I found this video excellent. I'm a long time musician but beginner pianist and tried my interpretation of the approach to arm weight that you described: letting the arms/elbows hang supported by the arches/fingers. I found this made my fingers want to 'walk' between keys since they have to support the arms. My fingers felt more like the 'legs' supporting my arms which hang more relaxed. I'm able to keep a good arch as far as I can tell, it does feel like the hands need to be 'stronger' for this approach, as you described. I could hear a significant change in my tone. The arms are definitely engaged to some degree in order to lift the hands where required or move the hands up to the black keys etc, but that seems moved more to the subconscious. I'm much more 'relaxed / loose' for lack of a better word, heavy feeling. The power pressing down the keys feels more like gravity/weight of my arms and shoulders. Really interesting stuff. Where should I go from here? Thx
I think the first 20 minutes already clear up a ton of doubts about arm weight any beginner student may have. I wish I had seen this two years back. When I was reading about gravity, and even about how dropping from higher up adding acceleration to the keys. Nothing falser than that, nothing farther from uncontrolled gravity. @10:15 the first (of many a) revelation, how we actually control acceleration by carefully experimenting on counteracting gravity, until the spot when we feel the hammer clicking away... and while one may learn it on his own, through months of experimenting and listening, here it is given to us on a silver plate! Thanks for this!
Plenty of more content like this on www.pianotechnique.org We really put in a lot of effort in that site. You might find this series quite useful: app.pianotechnique.org/series/72 Cheers, J
Is it me is this a bit long winded? Truth is you play with a combination of body, upper arm, lower arm, and wrist movement, depending on what level of tone is required. Weight is supported at all joints, fingers maintain a resistance against the weight but obviously need to move at the knuckle. Weight is controlled at the shoulder and all contributing muscles and fingers are as relaxed as possible, non contributing muscles are completely relaxed. It is this way you have more control of how the keys go down and hence the ultimate velocity of the hammers and resultant tone. Some lucky people do it completely naturally without much training. Also one needs to guard against the resting of weight on the keys after playing, only enough weight should be applied to hold the key down else your not ready to move quickly on.
This video of Richter playing the Schubert Sonata in G major is a great example of arm weight technique in the very first chord. Notice the arm working as one unit, and the slower speed in which he takes down the key to create a richer sound. The arch in the hand is being facilitated by the downward motion of the ever so slight collapse of the wrist, preventing tension from accumulating up the arm. Gilels has many such videos illustrating this point.
At 22:45 Fraser quotes Claudio Arrau, but Arrau's hand arch often flattened out while he played. I know this because my former teacher studied with Arrau and testified to this fact.
Thank you Benjamin for your enlightening comments. Do you see what I am talking about in the Richter video you cite? He uses a completely stiff hand, moved by the falling weight of the arm, to move the key. It is a perfect example. He gets a beautiful sound, but can you perceive the technical limitation in the way it's produced? I find it fascinating that Richter was often very dissatisfied with his performances, and I am beginning to suspect this is one possible source of his dissatisfaction.
There are several components of this technique that should be discussed. One, arm technique has more to do with accommodating the speed in which the key falls, than anything else. The arm, hand and fingers are one unit. This isn't to say there is no finger articulation, nor is it to say there won't be a passage that demands a more finger based technique; however, most of the motion is full body. The fingers are strong (not tight), and the arch and wrist facilitate the movement of the arm.
Arm weight technique, when well done, does indeed make effective use of gravity. In this lecture I point out that in most cases, arm weight technique actually divorces the hand from gravity, because the skeleton's function is to stand easily in the field of gravitation but arm weight technique mostly leads to a collapse of the skeleton. Thanks for your comment, it provides an opportunity for an important clarification.
excellent lecture. Alan although your book is more informative and contains much more, these concepts and movements are simply easier to explain in video. So i find these lectures excellent supplements to your book. I think it would be a great idea to have some lectures on most topics appeared in your book!
I indeed misunderstood you then. My impression was that you meant since there is flexion within the shoulder/arm/hand, it is a contradiction and negates the theory of "arm technique." That's why I mentioned the black/white bit. I wasn't expecting a reply from the head honcho. Thanks for replying. Also, your book seems quite promising. I will be ordering and checking it out!
