist the
downward motion of the fingers. Good luck, Greg
(PS a demonstration is worth a thousand words, but I don't know how to do
that for you over the computer)
"J e r" <mil...@prodigy.net> wrote in message
news:995mno$5fns$1...@newssvr06-en0.news.prodigy.com...
> Greg,
>
> I'd like more onfo on the concept of shifting weight of the forearm from
> finger to finger. Is there a book or video that describes it?
>
> AW mentions a "pull" and Barbara LIster-Sink in Freeing the Caged Bird
talks
> of a "freely falling forearm". Are these all different methods or just
> different words describing the same physical action?
>
>
> Regards, J e r
Deepak Subburam
prominence - they rise visibly (a little) when I play on their associated
fingers. Doing this also makes my hands less sluggish and more mobile.
However, my arms end up going higher in general and I have to increase the
height of my chair significantly.
My hands end up stretching quite a bit more than before (when I was
finger-playing) and they are actually aching quite a bit now after some
practice. Stretching between notes is significantly less comfortable than
before, and the right hand and arm start to ache (from around the wrist to
somewhere in the center of my forearm) when I play for example the Prelude
in C Major from WTC 1 or the moonlight sonata mvmt 1. Yesterday something
related to my thumb started to give pain (as opposed to ache) - when I
flexed it sometimes something around my wrist shot off a pain signal that
travelled up my forearm. I think it was happening because I was
experimenting with different wrist heights and the thumb was off the
keyboard because of the wrist height and I was doing something bad to get it
to strike the keys.
Even now when I play with my wrist a little lower than yesterday, the thumb
feels odd. I think I am going to lay off the piano and experimenting for a
couple days :)
Deepak
I don't quite get the tabletop or the ball squeezing comparisons. My wrist
does stay even with the back of the hand.
Deepak Subburam
I'll keep what you've said in general in this thread in mind as I progress
in my piano studies.
Deepak
greg presley
> > My hands end up stretching quite a bit more than before (when I was
> finger-playing) and they are actually aching quite a bit now after some
> practice. Stretching between notes is significantly less comfortable than
> before, and the right hand and arm start to ache (from around the wrist to
> somewhere in the center of my forearm) when I play for example the Prelude
> in C Major from WTC 1 or the moonlight sonata
Rest is probably good right now. The default position of the hand should be
a natural five finger position (something smaller than an octave certainly).
When the hand has to open for some reason, it should relax back into this
five finger position as soon as possible. Many people leave their hands wide
open, feeling that they will be more secure in hitting certain notes or
octaves this way. But that stretched position is tense by nature and will
cause tension in the thumb joint and in the forearm. The hand should have a
lot of mobility side to side (rolling, essentially) and the thumb is often
the best part of the hand suited to opening up and relaxing back. If you
look at your hand while playing and see that your thumb is staying stretched
out, or even locking in some geometric way away from the rest of the hand
(and staying there), then you need to spend some time consciously telling it
to relax back closer to the rest of the hand, until that becomes habitual.
Good luck, Greg
Deepak Subburam
> they lived with the effort of pure finger action for so long....
I just came across this about Glenn Gould's technique. Hmmmm...
---------------
Canadian composer and music scholar, John Beckwith, and pianist, William
Aide, both former students of Guerrero, made a comparative description of
their teacher's method of playing, on one side, and Gould's piano technique
on another. Beckwith agrees that Gould was a genius in possession of a
"natural technique". However, having been in music training with Guerrero
for nine years, Gould adopted two main features of his teacher's keyboard
method:
* a pure finger-technique as opposed to a "weight technique";
* finger-tapping.
The "pure finger technique" means that the main action of playing is
executed by the fingers with less employment of the hands, elbows and trunk.
This technique was also characterized by finger separation, quick non-legato
touch or so-called, playing in a detaché style.
