What's The Deal With The Humerus?

Before I start, I'd like to ask your attention for a performance by Robert Helps of the Chopin Piano Sonata #2. Helps was a pianist and composer, and also one of the most distinguished pupils of Abby Whiteside. He was certainly the most well-known practitioner of her theories of rhythm and of a technique directed from the humerus rather than the fingers. I also came across a clip featuring . Although there is some hand activity present (Josef Gat school of playing), I also see a lot of upper arm and torso movement. Many great performers seem to have this ongoing upper arm and torso activity that gives their playing unbelievable power. It is often called "arm weight school", but I don't believe it has anything to do with either weight or gravity. Unfortunately, Abby Whiteside's writings are too complicated and confusing to make any sense out of them. My question. Do you agree or disagree with the following statement: * upper arm and torso are rhythm and emotion * fingers/hands are intelligence If you want to create art on the piano, both are indispensable. P.S.: The underlying questions are, of course, 1) what movement(s) would that be? and 2) how do you go about teaching/learning both without mere pumping, pushing, etc.? Paul

Hi Looking forward to see Alans comment here. For me Cziffras technique was totally different. He played with his fingers even if he advocated complete relaxation in shoulders and arms.That is the adult Cziffra. I'm curious about the Rach-exercise. I heard from someone who met his family (long time ago in Costa Rica) about this exercise that he did with all fingers. And that probably there exist some movie were he plays the piano kept by his family.Know anything about such a movie? Best regards Eric

They all play with the fingers; that's for "intelligence" in art. Without the finger articulation, it would all sound amateuristic. What I mean is that there is a whole-arm/shoulder/torso coordination present in all good pianists that backs up those fingers, but it is NOT arm weight playing as such. It's much like the "educated screaming" in good opera singing, a power for sound that does not originate in the throat, but that comes from way down deeper than the gut. There must be a constant flow of air going through the pillar of the body. Against that stream, articulation is realized (with tongue, teeth, lips, mouth form, etc.) without ever interrupting the airflow. If this energy from deep down is not present, then the singer impresses nobody. Maybe that is why they all say that we should "sing" on the piano? Here is that same Cziffra playing , a topic Alan posted). In Artur Rubinstein, this is even more visible, for example in his famous rendering of ; it seems to be a movement of the upper arm that is not directed downward, but laterally, mostly towards the body, as if they want to hug the piano. Volodos is another example of people who do this. The thing I noticed is that if such a coordination is NOT present, then players sound either "unmusical" or "over-intellectual". I will try to translate some info from Russian into English about this yoga-like exercise Rachmaninov got passed on from one of his uncles. This may take some time because I'm rather busy, but I will certainly post it later on. As far as I know, there is no film of Rachmaninov playing the piano. There is a short accompaniment by him in a family surrounding of the song "boublitchki" on YouTube, but that's not very clear and certainly not representative. Paul

Before I start, I'd like to ask your attention for a performance by Robert Helps of the Chopin Piano Sonata #2. Helps was a pianist and composer, and also one of the most distinguished pupils of Abby Whiteside. He was certainly the most well-known practitioner of her theories of rhythm and of a technique directed from the humerus rather than the fingers. I also came across a clip featuring . Although there is some hand activity present (Josef Gat school of playing), I also see a lot of upper arm and torso movement. Many great performers seem to have this ongoing upper arm and torso activity that gives their playing unbelievable power. It is often called "arm weight school", but I don't believe it has anything to do with either weight or gravity. Unfortunately, Abby Whiteside's writings are too complicated and confusing to make any sense out of them. My question. Do you agree or disagree with the following statement: * upper arm and torso are rhythm and emotion * fingers/hands are intelligence If you want to create art on the piano, both are indispensable. P.S.: The underlying questions are, of course, 1) what movement(s) would that be? and 2) how do you go about teaching/learning both without mere pumping, pushing, etc.? Paul To be honest I'd describe the young cziffra as an example of how immature technique can still yield good results when there's enough talent. What he's doing is collapsing not just the hand (its slight but significant compared to his mature playing) but his whole torso downwards. This is a whole body version of what I refer to as a negative movement- that both reduces energy transfer and control by making the contact with the keys resistance feel spongy. Clearly one of his teachers must have dealt with these habits. I caught myself doing the same thing the other day and realised how significant the Alexander Technique thing about keeping the spine long is. In quiet playing I would slouch a little- making making the whole body give way and making various muscles tense up to try to create stability. Like with the fingers, I think it pays to appreciate the useful direction of movement and the harmful one. That way, you don't have to try to immobilise anything. The young cziffra moves inefficiently by letting his body fall down so far. In later years he kept traces of that habit (of following in with his body rather than striving to push it back and away) but very little. I'd make a big distinction between that and rubinstein's body movement.