I missed it this year, but hopefully I'll be able to attend in the future, BTW, 201 view and 2 comments??? Com'on people, this is a pot of gold of information!
I believe this video has key elements that can help me diminish tension causing playing. A key piece I notably suffer with is Prokofiev's prelude op12 7. My hand gets tired from playing the right hand(repetitive broken chords) and becomes increasingly stiff. I can't seem to find a practice method to help me overcome it. I think if I overcame the tension for this piece then it would also make many other pieces easier (vice versa)
The distance in which you sit at the piano is crucial to this technique, and the release of the key is crucial to prevent overuse of the muscles. Often there is a moment of preparation, a moment of attack, and a moment of release that is very distinct in this technique. The clinician in this video makes no demonstration of these fundamentals, and if students play as he demonstrates, OF COURSE there will be problems.
I have an observation. One of the most important aspects of the arm weight technique is the proper alignment of the hand and fingers in order to distribute the arm weight to the desired key; with that said, the arches are crucial, but for what I can see, you are isolating the arches in the hand from the arch on the wrist (which goes from the fingers all the way to the elbow), and in the video, you are actually collapsing that arch, that is why you have to rely on moving the finger, thus isolating fingers from the whole arm, and as a consequence a wrong execution of the arm weight technique. Of course there are muscular contractions, otherwise bones and joints wouldn't be able to keep their structure, but what the arm weight technique teaches is the use of the proper muscles, the control over contraction-release and the integration of all arm as a our main tool, not just the fingers. I hope this comment wasn't disrespectful in any way, I have great admiration for your work and for any pianist and teacher that promotes wellness in music performance, specially among pianists. Regards.
Sorry to bother... and to answer the question of the lady at min 30:35, the arm is separated, there are 4 major joints, wrist, elbow and collarbone (where the arm actually begins). Then, vertical movements should initiate from the elbow, horizontal movement from the collarbone. Body map is really helpful to understand piano technique, it takes us to the root of the functional movement of the body, therefore a better technique.
No disrespect felt, and your comments are much appreciated. I love the spirit of dialogue and mutual search much more than antagonism. First point: somewhere I write about my "keystone" (the metacarpal-phalangeal joint) vs. Thomas Mark's "keystone" (the wrist). It turns out that up until mezzopiano the great pianists consistently use the MCP joint as the high point of the arch, but when it gets any louder, the wrist takes precedence. BUT the hand's arch does NOT fall into lethargy! Second point: yes the bones must be aligned, not to transmit the arm's weight to the key, but to transmit a moving force to the key.... Thanks for your contribution! AFF
I think allowing the wrist to collapse is an important aspect of the technique, as long as it's done correctly. Of course you have to sit so that your elbows are forwards of your shoulders so that your arm falls back towards you when you let it go. The arch of the hand actually prevents the wrist from dropping too far. Also the moment of finger impulse causes the arm and wrist to bounce back upwards a little if done correctly. The hand arch coupled with the backward movement of the elbow actually causes the wrist to straighten out. If you sit too close so that the elbow doesn't fall backwards, then the wrist stays raised and jars the movement. This doesn't apply to the opposite movement (up and into the keys) because you want an arm movement that tends to push the wrist upwards.
This is no doubt one of many important points to discuss in piano pedagogy; however, this is not the arm weight technique. Rubinstein, and Horowitz are definitely not examples of this school. That isn't to say they never used any arm technique, but that wasn't the foundation of their technique. Richter and Gilels are the most obvious pianists to talk about (claudio arrau not so much, but more so than Rubinstein and Horowitz). Frank levy is also a very good example of the arm weight technique.
There are limitations to any technique. For example, in the case of the technique you advocate, you sacrifice quality of sound for dexterity, which is admirable in its own way. Many great pianists fall into this school of thought. Then there are those who play for the sake of the sound (even horowitz). Evgeny Kissin on the 'Golden Sound' In any case, a good pianist will be able to acquire many kinds of different techniques to achieve the most musical ideas. I believe Richter may have been disatisfied, not because he couldn't play in any way he chose, but because he was unwilling to sacrifice the beauty of the instrument in favor of the spectacle.