---------------
From "Psychobiography of a virtuoso" By Helen Mesaros
You can read the rest of it at:
http://www.gould.nlc-bnc.ca/docs/epsycho.htm
Deepak
Carl Tait
<subb...@stanford.edu> wrote:
>
>My hands end up stretching quite a bit more than before (when I was
>finger-playing) and they are actually aching quite a bit now after some
>practice.
To echo the idea that opened this thread: Stop, stop, stop!
Pain at the piano is a sure sign you're doing something wrong.
You really need a teacher who can watch you play, and explain what
needs to be fixed. As a guess (and I'm becoming increasingly hesitant
to offer long-distance advice without seeing what you're doing):
* Don't let your hand get stuck in a fixed, claw-like position.
* Don't grasp too strongly -- it's a gentle but firm finger grab.
* Don't keep mashing hard after the key hits bottom.
>I think I am going to lay off the piano and experimenting for a
>couple days :)
Yes, please do. The general sign that you're doing something right
with a new technical idea (weight or anything else) is that things
should feel better, not worse.
Carl Tait
<subb...@stanford.edu> wrote:
>
>[Quoting Helen Mesaros on Glenn Gould:]
>>Gould adopted two main features of his teacher's keyboard method:
>
>>* a pure finger-technique as opposed to a "weight technique";
>>* finger-tapping.
>
>> The "pure finger technique" means that the main action of playing is
>>executed by the fingers with less employment of the hands, elbows and trunk.
>>This technique was also characterized by finger separation, quick non-legato
>>touch or so-called, playing in a detaché style.
Yes, this is all true, and is to a great degree responsible for Gould's
hyper-articulate style. This often works very well in Bach, but is a
serious liability in producing a warm, colorful sound. Gould pooh-poohed
the notion of "burnished piano tone" as if it were something he could
turn on like a water faucet should he ever need it, but his pathetic
recordings of Scriabin and Brahms show otherwise. The sound he produces
in these works is the thin, colorless tone one would expect from pure
finger technique. The spidery, articulate attacks also manage to destroy
the smoky atmosphere that's so much a part of Scriabin's music.
Cc88m
methods/preferences were quite "non-standard".
C. C. Chang
LstPuritan
>news:mdLu6.129399$GV2.31...@typhoon.san.rr.com...
>> To continue; I actually think that most systems like "weight, James Ching
>> (stiff) and most of the others are adopted by us mere mortals because
>we
>are
>> trying to find out why we don't play better so we grasp a "system" hoping
>> that will do the trick. I maintain systems are futile. Common sense we
>must
>> use.
I believe that a single system for technique is probably futile and
counterproductive for any pianist trying to develop general fluency at the
keyboard and master a diverse segment of the keyboard library. One point not
yet raised is the difference between practice technique and
performance/production technique; regardless of skill level and the piece(s) in
question, it seems that some self-proclaimed pedagogical gurus often descend
from notable teachers who subscribed to one school or another of technique and
never questioned its propriety or logic, meaning they refuse to budge
themselves... I have found that there are some widely spread 'practice
theories' that simply don't agree with me and are utterly useless, in my
opinion:
1. Slow practice is not preparation for fast playing. OR: Fast playing a
piece often causes one to ignore nuances and accept mistakes.
2. 'Outlining': eliminating nonessential notes to grasp the 'rhythm' and
'overall feel' of a piece as an efficient way to start learing a work.
3. Raise/lower the seat, use more/less finger and more/less wrist,
de-emphasize fingers save as an extention of the forearm---which is connected
to the shoulders, and controlled by the torso. [Whiteside]
4. Exercises are not only boring and useless, but desctructive. Not making
music is a waste of time, and scales are beautiful complex structures not to be
practiced by beginners.
5. Only practice hands separately/hands together. Depending on the teacher,
one way is pious and the other hellish.
With these general assumptions I take serious issue and I personally have seen
pianistic blocks, confusion, and general frustration arise when technique and
practice method is prescribed to the extent that one's own natural tactile and
aural awareness is discarded, replaced by often uncomfortable 'systems'
insisted upon by one teacher or another.
