I've been reading a lot on here about teachers saying how much they hate when transfer students have a lot of tension in their fingers and wrists. This makes me worry because I suppose I'm not sure that I know how to make sure my students don't have tension, or how to correct it. Whenever I take on a beginner, on our very first lesson I emphasize the importance of loose, relaxed and elevated wrists and curved fingers, but that's about it. Can I get some advice on this topic? I don't want to cause any physical damage to my students that will be hard to undo later.

This is a tough question, but I'll take a stab at it...

I am always watching to make sure my students aren't physically tense. The telltale signs to me are shoulders scrunched way up by the ears, fingers that stick out straight when they aren't playing, a head that's really far forward (tense neck!).

When I see these signs, I tell them to stop and take a deep breath and drop their shoulders. I tell them to just do their best to stay relaxed and be aware of their body. One helpful thing is when I tell them to drop their hands into the keys rather than thinking of pushing or hitting keys with their fingers.

I think there are many different approaches to this, but whatever you say to your students, you have to really believe it and practice it yourself! Spend a lot of time practicing with this in mind, and you will develop your own way of explaining it to others.

Thanks for your advice! I remember one of my teachers doing the dropping-hands-on-the-piano thing to me and I never understood what she was getting at, so I'm afraid that wouldn't help much for me to tell my students to do the same thing. I can, actually, often tell when my student is approaching the keys incorrectly because their fingers sort of "attack" them by having little mini spasms each time one is struck. This mostly just occurs with the very little ones who have the weakest fingers. It seems the older the student is, the more they naturally know how to press into the key. Still, I fear that my students aren't learning the correct way to push the keys, so keep the advice coming!

In that case like 95% of students they probably do have tension. You know it when you see it, if you know what I mean. Watch Carola Grindea's videos here http://www.youtube.com/isstip it may help.

You're obviously a superior musical
talent, and such people often have
difficulty teaching. Everything
came easy and naturally to you
in music, and so it's probably
diffcult for you to see why your
average students are having so
much trouble. "Why can't they just
do it like I did?", is probably
what you're wondering. Without
the kind of talent you have, they
can't, and everything at the piano
is going to be a struggle for
them, all their lives.

I, by contrast, have below-average
musical talent. Everything at
the piano is a struggle for me--
I play some very difficult things
like the Krakowiak, but I had
to learn it note by note and
by rote repetition over many yrs.
So when I read your descriptions
of your average students' problems,
I immediately know what they are
going through.

In my view, things like "tension"
and "legato" are meaningless for
an average student. Never mind the
"tension," just hitting the right notes
at tempo is going to be difficult
enough for an average player.
And if he has to be a little
"tense" when he does it, fine, no
problem at all there. Similarly
with legato. Just hit the right
notes. If he has to do it with
less-that-perfect legato, no
problem at all, as I see it. And
in any case, I am completely against
this obsession with legato. Everything
that is not staccato is essentially
legato, so every student is
playing legato all the time, and
there is no need to make a special
issue of it.

GYRO, your post makes NO sense! How in the world did you evaluate the OP's musical talent or level when he said nothing of the sort. He only said he was a teacher.

Tension has NOTHING to do with legato or staccato. You are spewing out useless info as usual.

toejam, I would recommend doing lots of finger and hand exercises before playing. Shake the hands up and down, and left right from the wrists. They should be loose and fluid. Stretch the fingers and claw them like a lion's paw, this will build control.

Playing the piano should not hurt at all. If it does, tell the student to stop immediately and not to play through the pain. Get them to develop a soft touch on the piano, too many people play like banging a hammer. It should be like a wave floating through the water.

I guess I will add what Kenny Werner said in his book/lectures. He basically said that as soon as you start noticing tension building up, STOP, drop you hands to the side, stand up and walk away from the piano if you have to(I am adding this part). But his point is that by stopping you give yourself time to 'reset' your playing, and it's better than playing 'through' the tension and not stopping, which we often do.

For me, I noticed that I can get tense even before I start playing in front of an audience/teacher. I get nervous out of anticipation.. i don't know if that's something a music teacher can help you, or something you have to work through on your own, outside of music. Because chances are we experience similar tension in other areas of our lives, and it's more of a psychological issue.

If there weren't some tension in our joints we would be like cooked spaghetti, flopping all over the keyboard. There has to be tension in order to play. The trick is to know when to release it, as soon as the notes are sounded.

Quite right...and when to engage it, just as the notes are sounded.

I'm a boogey-boarder (it's like surfing but easier) and I imagine I'm swimming like a dolphin.
This is what I do to emulate the swim.