I beg to differ. Fraser's approach is ALL about improving sound quality. Improved dexterity is merely one of the many welcome side effects. Furthermore, it's an approach that tries its best to exemplify exactly what you say - acquire many different kinds of technique to achieve the greatest musical flexibility and richness of thought.
Only 12 minutes in so far, but I think Mr. Alan Fraser's thought process is far too black and white, and far too literal (At least thus far in the video). I suppose he would have more properly understood the theory behind arm-weight technique if it were thought of as making effective use of gravity.
I see it this way : A bowling ball is more effective at knocking down 10 pins than a soccer ball is, because it has more mass. It will be even more effective in a bowling alley on the moon where it weighs less, but still has the same mass. Mass doesn't have to rely on gravity in order to make use of it, in this case it is more about the effect of mass in motion. The arm can send the hand upwards, downwards, sideways, forwards and backwards. Do the right movements and you make a good, reliable tone with little effort. As long as a bowling ball is going in the right direction at the right speed it will knock down the pins. Your arm is a bowling ball operating in 3 dimensions, the keys are the pins and as long as your arm keeps moving and your fingers don't buckle, the keys will go down. It can't be all about using gravity, because once the arm and wrist have completely dropped, the arm and wrist motion will cease and you'll be left carrying a huge weight on your fingers. The mass of the arm has to be able to move in all directions in order to be effective.
Mr Fraser, im only 10 Minutes in the Video and laughing hard and enjoying your talk and learning from you.
I found this video excellent. I'm a long time musician but beginner pianist and tried my interpretation of the approach to arm weight that you described: letting the arms/elbows hang supported by the arches/fingers. I found this made my fingers want to 'walk' between keys since they have to support the arms. My fingers felt more like the 'legs' supporting my arms which hang more relaxed. I'm able to keep a good arch as far as I can tell, it does feel like the hands need to be 'stronger' for this approach, as you described. I could hear a significant change in my tone. The arms are definitely engaged to some degree in order to lift the hands where required or move the hands up to the black keys etc, but that seems moved more to the subconscious. I'm much more 'relaxed / loose' for lack of a better word, heavy feeling. The power pressing down the keys feels more like gravity/weight of my arms and shoulders. Really interesting stuff. Where should I go from here? Thx
You have saved me from so much tendonitis, RSI, and it's gotten a lot easier to play with Carpal Tunnel. :]
THANK YOU
I think the first 20 minutes already clear up a ton of doubts about arm weight any beginner student may have. I wish I had seen this two years back. When I was reading about gravity, and even about how dropping from higher up adding acceleration to the keys. Nothing falser than that, nothing farther from uncontrolled gravity. @10:15 the first (of many a) revelation, how we actually control acceleration by carefully experimenting on counteracting gravity, until the spot when we feel the hammer clicking away... and while one may learn it on his own, through months of experimenting and listening, here it is given to us on a silver plate! Thanks for this!
Plenty of more content like this on www.pianotechnique.org We really put in a lot of effort in that site. You might find this series quite useful: app.pianotechnique.org/series/72
Cheers,
J
Is it me is this a bit long winded? Truth is you play with a combination of body, upper arm, lower arm, and wrist movement, depending on what level of tone is required. Weight is supported at all joints, fingers maintain a resistance against the weight but obviously need to move at the knuckle. Weight is controlled at the shoulder and all contributing muscles and fingers are as relaxed as possible, non contributing muscles are completely relaxed. It is this way you have more control of how the keys go down and hence the ultimate velocity of the hammers and resultant tone. Some lucky people do it completely naturally without much training. Also one needs to guard against the resting of weight on the keys after playing, only enough weight should be applied to hold the key down else your not ready to move quickly on.
This video of Richter playing the Schubert Sonata in G major is a great example of arm weight technique in the very first chord. Notice the arm working as one unit, and the slower speed in which he takes down the key to create a richer sound. The arch in the hand is being facilitated by the downward motion of the ever so slight collapse of the wrist, preventing tension from accumulating up the arm. Gilels has many such videos illustrating this point.