Note: My opinions on technique here apply to solid intermediate players and
above only, and in no way am I suggesting a 'free for all' approach to
technique. Having taught piano to complete beginners through early advanced
students [at which point I am happy to admit that I am no longer qualified nor
do I have the time to keep up with the student, and recommend a good,
experienced teacher chosen from those pedagogues I trust in the area with more
experience and ability (I'm 22)]---it is absolutely crucial for those early
learners to learn the fundamentals of hand position, pedaling, phrasing,
confident sound touch, and the rest of the basics upon which we can all agree.
However, we all reach a point when we notice that infinitesimal changes in
thought, method, position, or touch produce large results that facilitate or
complicate; improve or worsen; inebriate or frustrate the art of piano playing.
It is at this stage, between intermediate and early advanced [Some of the Bach
48, a Classical Sonata or two, some Chopin or Liszt, Debussy, a stab at
Rachmaninoff or Prokofiev or Handel or difficult Beethoven perhaps] that new
attention beyond the basic mandates of 'general correctness' needs to be given
to piano playing: practice, technique, and performance. In other words, only
after one can maintain a mastery of that first set of technique basics without
conscious reminders should one venture into the land of 'individuated
techniques/methods.' In response to myself:
1. Fast or slow? I find neglecting either senseless. The 'fast practice
advocates' are the most outspoken and vehement; shouting that practicing slowly
at all subtempo destroys the pulse and other performance nuances necessary for
mastering a piece. 'Slow practice advocates' are far more stoic, and less
confrontational, often combining slow training of fingers with occasional A
TEMPO mock performances to add the proper pedaling and dynamics necessary to
translate the slow work into music.
2. The recent surge in Abby Whiteside devotees who refuse to stray from her
words have made outlining quite popular. She has some valuable insight, but
outlining is rubbish. Nonsense. What is suggested by this method of practice
is that the goal of the pianist is solely a final product of sound, and no
matter with how you get there... perhaps the appeal of this outlining
phenomenon is that from the very start of the learning process of a piece
something sounding vaguely like music is already present. I won't go deep into
the outlining process itself [for an unbiased and thorough discussion order
Whiteside's book from Amazon] but my stance is that—even greater than putting
fingers on notes—one should strive not just to play the piano but to be a
musician at the piano. This, to me, involves memorizing the written score,
practicing slowly with different fingerings, hearing the piece, and knowing
what the keys are visually on the keyboard. Rather than crashing through a
piece with only sketchy tactile memory slowly developed through outlining, this
provides four ways of 'knowing' the music: hearing it in the head, visual score
recollection, finger memory, and key knowledge.
3. Whatever works naturally and painlessly while being true to the character
and period of a piece should be developed and examined. There is some
instinctual judgement here which can take months or years to coax into working
order; with a knowledge of history, technique, and one's own physiology, a
piano teacher emerges less and less as a correcting agent and more as an aid
for interpretation and general wisdom for guiding piece selection and
discussing performance practice in past contexts.
4. If scales and technical exercises are boring, they are not executed
properly. Not only are these skills vital for internalizing the layout of the
keyboard on a deep and automatic harmonic level, such practice with various
fingerings and isolated difficult skill training reveals patterns found in all
music, significantly reducing the time it takes to absorb and play written
notes with prelearned finger patterns; mindless drilling may be tedious, but
diligent and mindful study of scales, arpeggios, and drills allow the pianist
to tackle and conquer weakness---effectively eliminating shortcomings before
encountering and stumbling on those very problems in real pieces. George gave
a fabulous testimonial to the benefits of his own experience as an adult
pianist finally deciding to give in and work on scales in a thread "Why
practice scales" a while back. I learned them at an early age, so his
arguments are more pertinent than anything I might say.
