Anyone have a great way to get these slouchers to sit up straight?!

I have had many a sloucher over the years, but this 9 y/o I have is the worst! His chin is practically on the keys lol.

lol! I think the best thing you can do is continually remind him. It may seem repetitive, but since he's been doing it for so long, I doubt he even realizes it. By telling him you will draw his attention to it.

Posture is a problem in singing as well, and there are certain hands-on things that can be done to help this (be sure to ask his permission first). Spend some time before he plays at each lesson, and just have him sit at the piano. Help him to find the right distance for the bench and where on the bench he should sit. Be sure both feet are flat on the floor, hip distance apart. Once he is situated, make any corrections in his posture by gently guiding his lower back so that there is a slight inward curve. Be careful that he doesn't raise his chest up high as a result. Stomach muscles need to be relaxed, and he should feel as though all his weight is on his sit bones, and not being held up by muscle. It's all about finding the right balance. He should be able to sit for long periods of time without muscles tiring if he is correctly balanced.

A good book about posture in general is "Ageless Spine, Lasting Health" by Kathleen Porter. I highly recommend it for everyone. We have such terrible posture in this country!

book

Here's a video about this as well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-vJ-aV6Xvo

With girls, I generally use the "you're beautiful when you sit tall" approach; with boys, I use the "How do you think girls see you when you slouch?" approach.

When that fails, I use a pencil in the spine (very gentle poke) which causes a reflex action of sitting straight, followed by, "Now that's the proper posture for playing the piano."

But some people will slouch no matter what we say. The worst problem is that people can play very well doing it, which we can see as we watch some of the really famous pianists. I personally think it eventually, at the very least, causes permanent problems with the spine. The problem is that teens and 20 somethings and 30 somethings are not worried about what it will do to them when they are no longer young.

It just takes constant reminders. I think most teachers fail at correcting posture because they lack persistence. It's not so much how you get your students to sit correctly, it's how consistently you encourage it.

Also, if you're using the words "sit up straight," I'd suggest something different. Straight always seemed a rigid, inflexible, and uncomfortable word to me, so I just tell my students to sit like a human, not like Igor (too slouched) or Frankenstein (shoulders tense.)

During lessons, all I have to do is mention Frankenstein or Igor, and the posture corrects itself quickly.

A typical conversation in my studio:

Me: "Um, it sounds fantastic, but you look like Igor."

Student: "Igor?"

Me: Acts out a slouching Igor character, and with an Igor-like voice, says "Like dis, Doctor Frankenstein's evil assistant. He's good at Zombies, but not so much at playing zee piano."

Student: Looks at me like I'm crazy, and the lesson continues, with better posture.

Love it Very good, thanks




yes, definitely something we need to work on. Currently if I touch his back (to remind him to sit up), the shoulders go up and the elbows go out too. It's actually quite a sight lol

This is going to sound a little weird. In my days as a chiropractor, I had many patients who wanted to form the habit of sitting or standing up straight. I would tell them to place two pieces of adhesive tape down their backs forming an "x" from shoulder to hip. When they slouched, the tape would pull and remind them to stand up straight. If you could get a parent to buy into this, you might ask them to tape up their kid before the lesson.

Yeah, yeah, I know it sounds funny, but it does work.

Sometimes believe it or not slouching is not just a matter of forgetting and having to be reminded. Sometimes literally the child should see a chiropractor and a simple adjustment a couple of times can help. Also the use of therapeutic grade aroma oils such as valor (whose nickname is actually the chiropractor, because it helps strengthen the muscles around the spine) to a simple oil like pepermint that brings oxygen to the person. You can get them from an aroma therapist for therapeutic grade oils. Many times a person, children included have their thyroid off which makes them stoop. So maybe you might look at actual physical things besides reminding the student to sit up. It is always good to rule everything out. It could be something very simple like those things.

Sit-ups and other core/abdominal exercises help, too.

So does walking, running, and playing outside!

