I know that it opens a lot more options but it is also a lot more difficult to stick to. Certain inversions on broken chords are more easily to be played like that. However when reaching further on the white keys you also risk playing the adjacent black keys as I previously said. I think your fingers are not only longer but a little fatter than mine. How do you play the white keys when you have to play them further up(towards the body of the piano)?
Certainly there is a little holding. But I see improvement. I feel the fingers have some weight behind them. It's just as when I was pushing, only that the tension is not there anymore. It feels quite strange.
"Must I move it laterally or as I would got ready to play piano?"
I'm not sure exactly what you mean. Just find the minimum effort from collapsed to aligned and then put it on the piano. don't fix in a position but perceive the smallest difference possible between collapsed and aligned.
I mean that I don't know the exact movement you suggested in this paragrapgh. I'm not really into theatre so I don't know how a musical theatre fan moves his hands:
I guess that's why my rotation seems to be chapter in my tehnique where I progressed the least. Playing octaves harmonicaly or even melodicaly is not quite a challenge as long as I don't use rotation. When I start to rotate, even if I played fifths and not octaves, my finger becomes charged with so much weight. The entire equilibrium is blowed off. At one point I will need rotation in my playing and I need to refine it from now. How can I maintain that "soft as a baby's bottom" feel of the arm during rotation?
I said it makes you think like that but it's certainly not the same. If I would got to the old bad habits I would certainly began to sweat heavily again and I wouldn't gain all this relaxation and technical progress.
Maybe your approach is more anatomical and Andrew's is more gravitational. It develops your method in certain aspects. Both are very fine in my opinion.
"I know that it opens a lot more options but it is also a lot more difficult to stick to. Certain inversions on broken chords are more easily to be played like that. However when reaching further on the white keys you also risk playing the adjacent black keys as I previously said. I think your fingers are not only longer but a little fatter than mine. How do you play the white keys when you have to play them further up(towards the body of the piano)?"
Actually, that's an interesting thought. This aspect ties in with my "two planes" idea, rather closely. If the finger is already in position, you simply ensure that the pull of the finger has as close as possible to no sideways component whatsoever. If it's already on the key and parallel to it, there's no problem at all. Sideways forces or excess height would make it harder. I've never had any problems between the black keys, provided that I'm thinking in advance and getting whole positions lined up very early. All the finger does is move. It shouldn't be finding the key too late.
"Certainly there is a little holding. But I see improvement. I feel the fingers have some weight behind them. It's just as when I was pushing, only that the tension is not there anymore. It feels quite strange."
Sounds good. I think that a lot of the tension comes from wanting to play the next note. If you simply notice what goes on with playing one staccato note, it gives you a much clearer feeling of how to go on to longer changes without fighting that returned force.
"I mean that I don't know the exact movement you suggested in this paragrapgh. I'm not really into theatre so I don't know how a musical theatre fan moves his hands"
Well, to put it in more blunt terms (without wishing to sound offensive but for the sake of illustration) imagine a cliched homosexual with a very limp wrist. Hang the hand down from your wrist and then feel the slowest, least effortful movement possible to get it lined up. Similarly at a piano, start by collapsing the wrist down and do the same. It shows the least effort to achieve alignment- without any fixing.
"I guess that's why my rotation seems to be chapter in my tehnique where I progressed the least. Playing octaves harmonicaly or even melodicaly is not quite a challenge as long as I don't use rotation. When I start to rotate, even if I played fifths and not octaves, my finger becomes charged with so much weight. The entire equilibrium is blowed off. At one point I will need rotation in my playing and I need to refine it from now. How can I maintain that "soft as a baby's bottom" feel of the arm during rotation?"
I'd just understate it and remember that the standing and aligned finger still applies. If you simply collapse onto the side, the finger is dead. But I'd do far more based on forming the shape from the finger, for now.
"Maybe your approach is more anatomical and Andrew's is more gravitational. It develops your method in certain aspects. Both are very fine in my opinion."