5. This I think depends entirely on the music and the mental orientation of
the pianist, and for anyone to insist on hands together OR hands apart practice
alone is not considering the needs of the student or the character of the
music; such a teacher is prescribing a method, and often can give no
justification other than an unwilingness to breach a 'school' of practice
theory. Not only is it my opinion that there are definite vertical thinkers
and, on the other hand, horizontal thinkers, the music itself can cry out the
solutions. For example, one may learn a Bach invention hands together, note
against note, but the contrapuntal nature of this music is harmony only through
and from interplay of melody [Zarlino: "L'harmonia nasce dal cantare, che fanno
insieme le parti delle cantile"]. On the other hand, a slow Beethoven movement
or Mozart Sonata-Allegro may naturally suggest a hands together approach
[Rameau: "La melodie provient de l'harmonie."]. All music and musical thought
follows along one of these two contrasting fundamental 'truths.' And neither
school of 'truth' has backed down and conceded to the other for 4000 years of
Western Development. This heated debate, and the myriad fields of art and
science which it enveloped, is out of the scope of the topic here. Although
this would be an interesting, and long, topic for another thread.
>However, having been in music training with Guerrero
>for nine years, Gould adopted two main features of his teacher's >keyboard
>method:
>* a pure finger-technique as opposed to a "weight technique";
>* finger-tapping.
> The "pure finger technique" means that the main action of playing is
>executed by the fingers with less employment of the hands, elbows and >trunk.
>This technique was also characterized by finger separation, quick non->legato
>touch or so-called, playing in a detaché style.
Remember that finger tapping is a slow and meticulous *practice* technique,
with the score memorized, one musical line at a time, one note every few
seconds in Bach's counterpoint; the point is to *not* allow for muscle memory
to develop which overwhelms the mental concept of performing the music,
acheived by means of fingering the music slowly enough and 'tapping' the notes
out to solidify and memorize which finger plays which note without allowing the
playing to be finger-automatic. In this way, Gould was able to keep all
horizontal lines in his head, bringing out certain voices clearly—something
that is very difficult to do if Bach is first learned hands together
note-against-note at a fast tempo. In a 5 voice fugue, what results from that
kind of all-at-once practicing with little attention paid to individual lines
sounds like a series of chords. Another way to avoid this muddy chordal Bach
is to play a fugue that is well known to you *minus* one voice, which is sung
by the pianist while playing the other voices. Each voice is eliminated and
sung until each line has its turn at elision, and when this skill is possible
(it gets easier with practice) then thinking along melodic lines becomes almost
effortless.
--
Carl Tait
IBM T. J. Watson Research Center
--------------------------------------------
>Yes, this is all true, and is to a great degree responsible for Gould's
>hyper-articulate style. This often works very well in Bach, but is a
>serious liability in producing a warm, colorful sound.
What about Gould's 2nd movement from Prokofiev's 7th? Or the Bach E Major Book
II? Beethoven op. 110? Berg Sonata? Scriabin op. 57 1 and 2? I hear some
warm tones, and when Gould was not deliberately defying the intent of a work
for philosophical objection [Moonlight, Bizet Nocturne, Mozart Emperor], I hear
Gould producing more than the "everything sounds like a harpsichord" sonority
which has become his reputation. Horowitz' Isle of Joy is worse in this regard
than anything I've heard from Gould.....
>Gould pooh-poohed
>the notion of "burnished piano tone" as if it were something he could
>turn on like a water faucet should he ever need it
Gould did not believe that music was or should be 'for' a piano. Thus, he
found Chopin, Schumann, and Liszt a "monumental waste of time... they were
attempting to create a certain kind of turbulence in the audience with
pianistic effects and tasteless virtuosity; all that effort to write—not
music—but piano performances in the whole of which I find very little actual
composition."
>but his pathetic
>recordings of Scriabin and Brahms show otherwise. The sound he produces
>in these works is the thin, colorless tone one would expect from pure
>finger technique. The spidery, articulate attacks also manage to destroy
>the smoky atmosphere that's so much a part of Scriabin's music.
