Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Do you workout with weights? Why or why not?

I have a garden so I don't have the time to waste lifting lumps of metal about the place. Also my experience in life is that the more muscle-toned the body the less able the brain.

I don't suppose Horawitz "weight-trained".

It is a modern fad. No time for that rubbish, I would be paying to make somebody else rich while the trees grow taller in the garden, pshaw, as we used to say.

I'll stick to playing the piano, stuff the "gym"!

Besides that, it seems so popular with everybody else they don't need me.

Mutual.

Actually, I think that if you have more (power) in reserve, you have more control. Like trying to open the jammed lid of a tin of cookies. If you're close to using all your strength, when it suddenly yields, it flies off because you're right at your limit and can't control it. Whereas someone much stronger can easily hold back and use just sufficient strength to get it open smoothly.

So, at the extremes of dynamics (I admit, more at fff than at ppp, but still....), a powerful pianist has greater control of tone and touch. I think it's possible to hear this in music that demands a huge dynamic range, say, the Liszt Sonata. A less strong pianist may sound more strident at fff, (or maybe he'll just scale down his fff to ff to keep in better control) whereas a more powerful player is able to produce a more rounded tone at fff as well as powerful sound.

It's often noticeable that teenage pianists who haven't yet fully developed their strength don't have the kind of control between pp and ppp that they later show, (as well as between ff and fff).

A little side story...

I work in an environment where physical fitness is taken extremely (really, I mean it) seriously be some of the staff. Others, like myself do not have to bother so much, and get paid proportionately less.

I asked one of my friends who was very fit to help me move my piano one night, he was very willing.

He came to my flat and I showed him where the piano was and where I wanted it moved to, "no problem, mate, let's get moving".

I went to the treble end.....

We moved the piano, had a chat and a drink and off he went.

I saw his wife at work the next day and told her I was very grateful to Malcolm for his help.

"Well, to be honest, he was a bit upset", she said, "he thought you looked stronger than him and he knows you don't work out, he was amazed that you weren't as tired as he was".

I couldn't help laughing and felt duty bound to explain, "Well, ELaine, you know what a grand piano or a harp looks like?"

"Yes".

"Well, an upright is the same shape only it's in a box, I made sure Malcolm had the heavy end!"

She let me down by telling him and I had to cough up for extra drinks.

Anyway, thanks Malcolm, I still appreciate it.

....So...it's not due to the amount of practice and skill they accumulate in later years at all? I agree with a lot of what you say, it's fair enough in most regards, but, as with any opinion posted here not in its entirety, leaves a lot of holes to be exploited. I mean, um, I have to disagree with the notion that more strength = more control; I'd adapt it to more strength = easier control...it's harder to pick up peas with chopsticks, but if you use a spoon, even though you get from one place to another with less effort, there'll be a little bit more wobble...of course, for moving lots of peas, it's incredibly difficult when using chopsticks...possible, but difficult, whereas with a spoon, it's still just as easy and the amount the peas wobble is *reduced*...um...I think that metaphor stands from all analogous standpoints...

It reminds me of a Sherlock Holmes programme on ITV, where Dr. Watson made several attempts to spear the last pea on his plate with his fork. Holmes (played by Jeremy Brett) lost patience, grabbed Watson's fork and, using the curve of the fork, squashed the offending pea instead (and thus mushy pea was born..... ).

The moral of the story: if Watson had a pair of chopsticks (and knew how to use them), he'd have been able to pick up the pea easily. Or alternatively, if he had more strength, and therefore more control with his fork........

Even if this statemenet is true(which is not at all clear especially since we don't kinow if you;re thinking of average amateur pianists or far better ones), I think any lack of dynamic control is because their technique isn't as developed as it becomes later and has absolutely nothing to do with their strength.

If you watch videos of great pianists(Kissin, Lisiecki, Conrad Tao, etc.) when they were very young, they don't look strong yet they have no problem with dynamic control since their technique is so good.

Kissin is probably the one pianist who has made recordings at all stages of his career since he was a kid of 12, playing the Chopin concertos, when his technique was already fully developed, but not his strength. It's noticeable that his dynamic range, especially at the softer end of the spectrum, became more developed as he matured. By the time of his Tokyo recital of 1987, aged 16, he was playing not just with stronger underpinning in ff, but also a greater range at pp.