Yeah, Alan has provided more help than I can describe with the physical aspects. I've just found that considering certain mechanically based guidelines can made the physical approach go even better. Gravity is never a replacement for good use of the hand, but I firmly believe that it's physically impossible for finger action to work to the full without the balancing force. This is nothing to do with dropping or collapsing through keys, but simply matching the forces that are returned to you when the finger acts properly. None of this is intended to contradict Alan's approach to the hand, but merely to help feel what is required to balance forces when using the hand well.
A very strange thing happened yesterday. As I was playing, I tried to think about the forearm and hand as you previously said-collapse the wrist and let the forearm drop down and towards you (a very good feeling to integrate in your playing). Just as I had found that gravitational force, my shoulder started to rise up and tense. I had muscle tension problems for a couple of minutes and then it started to get better. However this led me to the conclusion that all the 3 "giroscopes"(the wrist, the elbow, the shoulder) have the same importance and are interdependent. Relaxing the first 2 led to tension at the shoulder.
I started to think that grade 3(ABRSM) pieces are too difficult for me and started a menuet from Bach...a grade 2 from Anna Magdalena's notebook. I realise now that grade 2 pieces are more easy to learn than I imagined. So I guess I am above grade 2. The problem is not the finger coordination and hand position, but the arm. It's exactly how you said it here:
"A very strange thing happened yesterday. As I was playing, I tried to think about the forearm and hand as you previously said-collapse the wrist and let the forearm drop down and towards you (a very good feeling to integrate in your playing). Just as I had found that gravitational force, my shoulder started to rise up and tense. I had muscle tension problems for a couple of minutes and then it started to get better. However this led me to the conclusion that all the 3 "giroscopes"(the wrist, the elbow, the shoulder) have the same importance and are interdependent. Relaxing the first 2 led to tension at the shoulder."
That's an interesting one. In purely mechanical terms, sometimes doing one thing has a consequence upon another element and leads to compensations (which can be positive or negative). I totally agree that those three areas are all integrally linked in how they all contribute. However, I can't really see any mechanical reason why releasing more at the wrist and forearm would lead to a stiffer shoulder. It sounds very counter-intuitive to me. I suspect that this is a pure physical habit that has somehow become instinctive, rather than a natural compensation for looseness elsewhere. Have you tried collapsing EVERYTHING in the arm at once, with the whole palm sagging down into the keys and then sliding off (but no pushing! only releasing and resting). The most natural thing should be for the shoulder to sag down with this (and for the elbow to flop inward), not to rise up at all. I'd focus a lot on this universal collapse into the neutral state. Remember though, when you play normally the releases are solely balancing forces so there is no actual collapse whatsoever. It's just the feeling of what collapsed, were it not in perfect balance what the finger's action sends back at you.
From there, try starting with everything sagging onto a cluster of keys that supports your arm, but then ever so slowly feel the elbow drifting outwards. This makes the shoulder take on more support than when it started collapsed down- but it should come freely and not with any locking. Don't think "up" at the shoulder at all, think "outwards" to the side and away from your torso like the chicken clucking impression. This really cannot be done slowly enough though and should certainly not be overstated. Just feel a tiny 'drift' that does not change the alignment of the hand (not any big outward thrust as in extreme elbow out). That's all it takes to make the shoulder begin to offer some support without locking into a position. All the while keep your palm collapsed on the keys for now, but notice how this slightly lightens the pressure from your arm's previously dead weight. I think that this is the basic component that you need to feel when you go back to normal playing- in order to get your shoulder taking on some of the supporting role in a way that involves no locking whatsoever. I'd also use the wrist weights for various slow exercises away from the piano. Just move your arms around very slowly and feel how the shoulder can support without a trace of stiffness.
Does that help at all? I've found this "drift" to be extremely helpful for keeping effort light in both the elbow and shoulder, but without letting them slump into excessive collapse. It's probably a bit of a simplification, but I'm thinking of weight regulation mainly in terms of this virtually invisible sideways drift, rather than in terms of actually thinking of up and down forces from the shoulder. I'd always think of starting from excessively released states and then finding the small adaptations into the playing position- not starting from your accustomed playing position and then trying to remember to release a little bit extra.
