Trills And Tension

Hello, my biggest problems are playing trills and building up muscle tension in my for arms. Trills: They sound very slow and irregular when I play them and I can't get them up to speed. My for arm starts to get very tensed without seconds while I trill and raises a little bit in the air. When playing passages fast, my fingers start to contract till I play on my nails, this is a reaction I can't control and makes me louse the control over my playing. Whatever I play (scales, chords...) my for-arms are getting tired very fast and the muscles hard so I have to stop very often during a piece. These are my main problems, does this sound familiar and is there a way to change this? It would be great if I had a way to get rid of it. best wishes, Andreas van Haren, Sweden

This is a complex question, because i just can't tell you relax your forearm and everything will be fine.I thought i could take a stab at it, but i will leave it to prof.Fraser first.Lets see what he has to say on this subject! I will jump in right after that!

thanks!

From what you describe, it sounds like you have a collapsed arch in your hand. The place to begin is by bringing the top knuckle of your second finger into greater prominence, as I show near the beginning of the demo. Notice the shape of my hand, and how the second finger STANDS UP rather than being overly loose. If you achieve this, your hand will no longer feel like the one you always had - the difference is that striking! So you will have to relearn all the actions you do at the keyboard. I think I won't rewrite my whole book here in the post - the longer, more complete answer to your question is in there and in the film! Good luck, AFF

Hi Alan, thanks for your advice. I saw the demo movie a couple of times and recognize most of the things you talk about. During my first years of piano lessons, I have been though about the arc, something I still do automatically now, in combination with rotating the hand and for-arm when playing broken chords. My teacher always was very strict in not stiffen the pulse while playing and would hit my hand of the keyboard when if I would (in a nice way though..) I also learned about your legato playing, but more as a way to practice good legato play and not using it in the performance itself. Another thing that looks like something I learned, but I'm not sure if that's what you mean in the video, is the side hit with your 5th finger. I learned that in fast jumps over a long distance on the keyboard, I had to hit the distant key with the side of my 5th finger instead of moving my whole hand towards it and press it down (as my later teacher told me to do. he called my way of lay a karate kid way). Si I think I'm doing most of the things you talk about, maybe I have to pay more attention at it again. I'm interested though in your system and could see me using it in my piano lesson practice if I ever start that up again. Before doing that though, I really want to have fixed my own problems, so buying your book is something I absolute will do soon. Thanks fro your help.

I think that the only reason your trills sound slow and irregular is because you stiff your forearm and wrist.If you put your hand on the table and play some trills with your second and third finger, you will notice that the effect of your movement is visible all the way to you biceps. To me it's amassing and it always reminds me to loosen up my forearm and use all the power we have in th hand.Another issue is the wrist.Maybe you can try to "follow" the trill with your hand and forearm.Solve your technical problem playing musically.You will notice the change immediately, i guarantee! Rotating your hand may also help, especially if you play trils with the thumb and middle finger, or fifth. For the passages, i would suggest the same thing.Play them slow and musically, and it will show you how its meant to be played!Don't forget to shape all the phrases, or it this case the path of the passage itself. Jovan Haji-Djurich

Thanks, I tried the trill as you describe and I do feel my arm stiffen after some seconds, so I will put some attention on it to relax it. Do you think btw, that playing fast trills is a matter of training the muscles as well? I played for almost 30 years now so the muscles needed for playing fast trills should be strong enough, I think. Is it then only a matter of playing them in a good relaxed state?

It's all in the state of mind.Have you seen matrix?You remember when Morpheus asks Neo to jump over that huge gap between buildings.He said something like "free your mind". The point is to be as more natural and relaxed as we can.Your hands will find it's way.Of course, do not go into the extreme.Be relaxed but stable!

I saw that movie many times and love the whole All in the Mind thing. I love to study a piano piece in my mind away from the piano as well, I notice that it gives me a good mental picture of the piece (sheet music it self, as well as the finger feeling on the keys) that makes it easier to memorize. I'm trying to play my own piano compositions and struggle with lot of passages, it's very frustrating not to be able to play your own music. I have the tendency to rewrite things only because I can't play them, and I think that's not an good motivation. I will try to use the Matrix way and see how it goes. Thanks!

For Moshe Feldenkrais, the mind/body split did not exist. The part of your brain that controls the complex organization required for body movement is just as much a part of your mind as your verbal, linearly-thinking mind. The bridge that joins these two seemingly disparate parts of our mind is When you say you are going to relax your arm, I ask you, how to do you actually do that? A very interesting question! Thus it is that you don't need to train your muscles so much as to train your the part of your mind that deals with movement. If you really do this, you may notice that you are making different demands on parts of your musculature that require some muscles to develop their strength. But never just strengthen the muscle. Instead, develop the reflexes required for the movement to the point where they demand more power from the muscle. So: Play a trill, and pay attention to the sensations you experience as you play it. Does your arm move, breathe at all as you trill? Could you introduce a breathing movement of your forearm as you trill? How do your sensations change when you do this? Of course, if your forearm can breathe, it cannot remain as tense as it was, so you have already found a practical way to change the degree of tension in your arm while you trill! This is what I mean by, "Let sensation be your teacher."