"Caressing" A Key

Speaking of the alignment of the bones, I believe that besides the movement of "grasping" we could also add the movement of "caressing". To Get ready to caress the key to press it is not an useless movement because, if we observe the hand, the bones are surely lined up. They are many the examples of pianists (above all women pianists) that it apparently seems makes useless movements in to get ready to press the keys, as if they wanted to caress them. For example Valentina Lisitsa and Barbara Lister-Sink. In reality I believe that you deal with a habit to get a sweet sound in to caress the key that allows the hand, to the bones of the hand, to assume a very natural position like in the "grasping" movement.

Speaking of the alignment of the bones, I believe that besides the movement of "grasping" we could also add the movement of "caressing". To Get ready to caress the key to press it is not an useless movement because, if we observe the hand, the bones are surely lined up. They are many the examples of pianists (above all women pianists) that it apparently seems makes useless movements in to get ready to press the keys, as if they wanted to caress them. For example Valentina Lisitsa and Barbara Lister-Sink. In reality I believe that you deal with a habit to get a sweet sound in to caress the key that allows the hand, to the bones of the hand, to assume a very natural position like in the "grasping" movement. What specifically do you mean by "caress"? I'm not sure exactly what type of motion you are talking about.

This motion is a beautiful example:

Speaking of the alignment of the bones, I believe that besides the movement of "grasping" we could also add the movement of "caressing". To Get ready to caress the key to press it is not an useless movement because, if we observe the hand, the bones are surely lined up. They are many the examples of pianists (above all women pianists) that it apparently seems makes useless movements in to get ready to press the keys, as if they wanted to caress them. For example Valentina Lisitsa and Barbara Lister-Sink. In reality I believe that you deal with a habit to get a sweet sound in to caress the key that allows the hand, to the bones of the hand, to assume a very natural position like in the "grasping" movement. What specifically do you mean by "caress"? I'm not sure exactly what type of motion you are talking about. This motion is a beautiful example: Which exact movement? The ones that involve slightly slipping across the key, while 'stroking' it?

Amazing that you should write this, tgdigit - when I was last in Montreal in August, my old teacher Phil Cohen gave me a lesson and a part of it consisted of exactly that, a kind of caressing motion. He even had me caress one hand with the other while the hand being caressed was playing, to really transmit the "quality" of caressing to the notes in question. It was a fascinating experience to hear the effect on the sound, and to feel the dramatic change in my hand - a sense of tremendously profound ease appeared... And you hit the nail on the head when you say that "caressing" allows the hand to relax so the bones automatically find their best alignment - that's it. Thanks for reminding me about it! AFF

Amazing that you should write this, tgdigit - when I was last in Montreal in August, my old teacher Phil Cohen gave me a lesson and a part of it consisted of exactly that, a kind of caressing motion. He even had me caress one hand with the other while the hand being caressed was playing, to really transmit the "quality" of caressing to the notes in question. It was a fascinating experience to hear the effect on the sound, and to feel the dramatic change in my hand - a sense of tremendously profound ease appeared... Thanks for reminding me about it! AFF Thank you, is a problem explain with my bad English .

Thank you for posting this.I think that in most upright pianos like yamaha or young chang ones or any normal piano,caressing the keys does not produce the same effect as a very fine tuned and properly regulated concert grand.But the motion that takes place when caressing helps us maintain a better quality in our playing. I noticed this yesterday i was practicing some jazz piano preludes of Nikolai Kapustin,i noticed that while the notes were hit evenly there was a kind of harsh tone,-i thought this ought to be the reason these are jazz preludes-,i come back to some Bach some Chopin afterwards but no! there was something in my sound i didnt like,Chopin etude op 10 no1 and 2 were with good sound (one forte other pianissimo) and no 4 and 12 were evenly played but something is not good,i felt like the music was full of tenuto notes like a piano tuner does when he tunes the piano. I was practicing the finger shapes of natural curl without curling actively,but then i read that one thread i watch the video and i come back to play the jazz preludes and the Bach and Chopin. At once the hand was fred and the sound was different.Maybe some time we all need to do this,i believe that if i had a good concert grand i would careness the keys more.I noticed in those large instruments that have good mechanism any action the finger or arm or hand does is transfered.While on the uprights well that's a different story.I believe in some point while we all careness the keys in uprights then we tend to forget it because uprights do not have the mechanism of concert grands. Kind regards