At 22:45 Fraser quotes Claudio Arrau, but Arrau's hand arch often flattened out while he played. I know this because my former teacher studied with Arrau and testified to this fact.
Because he’s already old. Age and health affects our technique.
Thank you Benjamin for your enlightening comments. Do you see what I am talking about in the Richter video you cite? He uses a completely stiff hand, moved by the falling weight of the arm, to move the key. It is a perfect example. He gets a beautiful sound, but can you perceive the technical limitation in the way it's produced? I find it fascinating that Richter was often very dissatisfied with his performances, and I am beginning to suspect this is one possible source of his dissatisfaction.
There are several components of this technique that should be discussed. One, arm technique has more to do with accommodating the speed in which the key falls, than anything else. The arm, hand and fingers are one unit. This isn't to say there is no finger articulation, nor is it to say there won't be a passage that demands a more finger based technique; however, most of the motion is full body. The fingers are strong (not tight), and the arch and wrist facilitate the movement of the arm.
Arm weight technique, when well done, does indeed make effective use of gravity. In this lecture I point out that in most cases, arm weight technique actually divorces the hand from gravity, because the skeleton's function is to stand easily in the field of gravitation but arm weight technique mostly leads to a collapse of the skeleton.
Thanks for your comment, it provides an opportunity for an important clarification.
excellent lecture. Alan although your book is more informative and contains much more, these concepts and movements are simply easier to explain in video. So i find these lectures excellent supplements to your book. I think it would be a great idea to have some lectures on most topics appeared in your book!
I indeed misunderstood you then. My impression was that you meant since there is flexion within the shoulder/arm/hand, it is a contradiction and negates the theory of "arm technique." That's why I mentioned the black/white bit.
I wasn't expecting a reply from the head honcho. Thanks for replying.
Also, your book seems quite promising. I will be ordering and checking it out!
I missed it this year, but hopefully I'll be able to attend in the future, BTW, 201 view and 2 comments??? Com'on people, this is a pot of gold of information!
I believe this video has key elements that can help me diminish tension causing playing. A key piece I notably suffer with is Prokofiev's prelude op12 7.
My hand gets tired from playing the right hand(repetitive broken chords) and becomes increasingly stiff. I can't seem to find a practice method to help me overcome it. I think if I overcame the tension for this piece then it would also make many other pieces easier (vice versa)
The distance in which you sit at the piano is crucial to this technique, and the release of the key is crucial to prevent overuse of the muscles. Often there is a moment of preparation, a moment of attack, and a moment of release that is very distinct in this technique. The clinician in this video makes no demonstration of these fundamentals, and if students play as he demonstrates, OF COURSE there will be problems.
I have an observation. One of the most important aspects of the arm weight technique is the proper alignment of the hand and fingers in order to distribute the arm weight to the desired key; with that said, the arches are crucial, but for what I can see, you are isolating the arches in the hand from the arch on the wrist (which goes from the fingers all the way to the elbow), and in the video, you are actually collapsing that arch, that is why you have to rely on moving the finger, thus isolating fingers from the whole arm, and as a consequence a wrong execution of the arm weight technique.
Of course there are muscular contractions, otherwise bones and joints wouldn't be able to keep their structure, but what the arm weight technique teaches is the use of the proper muscles, the control over contraction-release and the integration of all arm as a our main tool, not just the fingers.
I hope this comment wasn't disrespectful in any way, I have great admiration for your work and for any pianist and teacher that promotes wellness in music performance, specially among pianists.
Regards.
Sorry to bother... and to answer the question of the lady at min 30:35, the arm is separated, there are 4 major joints, wrist, elbow and collarbone (where the arm actually begins). Then, vertical movements should initiate from the elbow, horizontal movement from the collarbone. Body map is really helpful to understand piano technique, it takes us to the root of the functional movement of the body, therefore a better technique.
No disrespect felt, and your comments are much appreciated. I love the spirit of dialogue and mutual search much more than antagonism.
