A question for wind players and vocalists

[m1469]

I am putting this topic under performance because it ultimately has to do with "technique," and though it is initially directed toward wind players and vocalist, my intent is to gather information that can carry over into piano playing.

If you spend time in lessons and in practice learning about the body and how to use the inner muscles to help you produce sound, have you found that this very same knowledge can carry directly over into your pianistic studies and performances ?

If so, would you please explain/describe how you use this knowledge ?


Thanks,
m1469

[imapnotchr]

a few thoughts.  I also play the flute.   

Ensemble and orchestral work has enhanced my piano playing as it has taught me to listen to parts and understand what to bring out, what is important in a piece, etc.  It has taught me to keep a consistent tempo!

Phrasing and breathing carry over to piano in a way that I might not have fully understood if I were not a wind player.  Artuculation is everything on the flute and has made me realize its importance on the piano.

Piano technique has helped my flute technique.  Literally - scales, those dreaded exercises  , etc. have strengthened fingers that are in an awkward position on the flute.  That said, fingers have to be fast but gentle on the flute.  Pressing keys harder do not produce a stronger tone!

I'd say that studying several instruments and singing in a chorale are all inter-related and enhance one's musicianship tremendously.  You pick up ideas and techniques that carry over to all musical endeavors.


Is this is what you are looking for?

[ramseytheii]

You didn't address this question to me, because I don't play any wind instrument, but I had a few thoughts to share, and the above answer also had some good ideas which I wanted to correlate.

If you are looking for a linkage between sound production in wind-playing and sound productin in piano-playing, a linkage that goes beyond the mystical and into actual muscular use, I doubt you will find it.  Anything that is produced with breath is concerned with a different sent of muscles than what is not.  That is not to say that breathing doesn't assist piano playing, but it does it in a much more general way, and is obviously not how anyone makes a sound on the piano.  OK, we can be concerned with how the trunk of the body aids in giving weight and making a bigger sound, but we are not really concerned with the action of the diaphragm, or the sustaining of one breath, because we produce the sustained line in different way, and don't need to activate the diaphragm to make a sound on the piano.

I think the upper poster had it right when they said,

"I'd say that studying several instruments and singing in a chorale are all inter-related and enhance one's musicianship tremendously.  You pick up ideas and techniques that carry over to all musical endeavors."

Especially when singing in a chorale.  Sometimes, especially when learning a new piece, it is hard to really make a free, relaxed, but still meaningful differentiation between the registers on a piano.  It is tempting to play things all at similar volumes, and when you aren't totally aware of the larger form of the piece, the volumes don't temper themselves right away.  I experienced this recently learning Bach-Busoni "In Dir ist Friede," which has a lot of complicated polyphony, constant double notes, and an octave refrain in the bass. 

The difficult was coming mainly from the balance, but when I imagined a choir that I know very well taking each part, it was like magic, and the piece came to life in a totally different way.  I found I didn't have to push to play loudly, because the loudness of one voice was enhanced by the relative quietness of another voice in proximity.  I was able to really create the feeling of alternating tenor and soprano lines at the beginning, each singing the first three notes of the chorale.  I just pretended that these people I know were actually singing those parts, and I was directing them, not playing the piano, and allowing this voice to come out, and this voice to recede.

I think the biggest things we can learn from vocalists are breathing and blending, and in my opinion, people don't blend enough on the piano.  It is usually only the upper part that we can hear, and everything else is a distant blur.  Left hand especially suffers from this.  If you start to appreciate every note that was written, and hear it as if the different timbres of a choir are singing it, the music will come alive for you in a totally different way, then just bringing out a damn melody ad infinitum.

I am lucky to know personally this choir, and can therefore imagine specific voices singing the parts.  Perhaps it would behoove you to become attached to an organizatino like this, or to even lead or accompany a choir.

Walter Ramsey

[timothy42b]

As far as direct technique transfer, I think very little from wind or vocal studies applies.  Of course at some level musicality is musicality, but I guess that's obvious.

There are two ideas that I bring from the trombone world that might have some relevance.  One is easy to understand, you just won't agree with it.  <grin>  The other I'm not sure I can explain well but I'll give it a shot.

First, the wind instrument and vocal world is more performance oriented, even at perhaps more pedestrian skill levels.  Pianists tend to accept the rewards of private practice with little or no performance, ever.  I don't know any trombone player anywhere, regardless how lousy, who doesn't play in public.  Usually loudly!  We all join bands, orchestras, combos, etc.  That was the biggest culture shock for me when I started taking piano lessons and reading these forums.  That's a 180 degree mindset difference, and it makes a difference in what and how you practice, as well as how you select and prepare repertoire, who you seek out for lessons, etc.

Now the hard one.  "Real time."  Part of this comes from the fact that we wind players and vocalists play with somebody else and must accomodate an external tempo, part of it is theoretical based on how we think learning takes place.  Timing is everything, but also serves to connect neurological functions unconsciously.  Told you I'd have trouble explaining it.  Well, here's an example.  Suppose I'm going to play a half note middle C.  Whenever I'm ready.  On piano, you are probably going to adjust posture, picture the tone, hit (or release) the note.  Trombone is so fantastically complicated physically (breath just right, lips just right, pitch in your head firmly, timbre in hour head) you can't do it that way.  The only way to consistently let that note start is count:  1-e-and-uh, 2-e-and-uh, 3-e-and-uh, 4-e-and-uh,  PLAY.  You have to connect to the time stream of the universe, or at least the internal pulse of your body, to have a chance to coordinate all you need to.  But using that pulse as a coordinating mechanism makes a lot of other things work, too.  And you have to subdivide every beat for the precision required, at least to sixteenths.  Beginners in piano never play in real time.  They don't play slowly in good time, they play without time at all.  I suspect that is ultimately why most people who take piano lessons never learn to play fluently, while almost every guitar owner that ever lived can play simple songs well. 

Hope that helps a little.  Like all your questions, m1469, it is intriguing.  There are some other minor thoughts, maybe I'll add if time permits. 

[Bob]

Yes.  The same ideas work for wind instruments as for piano.  Piano parts are a lot bonier though.  I see the hands equal to the chest that way. 

You can't push piano the same as you can a wind instrument.  The bony/squishy difference.  Abs are squishy and can take a lot more abuse than a bony part like the hands.

Prepping literature is the same.  On piano it's easier to just do repetition and engrain a piece more that way.

The idea of a daily routine I have seen in wind instrument.  The discussion on technique.  That stuff seems more wind oriented.  It's like blashphomy in the piano world.  I have found creating a piano routine does have an impact.  But you get what you practice -- Practicing just technique improves technique and only technique.  It's not a bad idea.  There's just a lot more available on piano than that.  On the flipside, I have noticed it can be difficult to access certain areas and ways of thinking on another instrument.  Piano is lucky to have so many great composers writing for it.  Other instruments don't have that.