Thank you for posting this.I think that in most upright pianos like yamaha or young chang ones or any normal piano,caressing the keys does not produce the same effect as a very fine tuned and properly regulated concert grand.But the motion that takes place when caressing helps us maintain a better quality in our playing. I noticed this yesterday i was practicing some jazz piano preludes of Nikolai Kapustin,i noticed that while the notes were hit evenly there was a kind of harsh tone,-i thought this ought to be the reason these are jazz preludes-,i come back to some Bach some Chopin afterwards but no! there was something in my sound i didnt like,Chopin etude op 10 no1 and 2 were with good sound (one forte other pianissimo) and no 4 and 12 were evenly played but something is not good,i felt like the music was full of tenuto notes like a piano tuner does when he tunes the piano. I was practicing the finger shapes of natural curl without curling actively,but then i read that one thread i watch the video and i come back to play the jazz preludes and the Bach and Chopin. At once the hand was fred and the sound was different.Maybe some time we all need to do this,i believe that if i had a good concert grand i would careness the keys more.I noticed in those large instruments that have good mechanism any action the finger or arm or hand does is transfered.While on the uprights well that's a different story.I believe in some point while we all careness the keys in uprights then we tend to forget it because uprights do not have the mechanism of concert grands. Kind regards What exactly do you mean by "caress" in this context? Sorry, I don't mean to sound willfully obtuse but I'm really not clear as to what it would refer to. I can understand the idea of slightly stroking a finger across the surface of a key, as way of "caressing" out a cantabile melody- instead of bonding inseparably with the key at the fingertip. However, I don't really understand what quality of movement this might refer to in something like a rapid Chopin study. Surely not actually allowing the fingers to slip along the keys? Playing with flatter fingers, maybe? In fact, is this possibly a similar thing to the other thread about the natural path of the finger or the natural path of key? I think that aiming to retain the finger's more natural path makes helps make a more musical type of sound, while aiming more directly through the path of the key has a slightly more mechanical and 'notey' feel to it, as if every note it being tapped out. Good for clarity perhaps, but not terribly beautiful or conducive to a long line. Is this perhaps the sort of thing that you mean? More direct lines of attack involve a much more sudden cancellation of energy (directly in the face of the keybed), whereas the arm is more inclined to absorb the force, when the finger uses a more natural arc. One way I've been looking at it is to think of it in terms of the fingertip staying in the same place and the arm moving in response to that (rather than the finger moving in relation to a static arm). The fingertip "strokes" and the arm is free to respond to the results of that motion. Is this perhaps the sort of thing, or something totally different? I could understand the intention to do something like those motions could still be useful, but presumably this is without any of the slipping motions, when you use it in an Etude?

I should have made myself more clear. The very act of trying to do what she does in the video in slow playing,(that is i didn't play the etudes or the music pieces in fast tempo),made my sound be better in slow playing,so when i tried to play in tempo the sound was so much better. Meybe the idea of trying to hug the keys like she does helps to have better skeletal alignment like Mr Fraser says. Now regarding the finger staying in the same place and the arm moving in response is something i have been trying too lately,and i am happy to see that you though it too.It is a very interesting sensation and opens up new ideas. I will post more of my experiance with it.

I should have made myself more clear. The very act of trying to do what she does in the video in slow playing,(that is i didn't play the etudes or the music pieces in fast tempo),made my sound be better in slow playing,so when i tried to play in tempo the sound was so much better. Meybe the idea of trying to hug the keys like she does helps to have better skeletal alignment like Mr Fraser says. Now regarding the finger staying in the same place and the arm moving in response is something i have been trying too lately,and i am happy to see that you though it too.It is a very interesting sensation and opens up new ideas. I will post more of my experiance with it. Ah, I see. There's a kind of relaxation that carries across from doing those things in the slow playing, then? Yeah, might well be a good antidote to the more intensive finger actions that I'm using at the moment for most things. They can be quite hard work. I'd be interested to hear how you're getting on with everything. Have you uploaded any videos recently? Interesting that you're looking at the same thing. On the surface, it seems so amazingly obvious that the finger should normally avoid slipping across a key, that it barely seems worth thinking about. However, it's amazing to see just what a difference it makes, when you view movement of the entire structure from around that point and look for even the smallest failures to keep that single point 100% consistent. I had a student today, and noticed that, like myself, he slipped more on the fourth and fifth. I think it's easy to perpetuate the pre-existing weakness of the fifth, unless you can eradicate the slip and allow the muscles to actually act against something. Did you try the extreme versions of both the finger's natural movement and that of the key's path, while keeping the fingertip in one spot? I'd try it in the air first, to consciously notice just how different the two paths of the finger would be. Are you generally more towards the finger's natural path, when doing it, or more in the key's path? I find that thinking of the arm moving in response to the fingertip makes it possible to go with much more exaggerated versions of the natural finger action, without the need to "correct" the finger's path into a more downwards line. Personally I'm finding that it's vital to start with a very relaxed curve though, especially on my second and use the pads. Otherwise, it's very hard to stick with the natural finger action, without causing slippage. Although I think we're doing pretty similar things, based on your post in the other thread, I'm thinking of this is a way where the finger's purest inward actions the arm's responses. However, I think that the exercise of simply placing the finger in a consistent spot with low effort and moving more willfully back and forth with the arm is also exceedingly useful as a low effort version (which I definitely need to balance against the more hard-working ones). I think the final ideal is probably somewhere in between the two of those. I think that yours is a very light version that helps the hand to perceive the minimum effort to sustain balance for each angle, whereas it's also good to do a slightly harder one, where you feel the fingers actively working towards moving some of the arms mass, rather than simply maintaining balance in response to it. I think that the harder working one is good for building the ability to move the key with real power, but the lighter one is great for ensuring that excessive effort doesn't spill over into sustaining balance after the power has been applied. I think I'm going to try alternating between each of these for a variety of etudes.