First point: somewhere I write about my "keystone" (the metacarpal-phalangeal joint) vs. Thomas Mark's "keystone" (the wrist). It turns out that up until mezzopiano the great pianists consistently use the MCP joint as the high point of the arch, but when it gets any louder, the wrist takes precedence. BUT the hand's arch does NOT fall into lethargy!
Second point: yes the bones must be aligned, not to transmit the arm's weight to the key, but to transmit a moving force to the key....
Thanks for your contribution!
AFF
DTZepeda87
The body map referred to can be found in Thomas Mark's book, "What Every Pianist Needs to Know About the Body."
I think allowing the wrist to collapse is an important aspect of the technique, as long as it's done correctly. Of course you have to sit so that your elbows are forwards of your shoulders so that your arm falls back towards you when you let it go. The arch of the hand actually prevents the wrist from dropping too far. Also the moment of finger impulse causes the arm and wrist to bounce back upwards a little if done correctly. The hand arch coupled with the backward movement of the elbow actually causes the wrist to straighten out. If you sit too close so that the elbow doesn't fall backwards, then the wrist stays raised and jars the movement. This doesn't apply to the opposite movement (up and into the keys) because you want an arm movement that tends to push the wrist upwards.
This is no doubt one of many important points to discuss in piano pedagogy; however, this is not the arm weight technique. Rubinstein, and Horowitz are definitely not examples of this school. That isn't to say they never used any arm technique, but that wasn't the foundation of their technique. Richter and Gilels are the most obvious pianists to talk about (claudio arrau not so much, but more so than Rubinstein and Horowitz). Frank levy is also a very good example of the arm weight technique.
There are limitations to any technique. For example, in the case of the technique you advocate, you sacrifice quality of sound for dexterity, which is admirable in its own way. Many great pianists fall into this school of thought. Then there are those who play for the sake of the sound (even horowitz). Evgeny Kissin on the 'Golden Sound' In any case, a good pianist will be able to acquire many kinds of different techniques to achieve the most musical ideas. I believe Richter may have been disatisfied, not because he couldn't play in any way he chose, but because he was unwilling to sacrifice the beauty of the instrument in favor of the spectacle.
I beg to differ. Fraser's approach is ALL about improving sound quality. Improved dexterity is merely one of the many welcome side effects. Furthermore, it's an approach that tries its best to exemplify exactly what you say - acquire many different kinds of technique to achieve the greatest musical flexibility and richness of thought.
I think you have great info here but quite hard to follow your teaching - might help to focus on the objective.
Try app.pianotechnique.org/
Who are the pianists mentioned at 17:50? Thanks.
Awesome
21:44 :-)) ! ( 20:30 ff.) So true.... love it......... Thank you for your work ! ( Found it several days before.)
Plenty of more videos on www.pianotechnique.org (over 860 and counting)
Thank you for your kind reply ! Greetings from Lübeck/ Germany ( Hometown of Dietrich
Buxtehude , visited by JS Bach in 1705 ) Have an amazing day !
Only 12 minutes in so far, but I think Mr. Alan Fraser's thought process is far too black and white, and far too literal (At least thus far in the video).
I suppose he would have more properly understood the theory behind arm-weight technique if it were thought of as making effective use of gravity.
I see it this way :
A bowling ball is more effective at knocking down 10 pins than a soccer ball is, because it has more mass. It will be even more effective in a bowling alley on the moon where it weighs less, but still has the same mass. Mass doesn't have to rely on gravity in order to make use of it, in this case it is more about the effect of mass in motion. The arm can send the hand upwards, downwards, sideways, forwards and backwards. Do the right movements and you make a good, reliable tone with little effort. As long as a bowling ball is going in the right direction at the right speed it will knock down the pins. Your arm is a bowling ball operating in 3 dimensions, the keys are the pins and as long as your arm keeps moving and your fingers don't buckle, the keys will go down.
It can't be all about using gravity, because once the arm and wrist have completely dropped, the arm and wrist motion will cease and you'll be left carrying a huge weight on your fingers. The mass of the arm has to be able to move in all directions in order to be effective.
f
me?