The problem with posture has to do mostly with bones, not weak muscles. If you rely upon the skeleton to do it's job, then the muscles can be completely relaxed. Not to say that having strong muscles isn't good, but even those with strong muscles have back problems. A chiropractor is good for alignment as well, but without the proper concept of posture, it will always revert back.

Morodiene, I'm not sure that's correct. The back needs muscles working to remain erect. There are students with true skeletal problems, such as scoliosis, but I think we're talking about the students whose backs are just fine, but don't sit or stand erect often enough to keep their muscles in tone.

I'm thinking, I'm thinking.

I think it is the reverse. Poor posture is mostly caused by weak muscles, and most easily cured by strengthening muscles. Not sure where i got this idea, I know it is not original. I'll try to find the source.

The best posture is caused by back pain - in the workplace when i see someone sitting or standing perfectly, it's usually because he's hurt his back and is trying to limit the pain!

Evidence for the use of oils to strengthen muscle or improve VO2 max? I'm sorry, I can't let superstition like this go unchallenged.

Nor would I send a healthy child to a chiropractor.

John & Timr, this is a common misconception. You actually do not need strong muscles for the back to be erect, you need balance on the bones. Please check out that video I posted, and if you're interested, that book is an eye-opener. I tried it out myself, being a bit skeptical, and I can actually feel my muscles relax when I'm balanced.

Both balance and strength are needed and they go hand in hand. The activities John mentions (running, walking, sports) affect the feet, and it is the feet and ankles which affect what we end up doing at the hips, which in turn affects that balance. On the other hand, if a poorly balanced adult engages in sports, he's likely to do these sports "out of balance" - over-strong muscles compensate for the weak ones so the imbalance continues. That's why I think that it's not either/or but both. Morodiene, it is indeed an eye opener -- I found it humbling.

(Hoping this post is welcome.)

What do you believe is the correlation between slouching and one's ability to play the piano?

Should one sit at a whatever position feels comfortable to him/her? What is slouching feels more comfortable than sitting up straight?

As you can probably tell, I'm a sloucher (have been all my life). My teacher is always "reminding" me to sit up straight, but for the life of me, can't figure out what this has to do with learning how to play the piano.

Insights?

Playing piano is all about levers: the bigger/longer the lever, the more power you have. For lighter works like Baroque or some Classical, a straight back is all that is needed so that the arms work as your longest lever. For larger Romantic works, where more volume is required, you need to be able to use your back as a "lever", which means sitting further back and leaning forward slightly. If the back is curved, you will have to compensate in any case, whether doing lighter stuff of larger works, with the muscles in your arms, shoulders and back. This at best makes for a less efficient technique, and at worst can lead to fatigue and injury by putting more stress on muscles and not using levers to your advantage.

Well for this guy in particular, his arms are below the keys which means he isn't hitting the keys with any strength. He is at a height where if he sits up straight, he has nice leverage, but if he slouches it makes him too short. Like Morodiene said, you need to have leverage to get the proper sound.

In general it is bad for your spine (not just at the piano), and it looks terribly unprofessional and sloppy!

All that aside, and not to dismiss the importance of posture for effective playing, piano is a performance art, and in the end, we're playing for others. When we slouch, it makes others uncomfortable.

This back about great art, or dance, or sports even, or acting. How many great painters portrayed slouched subjects, unless they were in the act of being defeated, dying, etc.? Even in contemporary movies, slouching is only portrayed as a negative. Perhaps we're hard wired to be repelled by slouching. Maybe that's why the word "slouch" has such a negative connotation.

So our students don't go on to be professional pianists. But many, if not most, will go on to be professionals. They may have to give presentations, appear before the public, or an audience of some kind. If they slouch, they've lost the "sale" before they ever open their mouth.

The audience identifies with the characters (who are actors trained to have a good posture) assuming unconsciously that they share in the actors' good posture habits - obviously they don't. Maybe we need more slouchers in the movies!