The Brahms varies in quality, but I'm not sure what kind of "smoky atmosphere"
you look for in Scriabin. I appreciate Scriabin played clearly and strictly;
any 'murk' or 'smoke' or 'fog' in Scriabin (often due to massive overpedaling)
detracts from the nuances which, when articulated well, reveal various bell
sonorities, polyphony, important middle voices, and the essense of Scriabin the
Symbolist (Like Debussy the Symbolist; any approach to these two composers with
"impressionism" in mind spells disaster). If you want Smoky Scriabin, try Ruth
Laredo, generally the worst butcher of Scriabin's music I've ever known.
>I actually agree with you, Jim. There are some piano students for whom
>proper technique came intuitively, and they don't need to ever hear the
>words shift of weight or anything of the kind. However, many pianists start
>their training with the notion that the fingers must do all the work, and
>the wrists must be low, and the fingers lifted high, etc, etc. These are
>the
>ones for whom a conscientious teacher has to find language to change
>life long unproductive habits. My most common mantra is that we are training
>awareness - not muscles - and the nerve connections between brain and
>finger. If that is a system, then I must be guilty. Greg
I agree with that. But what about Richter's fondness for playing octaves with
the 2nd and 5th fingers of one hand, back of the wrist perpendicular to the
keybed, 3rd and 4th fingers curled under the palm, punching straight into the
keys? I shudder every time I see him do that; an unproductive habit, but he's
Richter...
--Justin
**************************
www.mp3.com/justin_d_scott
**************************
Liszt, Scriabin, Schoenberg, Bach
Fractal Composition, Original Works
Debussy Orchestrations, and More
LstPuritan
>methods/preferences were quite "non-standard".
>C. C. Chang
What about the beloved Chickering?
Christof Pflumm
> "Deepak Subburam" <subb...@stanford.edu> wrote in message
> news:99j91f$pk3$1...@nntp.Stanford.EDU...
> > > My hands end up stretching quite a bit more than before (when I was
> > finger-playing) and they are actually aching quite a bit now after some
> > practice. Stretching between notes is significantly less comfortable than
> > before, and the right hand and arm start to ache (from around the wrist to
> > somewhere in the center of my forearm) when I play for example the Prelude
> > in C Major from WTC 1 or the moonlight sonata
>
> Rest is probably good right now. The default position of the hand should be
> a natural five finger position (something smaller than an octave
> certainly).
My teacher told me that the default position of the hand should be the
same as if you let your arm hang from your shoulder totally
relaxed. If you do that, your fingers and your wrist automatically go
into "default mode".
> If you look at your hand while playing and see that your thumb is
> staying stretched out, or even locking in some geometric way away
> from the rest of the hand (and staying there), then you need to
> spend some time consciously telling it to relax back closer to the
> rest of the hand, until that becomes habitual.
Some days ago I discovered exactly what you're describing. I've been
playing BWV926 and in the middle section there are some octave jumps
in the RH. Up to now, I left my thumb over the key that it has to play
next. But there's a rest after the jump, and so I found that it is
much more comfortable to relax, although at first it feels a bit
unsecure, because I have to position the fingers anew after
relaxing. After practicing the passage sometimes with paying attention
to the relaxing, it feels better now.
Do you think that this should be done all the time? For example if you
have to play octaves with short rests inbetween, if you relax back
after every octave, you have to do stretch-relax-stretch-relax... all
the time. I imagine this could also be exhausting.
Bye,
Christof
Carl Tait
>[Carl Tait wrote:]
>>Yes, this is all true, and is to a great degree responsible for Gould's
>>hyper-articulate style. This often works very well in Bach, but is a
>>serious liability in producing a warm, colorful sound.
>
>What about Gould's 2nd movement from Prokofiev's 7th?