RH: Start with under (with thumb), finish with over (little finger)

LH: Start with over (with little finger), finish with under (with thumb)

Then practise with both hands, remembering that strength comes from whole of arm, shoulders, elbows (not just hands)

I am completely against
this obsession with legato. Everything
that is not staccato is essentially
legato, so every student is
playing legato all the time, and
there is no need to make a special
issue of it.

[/quote]

Please tell me that you don't teach, Gyro. You, my friend, have some convoluted logic at times.

Stores, when you're playing notes
without that staccato dot over them,
how are you playing them? You're
playing them legato, whether you're
conscious of it or not. This
is how everybody is playing when
he's not playing staccato.
Of course, in some sections of
certain pieces the playing is
supposed to be "more legato."
Such sections might be marked as:
legato, sempre legato, molto
legato, legatissimo, etc. But this
is all well within the range
of ordinary technique and there
is no need to become obsessed about
it.

One forum member a while back was
given "special legato exercises"
for years by his concert pianist-level
teacher, in order to develop his
legato playing. This is incompetent
instruction in my opinion.
There is no such thing as a special
legato exercise. All technical
studies: scales, arpeggios, Hanon,
Czerny, etc., are played legato.

Stores,

just ask Gyro how long he has been playing the piano and what he has accomplished, in terms of repertore. His progress(or lack thereof) tells you a lot about his approach/philosophy.

I guess if you want to play like Gyro you'd follow his advice, but then again who would want to listen to him when Gyro himself admits that his ability on the piano is mediocre at best?

and how in the world is Gyro capable of criticize the teaching method concert pianist, considering the fact that he is not capable of playing Chopin's Op10 and Op25 etudes?

I will admit that Gyro made an accurate observation about one thing, in that a lot of techniques on the piano have come naturally to me, and now that I am a teacher, I find difficulty in relaying the same sort of information to someone who may not see it as plainly as I did. For example, scales. Ever since I was a kid, I saw scales in a very mathematical way and had no trouble with fingering or memorizing the intervalic formulas. But now I've got kids who are having all sorts of trouble getting the patterns down and I feel bad because I never learned any cool tricks or reminders to get through them, because I didn't need them, thus I have none to pass on to my students.

...huh?

How about if they have one of these...

^

... or one of these

V


What if you sat at the piano and I asked you to play a scale stacatto. .. then again, detached.

Would you look at me like I had 3 heads?

Breaking the tension is such an important issue for me. Along with noticing the hunched up shoulders, I also notice quite a bit of tension in the elbow as well. It seems that they (and sometimes we!) think that the way to get thru a difficult passage is to brace ourselves by clenching. It gives them more of a feeling of control, when in fact, it is the opposite that is needed. I also watch their breathing. They oftentimes finish a piece and let out a huge sigh. I'll say "were you holding your breath the whole time?" "Yeah."
I guess it is the yoga student in me, but I place a lot of emphasis on making sure we are always breathing when we play. We think it's a given, but it isn't, necessarily.

As for releasing weight into the keys, I have them place their arms on the keyboard, and then have them put their head on their arms, so that the whole weight of their upper body is on the keys. I ask them to focus in on what that feels like--hone in on the feeling of having ALL of that weight falling into the keys. Then we back up from there, deciding what muscles we need to sit up, hold our arms/hands correctly, etc. We then try not to use any more than that, while keeping everything else as relaxed as possible.

I dunno. To my ears it sounds like portato rather than legato. But because of the percussive attack when the hammer hits the string, isn't this one a little gray? There's a range of acceptable overlap variation.

I think that the real problem here is, as Gieseking claimed, learning to hear - to really listen hard.

This is a very interesting topic for me. I am an undergraduate performance major with a concentration in pedagogy and have several very young students. I have struggled with tension myself and found what has helped me is hard to translate for young beginners to understand.

I have tried having students drop their hands into the keys but found that they usually do not totally release the weight of their arm into the keyboard. After my arm problems started during the first years of my undergrad it took me a long time to really learn to put the weight of my arm into the keyboard so I am not surprised that my students don't achieve this feeling totally. I agree with Rachel J that it is important to stress "dropping" into the key instead of "pushing." Sometimes playing a student's finger for them helps them to feel less tension.

I have another question related to this topic - any suggestions about what to do when a student constantly collapses on the 5 side of the hand? I do not want to give her "strengthening" exercises because I think that will just cause more tension, especially since she will not have anyone coaching her during exercises at home.