Also, press ups are very good for this feeling of a 'wider' space to the shoulders. I often do a few light ones against the piano (with the whole palm on the keys) while practicing. When you lean in with the hand spaced out, it can really open them out wide (let them get pushed right back to the outside of the torso- don't hold them on the inside). This helps get that 'floating' feel- instead of having to resort to only the extremes of collapsing or locking. I tend to notice that most raised shoulders from students also tend to pinch inwards too much. Odd as it may sound, I think that it's primarily an outward feel that balances best.
I'm finding this very useful for practise on my digital at the moment. It's still very hard to play compared to my Bluthner. I have to hold back much more weight, due to the light action. But then I can sometimes feel I'm slightly locking up- rather than holding back while still leaving free slack for the returned forces to be absorbed by. Because the release that serves to balance is so much smaller than on a real instrument, it's far harder to get the tiny amount just right. It's tiny, but it's still a release- not a case of holding everything in fixed position. Strangely, I think it's far easier to end up fighting against small return forces, than larger ones.
Also, when you get to the point where you simply could not want to drift any further without screwing up the alignment, try stopping. Then do the same again, but this time don't think of stopping but still think of drifting, but so slightly that it doesn't even lead to any movement any more. But it's still felt.
I'm not sure if that necessarily makes any sense at all or sounds like a load of old hogwash, but I'm finding this makes a huge difference, subtle as the change might seem. Whenever I feel that I stop the shoulder and elbow are prone to ever so slightly getting stiffer, little by little. However, just imagining the drift to be ongoing keeps it free. I don't think this is purely an illusion. Gravity would bring the elbow back in, so if you imagine the drift I think that makes it easier to keep feeling the interaction between the muscles ongoing force and the gravity that wants to make it fall back in to the torso. If I just let my elbow stop in a position, I think it subconsciously starts to get 'held' in place by some opposing muscular actions. However, when I keep the tiny drifting feel, I think it's a much more sensitive balance between the action of gravity and a more exact balancing force that is only just enough to stop that gravity pulling it in. I think it's much closer to a refined unstable equilibrium. I don't want to have to do this consciously forever, but I'm trying to do it almost 100% of the time right now. The moment I forget it, if I zone in on my elbow, it will almost always feel slightly stiffer. I think this slight action needs to become automatic, in the long run, before it can be forgotten.
Remember though, this isn't to encourage you to withold more, but a suggestion for how to do it in a healthy instead of the stiffened way. So I'd focus very much on a true state of release first and feel this drifting action as a really very slight deviation. The feel for neutrality has to come before you can put anything back in- and that will need to be done very slowly and carefully, if it is not to simply encourage the excess holding.Oh, and just to be clear, the motion of the elbow in the drifting exercise might literally be as little as one or two inches- although I'd experiment with various different distances of motion.
I sometimes start to feel this. However I encounter setbacks from time to time: I sweat in the underarm and upperback(shoulder blades) area - a clear sign that some unwanted muscular activity is occuring there.
If we ignore the weaker tone and control I have in this position...yes....it should be more comfortable. The fingers remember that they have to be more curled and are pulling with the same force as in a standup drill so the arch gets pronounced again(or at least that particular finger) without being able to control this. Although a greater part of the muscles in the hand rests when one plays in this position, you have the sureness that pulling the key from totally flat fingers is much more difficult.
I obtain the strongest release when I think about the elbow bent as it is when one plays the piano but willing to drop as if the keyboard wasn't there or would disappear taking the arm by surprise. I guess the fingers will have to accomodate to the increased effort they have to make to neutralize the force of the gravity. I don't like the way my arch behaves: the wrist raises, collapses while the hand swings from left to right or viceversa. The unstable equilibrium is not stable enough yet if you know what I mean.