You must be joking. Virtually every note has an ugly, bumpy accent.
The legato is nonexistent.
>Or the Bach E Major Book II?
Again: are you serious? Gould plays this lyrical work with all the
ratchety musicianship of a slot machine.
(And really, I *do* like a lot of Gould's Bach and early Beethoven,
though he's best in music requiring brio, clarity, and rhythmic drive.)
>Beethoven op. 110?
The first few bars are actually much better than usual for Gould in
this sort of music, though the tone decays rapidly. This is especially
noticeable in the long notes of the second major phrase.
>Berg Sonata? Scriabin op. 57 1 and 2?
Mercifully, I don't own those recordings.
>[...]
>Gould did not believe that music was or should be 'for' a piano. Thus, he
>found Chopin, Schumann, and Liszt a "monumental waste of time... they were
>attempting to create a certain kind of turbulence in the audience with
>pianistic effects and tasteless virtuosity; all that effort to write—not
>music—but piano performances in the whole of which I find very little actual
>composition."
He's entitled to his opinion, of course, but one wonders what sort of
"pianistic effects and tasteless virtuosity" Gould heard in works such as
Chopin's Mazurka Op. 50/3 or E-minor Prelude, or Schumann's F-sharp Romance,
or Liszt's D-flat Consolation, or ... [insert any of dozens if not hundreds
of other pieces here].
>[...] I'm not sure what kind of "smoky atmosphere" you look for in Scriabin.
The kind he marked in his scores, and the kind played by Russians steeped in
the tradition of playing this music (e.g., Scriabin's son-in-law Sofronitzki).
>I appreciate Scriabin played clearly and strictly;
>any 'murk' or 'smoke' or 'fog' in Scriabin (often due to massive overpedaling)
The "massive overpedaling" at the start of the Third Sonata is Scriabin's
own highly-characteristic marking, present in the first edition. Gould
turns this atmospheric blur of bass growls into something utterly ordinary
by substituting conventional bar-line pedaling. Worse yet, he changes the
glorious D-natural near the end of the melody's first phrase to a tepid
and pedestrian D-sharp.
>[...] If you want Smoky Scriabin, try Ruth
>Laredo, generally the worst butcher of Scriabin's music I've ever known.
Laredo is more Sucky than Smoky -- but we agree she's lousy in this repertoire.
--
Carl Tait
IBM T. J. Watson Research Center
Hawthorne, NY 10532
Tom Shaw
it.
TSnews:3abf1949...@news.newsguy.com...
Martin Paton
Tait) wrote:
>Carl Tait
>IBM T. J. Watson Research Center
>Hawthorne, NY 10532
Were you at Linux World Expo?
Deepak Subburam
stretched out wide even when I needed not to. I am going off for a week long
vacation now - maybe when I'm back my hands would more naturally do what is
comfortable with the new method as I try not to think about it too much.
> needs to be fixed. As a guess (and I'm becoming increasingly hesitant
> to offer long-distance advice without seeing what you're doing):
Yes, I yearn for someone competent to see how I am playing. I am due to see
my piano teacher in a couple weeks, I'll ask him then. Strange though that
he has never made much ado about how I've been playing in the past.
Once again, thanks G+C!
Deepak
Darryl Greene
comparing his English Suites against Murray Perriah's recording is
night & day. Talk about lyricism, I think that Perriah is a great
example - in total contrast to some of Gould's recordings. His
Goldberg Variations set the standard, to my ears.