His recordings and concerts from aged 18 onwards sound to me like the fully mature Kissin with complete control at all dynamic levels.

All the pianists I mentioned and tons of others have Youtube recordings of them playing at very young ages so it was not only Kissin.

They all had sensational technique at a very young age. It's your opinion only that Kissin had any lack of control at soft dynamic range an early age(and the same thing for any other great pianists who you think might be lacking in dynamic control at that age). It goes without saying that there would be some technical improvement in every area for these pianists beyond their early teen years, but implying that they were lacking in dynamic control at low levels(as you did in your first post) and that this was due to their lack of physical strength is quite silly IMO. It's also impossible to know if a greater degree of dynamic variation(if in fact there was any)is related to improvement in technique or simply a desire or play the piece differently.

Perhaps Kissin went from "A" dynamic control to "A+" dynamic control later. His earliest recordings/performances would not have been so celebrated if there was any lack of dynamic control(or lack of anything). His physical presence at age 12 was certainly not great and he lacked the physical strength of an adult but it's mostly irrelevant to playing the piano. Playing the piano with dynamic control at low levels is not like removing tops of tight jars.

It's not at all silly to say that Kissin didn't display quite the range between pp and ppp at 12 as he did at 16. And I didn't say he was lacking in control. In all other respects, he was already the complete package at 12. I don't have any recordings of Lisiecki before he was 16, and I've never heard of Tao, so I can't judge them.

Don't you think it's rather silly to keep harping on a point? Feel free to disagree with me, but to say it's silly is plain silly. It's my opinion based on Kissin's several CD/DVD recordings (I never judge these things based on YouTube videos, where the sound quality is so variable) - no other pianist prodigy has been so frequently recorded in good quality sound from such a young age.

Frankly, my dear, your constant use of the word silly is just plain silly - and VERY, VERY tiresome.

OK, I'll just say your post was dumb.

Ah, that's much better, my dear.
See, you can expand your vocabulary when you want to .

I do. It is the way to get the kind of body I want.
I usually have the care to keep my wrist free, Not stiff and tense, But firm enough to have enough strength to pull them up and down.

I can end up with blisters on my hands but they usually go away after a few days if I apply moisterizer.

I find it helps my back muscles get stronger, which stops me from slouching forwards. I get much less fatigue after practising several long hours. I am really hyperactive hence it allows me to use up some energy.
Also, it puts me in a great mood and much less likely to get annoyed.

Bennevis...you're dangerously close to being priceless sometimes, just to warn you.

I have to do it. I am an industrial strength, heavy duty piano player and have to keep the stamina up...way up...

There was a time I was quite involved with the weight training. Unfortunately, that time also coincided with me refinishing a piano and also playing the piano. The net result was a great case of tennis elbow. Something had to give and I guess it has been the weight training. That said, it rarely takes me more than a couple of weeks to get back the stamina to play exhausting works like the A flat polonaise or Ginastera Sonata that I never seem to tire of. I am always physically active and do a lot of work on my cars, boats and bikes.

Weightlifting is awesome, but one has to be extremely careful of the wrists, back and elbows because even tiny strains can cause a lifetime of pain for people who type at a computer or play the piano. Most weightlifters don't type or play the piano so they have no worries about pushing the weight limits.

Typing 8 hours a day or playing the piano 4 or 5 hours day is very demanding over 20 or 30 years. So it is one of the times in life where you have to use your head and not your muscles!

I hear taffeta's good for that.

Brilliant.

My 2 cents: Be careful of the small joints/wrists when lifting. I had carpal tunnel last year and trigger thumb surgery this week. Some say it's my starting the piano late in life, I say it's all the weight lifting I've done during my life. I miss the lifting but I now power walk 1,500 miles a year and feel great. Some people have bodies for lifting, I guess I don't.
Life goes on......
frank

Learning to play the piano has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with age. I have weight trained over the years since I was 21. I started to play the piano at 62. I learned to type when I was 13 and typed for a living since I was 21. So as I say, just use your head and not your muscles. When you get the burn, you get the gain, but that is the point when you don't take a 2 minute rest and then type for 8 hours non-stop. You can do it all, but you have to do it right.