The elbow does flop inward and the shoulder does sag down but is imediately followed by somekind of reflex that pushes the shoulder forwards and up.
"If we ignore the weaker tone and control I have in this position...yes....it should be more comfortable. The fingers remember that they have to be more curled and are pushing like in a standup drill so the arch gets pronounced again(or at least that particular finger) without being able to control this. Although a greater part of the muscles in the hand is rests when one plays in this position, you have the sureness that pulling the key from totally flat fingers is much more difficult."
You say "pushing" in the standup? Are you digging in, or perhaps even straightening the end joints of the finger, instead of simply using the natural inward action at each joint? I think that could explain a lot.
You might find this interesting:
I've been thinking a lot about the most fundamental explanations for certain problems. I'd be interested to know if that makes any sense to you or not.
"I don't like the way my arch behaves: the wrist raises, collapses while the hand swings from left to right or viceversa. The unstable equilibrium is not stable enough yet if you know what I mean."
I'd just be careful to remember that the release is designed to match the finger, more than vice versa. Start from normal finger actions, but use the release to maintain stillness, instead of holding still. That's basically what the released gravity is for- to keep you still without seizure, as the finger pulls. It should be precisely a balancing release of force, not a destabilizing one. If there's collapse then it is not in balance with the finger.
Very sorry for the grammar mistakes I made last night. It was quite late and I was tired. I edited my previous reply. I thought about pulling and actually wrote pushing, dough they are completely different moreover the latter being wrong to apply in piano tehnique.
Beyond this, I wanted to say that when playing with less-curled fingers the muscles don't need to supply so much force anymore or maybe they do but in a completely different way and this is the main problem. That's why I compared that phenomenon to a standup drill when the surplus of force overcomes the weight of the arm and makes the finger(and the hand) stand up.
Ah, fair enough. I'd keep working on the slightly less exaggerated curve though. Mechanically, it makes the force from the natural inward actions more direct and it also uses the strongest part of the muscle's action (which becomes weaker, once the finger has curled up). If it feels weak, it's simply a matter of becoming accustomed to utilising a part of the finger's motion that is not normally involved in contibuting anything, when you move after a prior curl.
I find it very useful to simply work on balance, rather than on moving anything, at a tabletop. Start with a slightly lowered wrist and simply try to balance a reasonably flat finger (with a large surface area contacting on the pad), with every joint working slightly inwards to contribute to the balance without actually curling up. If you can find balance in those situations, it will gradually start to transfer to flatter positions at the keyboard. I realised today that even just doing it on a tabletop, my fingertip sometimes loses contact and slips- ever so slightly but enough to be significant to the ability of the finger to apply forces. On my upright, I can sort of get away with this, but I'm noticing that imprecisions in the quality of action are caused by this- especially in the fourth and fifth of my right. Just the faintest slide means the finger's muscles are no longer able to activate properly.
I have accustomed to this almost seamless curve. The shoulder became more relaxed as I played in this position and maintained much of their relaxed state as I switched back to the pronounced arch I had before. You were right: it offers one much more possibilities. However I still have problems when trying to play broken chords or whatever and touching the adjacent black keys. On an acoustic piano this is not going to happen, no matter how far from a "straight down" trajectory you will be;or maybe if you are extremely negligent you will barely make one of the black keys next to the white one you play to sound. On a digital you have to be very careful and upright(in terms of key attack) on such situations.
As for the octaves I am starting to understand what Cziffra's finger action means. If you use the fingers and position your hand behind the 5th, you can rotate more freely and avoid any involuntary touch from the 4th.
Much of the weight of the arm is now directed towards the hand and the fingers. It's extraordinary how the weight makes you more secure and stable at high speeds and more relaxed at lower ones. However I think that the pulling does not match the release yet. It's still much more pulling than it should be. I feel that the wrist tends to go up when I (probably) try to play forte or louder. It's much better anyway. In the old days, if I tried to play forte, my wrist would lock and I would start to push like mad.
