Pop

I want to share my enthusiasm for something I'm working on, and that's playing on the bones. I like the Liszt "bicycle spoke" exercise from "Honing." I think it brings home the point that you can have fingers like steel rods without needing to work hard to stiffen the muscles of your hands, and when your bones are lined up to be as solid as steel you aren't inclined to compensate for weakness and squishiness in your hand with tensions in your arms and shoulders. Alan also touches on the topic of playing on the bones in an online master class. I think the pianist's name is Matthew and I really liked how he did. I like to try out that Liszt exercise just on a table top to find the sweet spot where I get a Pop! without any particular effort. Then I do the same thing with the thumb strut position that Alan demonstrates in "Honing." You can line the fingers up that way, too, to get a solid Pop! or Thump! on a table top without any particular work. My enthusiasm for this comes from extending it to all playing, not just fortissimo notes. I think the fingers should feel this solid and be lined up for just this kind of Pop! even for pianissimo notes. I believe it is helping me to play with more evenness. If I listen and notes are dropping out or are weak, I find two common culprits in my own playing. One, I might just not be moving the finger. Alan gave me aggressive exercises to foster mobility in my finger work. Two, even with mobile fingers, I might not have the bones lined up with the consequence that the weak note might have a squishy structure behind it. After the didactic tabletop exercises, I practice musical passages hands apart slowly in a fortissimo staccato in order to identify all the positions necessary to hit the "sweet spots" that let my fingers Pop! solidly on each note without working hard at it. This is revealing something else about my playing. I could use some more arm mobility, allowing my arms to travel out and get "behind" my fingers structurally. Alan had me stroking chords forward and back on the keys to feel nice alignments. If I combine that idea with this fortissimo staccato, I find that the direction I need to go to get the Pop! into the keys isn't necessarily quite the direction my brain expected. The work into the keys might be kind of back towards the fallboard to galvanize the position of my hand, so that "sweet spot" might not be what I feel subjectively as straight down into the keybed. Or it might not be strictly lateral when I'm shifting. There might be some kind of arcing trajectory. I hate writing that way. I'm trying to describe my subjective impressions and I don't know how accurate the descriptions really are. I know that if I seek the feeling of the Pop! with these exercises then I manage somehow to find through feel an effective structure, angle, and leverage which afford me not having to waste effort to move a key. Physically, the effort becomes easy and I don't have to press into the keys and struggle. Jai Jeffryes

Recently, I've actually been starting to wonder if there's a very simple explanation that runs behind these kinds of exercises- regarding the concept of alignments where the muscles seem not to have to do anything. Although the end product is so low in effort, it can seem like the muscles do nothing at all, I'm becoming convinced that the exercises actually serve to trigger a very simple action of extension in the finger (which can keep the key depressed without need for additional pressure from the muscles of the arm). Personally, I've been finding that seeking to perceive this small effort when doing such exercises has actually been extremely useful. It's not that I'm saying it would be necessary to notice it at all times, but I think there's great value in perceiving the key muscular action- in order to then go on to forget about it (without risk of losing it and going on either stiffen or collapse instead). Rationally, I can only see two obvious explanations for how a finger can be prevented from completely giving way, either when moving a key or keeping depressed. If it's extended to the limit of the joints motions, it could not double back any further, once you get to a certain point. In this case, the muscles might do very little- but you'd have to question how healthy it would be to rely on the joint itself to bear such forces and those with flexible joints would end up doubled back into all kinds of weird positions. It would be likely the finger would have to grip slightly inwards. Alternatively if the forces would act to make the finger curl up in an unwanted way, this can be countered by an action that serves to extend and straighten out the finger. It's not that I'm wishing to question the value of the skeletality explanation and exercises by any means. However, I've often found it difficult to really pinpoint exactly what I'm looking to find, or to know how close I am to finding it. Particularly in the past, what I thought was a low effort state was actually pretty seriously stiff. For that reason, I think it helps to know what the relevant activity actually is while performing such exercise, in order to be able to monitor how efficiently it is being applied. I still value the exploratory exercises, but find it useful to have this additional point of conscious focus. I'm currently working at pinpointing the exact activity that is required within any good quality of balance- and only then going on to treat it as if it were achieved without effort at all. Rather than try to trigger the balancing actions of the muscles using the subconscious alone, I'm finding that a conscious awareness of slight extension action as the source of most balances has been making me much better at achieving a stable but low effort hand. When relying on the subconscious approach alone, I still tend to lose the feel very easily. However, with the ability to consciously bring in a touch more of the extension action, it's possible to put things rapidly back on track if my hand starts reverting to floppiness or stiffness.

Hello Jai, I know exactly why you "hate writing this way;" I do too - but somehow we opened this Pandora's Box and now are to 'write this way' in an attempt to describe our experience meaningfully and helpfully... I like your description a lot, and I think it's right on... I believe the 'Pop' you are referring to is my 'thok,' is it not? If it's not, please tell me the difference. (Note: this question is 62% facetious, not 100%) All best, AFF

Yes, I intend it to be the same thing. I described it in my own words to see if I am understanding you correctly. I got the idea from you, though. Somewhere, during the spokes exercise and the thumb strut exercise I noticed that I could thump a table top without working to stiffen my fingers. There is a "sweet spot" in that alignment that is so solid, if I did it on the piano it would break strings (not that I'd want to, I just mean it's solid). I noticed in some difficult passages, like an awkward arpeggio for example, there were notes in the middle that were "hard" to play and I was pressing in order to make them. When I deconstructed the passage, I noticed I wasn't lined up. If I played the whole thing like bicycle spokes, no worries. Then I did it from a playing position, attacking each note alone until I found the "sweet spot" in the alignment of my arm, hand, and finger. Then if I play the arpeggio slowly in a forte staccato, I see that none of my fingers is actually "weak." I just wasn't lined up. That's when I started thinking I should be this lined up for every single note, not just forte ones, and that's when I started improving the evenness of many passages that have been troubling me. I'm finding often that one source of the weak alignment is I'm not traveling out with my arm. By "traveling out" I'm not referring to the mistake you refer to of the "classic arm out" which happens after playing a note. I mean I don't allow my arm to follow easily along behind my hand as I shift. I think I lock my elbow in to my side, more or less. Then my hand gets weaker and weaker on the outside as it shifts outward. If I practice slow forte staccato, it reveals the weak notes that I don't "thok" freely. Then I can find the position that is sweet, and work up to a decent tempo that is solid on each note, yet free of forcing or pressing. Thanks, Alan. I've been looking at "Honing" for weeks. I won't be done with that one any time quick. When I read something interesting, then I'm gone for hours or days while I try it all out. Jai

Dear Jai, The thing I love the most about your post is that you have found your own solution for the problem we (both somewhat surprised) ran up against in our last lesson. I gave you a "work the extensors, get those muscles activated in a big way" lesson; you found something much more skeletal that is working for you. This is great! I would even say, fantastic! And I love your description of what's going on - it's so clear it's palpable. Onward and upward! AFF