Also, I didn't like helps' sound much. While his hand seems adept at not giving way, it's nowhere near positive enough to make any real tonal differentiation. The sound comes in hard equal blocks- with the fingers doing too little to make serious difference in voicing. He's not giving way with his spine like cziffra and the movement looks healthy enough, but it's not enough to make for good voicing. Rubinstein uses his arms plenty but does way more at the fingers.

Can't we blame that partly on the fact that this is an unedited amateur film? Everything seems to be "flattened" if you don't filter professionally. After all, the man was a conservatory teacher, so he must have known what voicing is... Of course, they're different calibre pianists. Besides, Robert Helps is concentrated on outlining only (his specialty), while Rubinstein fills in more of the beautiful details. Still, there is the same basic emotional power in both. I found Helps a relief after the many intellectualized but soulless versions I've heard by too many pianists, where there is no pulse, no drive at all. Paul

I'm really looking forward to that translation. The rumor is that the family keeps such a film (films). I agree that there is a tendency to overorchestrate sometimes and that straight forward interpretations like Helps without personal bizarreries are a relief. Like Rubinstein. What I meant was that Cziffra used his fingers much more than Helps to manipulate the key. Which is no judgement of Helps at all in fact he has a nice arch and I envy his comfort. It would be interesting to hear him in Moszkowsky or something alike.

Can't we blame that partly on the fact that this is an unedited amateur film? Everything seems to be "flattened" if you don't filter professionally. After all, the man was a conservatory teacher, so he must have known what voicing is... Of course, they're different calibre pianists. Besides, Robert Helps is concentrated on outlining only (his specialty), while Rubinstein fills in more of the beautiful details. Still, there is the same basic emotional power in both. I found Helps a relief after the many intellectualized but soulless versions I've heard by too many pianists, where there is no pulse, no drive at all. Paul It's possible that it would have sounded better- but i'm always sceptical of this type of thing. I've seen some terrible amateur footage of great pianists who sound very musical despite any dynamic compression. After I wrote that,I heard far more musical voicing in the funeral march. However,I think it's a common tendency among even good musicians to lose voicing at upper levels and make percussive slabs of sound. This seems to be the case here. Sure, it's professional and solid playing still, but I think he limits his scope to make something more musical due to his technique.

My question. Do you agree or disagree with the following statement: * upper arm and torso are rhythm and emotion * fingers/hands are intelligence If you want to create art on the piano, both are indispensable. I basically agree but I think of it a bit differently. The upper arm and torso control the underlying elements of music, including rhythm and mood, as you have already mentioned, but also the arc and intent of a phrase. The fingers and wrist control the detail/surface elements - the voicing, articulation, and motivic shapes. So I prefer to think in terms of underlying and surface elements. How would this all work in practice? Skeletal movement is the key. The pelvis and the spine through to the wrist and fingers form a mechanical chain reaction. When you start to feel the pulse, the pelvis oscillates on its own and then the arm and wrist start to feel light and bouncy. Your fingers then drop into and manipulate the keys, getting the precise tonal color. I do not think it is a good idea to any of these processes. The best way to start is to develop a visceral feeling for pulse. Then you need to line up the bones properly and learn certain patterns of movement where the. That seems to me the ideal. I hope this makes sense.