- Darryl
greg presley
> counterproductive for any pianist trying to develop general fluency at the
> keyboard and master a diverse segment of the keyboard library. One point
not
> yet raised is the difference between practice technique and
> performance/production technique; regardless of skill level and the
piece(s) in
> question, it seems that some self-proclaimed pedagogical gurus often
descend
> from notable teachers who subscribed to one school or another of technique
and
> never questioned its propriety or logic, meaning they refuse to budge
> themselves... I have found that there are some widely spread 'practice
> theories' that simply don't agree with me and are utterly useless, in my
> opinion:
While I agree, Justin, that no "system" of practice in itself is going to
result in a finished polished performer of impeccable virtuosity and
control, there are reasons for all methods of practice, and all have worked
to some extent or they wouldn't have disciples. Where you see defects in all
the different systems, I find some value in each. Slow practice teaches the
details, but gives no preparation other than that for fast playing. Fast
practice gets your arms and fingers in the right place at the right time, so
you are preparing for a concert tempo, but doesn't leave time for an
"appreciation" of the details of the score. Outlining is great for teaching
the muscles their arrival points, and for establishing very clearly on which
notes the accent must eventually fall, so that there is not the muscular
confusion which often results from a musical idea which ignores the muscular
impulses. (Typical example, that after some beats of silence, the entrance
of the hand that had been silent will be directed by the muscles to come in
too loudly, unless conciously told not to). And it is a very useful method
of going back and fixing a difficult messy bit of passage work in 16ths or
32nds, because it shows prioritization and destination. But it too leaves
out the detail work, at least until you get to the subsequent stage and
start filling in the missing subdivisions.
I'm personally grateful to have this menu of systems to choose from,
because, to be honest, there are many days in which practicing is not fun,
and ANY new approach that makes things seem fresh is welcome. But really
this thread started not with systems of learning pieces and practicing so
much as with the very basic idea of how to get the fingers to move on the
piano without causing pain and injury. Hence all the discussions about
relaxation and shift of weight, etc. Greg
Joan Craft
Lister Sink. It's all about relaxation of the hand, wrist, arm, actually the who
body. Her ideas are great.
Nazodesu
the "To," "Cc," and "Newsgroups" headers for details. ]]
In article <3AEC49C1...@erols.com>, Joan Craft <Ra...@erols.com>
wrote:
> There is a tremendous video out there called "Freeing the Caged Bird"
> by Barbara Lister Sink. It's all about relaxation of the hand,
> wrist, arm, actually the who body. Her ideas are great.
Amazon has no book by that title, and no author by that name. All movie
guide also gives zero info.
Can you clarify?
--
The storm starts when the drops start dropping. When the drops stop dropping
the storm starts stopping.
Guy Provencher
search engine just looking for "Barbara Lister Sink".
http://www.ohscatalog.org/freeincagbir.html
"Nazodesu" <22...@home.com.nospam> wrote in message
news:290420011055399608%22...@home.com.nospam...
LEC
Deepak Subburam
> > have to play octaves with short rests inbetween, if you relax back
> > after every octave, you have to do stretch-relax-stretch-relax... all
> > the time. I imagine this could also be exhausting.
Yes, I identify with the above sentiment! I just finished working on the
octaves part of Grieg's March of the Dwarves and was wondering what to do
too. Eventually after quite a bit of practice, suddenly all the questions
disappeared (without having been answered...) and I was playing it well
without any effort. Now when I look at my hands and analyze what's going on:
a) the thumb-pinky remain stretched to about an octave throughout *BUT* I do
feel that I am relaxing in *some* sense between the octaves. The fingers are
still far apart, but feel relaxed and not tense.
b) I am not doing the 'jump and cover' approach. It was good when I started
to practice the passage, but it is too slow (for me anyway) and I don't do
it now.
Interestingly, my teacher just encouraged me to use pretty much pure finger
action on another passage* I am working on, saying that while it is actually
easier to use the weighted action, it requires you to know "exactly how long
your fingers are" to keep it even. I understand what he means, and I think
the approach to technique is to be aware of the different kinds out there
and try them all out every now and then to see which is the best for which
passage. After a while it will perhaps become intuitive and you'll
automatically start picking the best technique first without thinking about
it.
Deepak
*the passages with the string of 32nd notes on the RH in Grieg's March of
the Dwarves, Lyric Suite Op 54.