Lightness and loudness

[slyle]

In several of the pieces I've played, I've never managed to obtain a lightness in the sound that is kept when I reach a Forte or Fortissimo part of the music.
I know that it is possible, since in many of the recordings that I've heard of, the pianist achieves this, and now that I've started with Chopin waltz no. 14 (posthumous), I really need help with this!  So can anyone give advice on how to do so?

[carl_h]

Hello,

I'm not quite sure if I understand correctly and if this will help you but maybe you are pushing to hard in the keys, with too much tension. This will result in a harsher and heavier sound. Your attack must be fast but once the key is down you should release the pressure.
Also, forte doesn't always have to be LOUD, it's all in relation to the rest of the music. With this in mind you could try to play the preceeding part more quiet so that you have to 'work' less to achieve this forte-effect and this might help to play it lighter.

Greets,

[awesom_o]

In several of the pieces I've played, I've never managed to obtain a lightness in the sound that is kept when I reach a Forte or Fortissimo part of the music.

So can anyone give advice on how to do so?

I doubt that anyone will want to share this knowledge free of charge over the internet. Piano teachers  have to eat, and food costs money!

I will give you a few thoughts on the subject.... but the reality is that having an excellent sonority at FF takes a good deal of experience and and even greater deal of talent. I've heard big-time concert pianists who can't do it.... and those are people who have had many years of the finest available teaching plus thousands upon thousands of hours of practice. Nobody can 'teach' you to do this on a forum. You need lessons.

Most people simply bang away whenever they see FF in the music, without sufficient respect for sound texture or expression. This results in heavy-sounding, unmusical blocks of noise.
 
In order to sound musical in FF (for example, having a brilliant, agile sound) one must have both exceptional technique on the physical level coupled with a refined musical imagination.

However, the hands cannot produce a sound that the ears cannot imagine.... and the ears cannot imagine a sound that the hands cannot produce. It's a vicious circle.....most people, even those with talent, need a great many lessons in order to break out of it!  

[flashyfingers]

BTW, when Awesome refers to technique, I think he is referring to a combination of many aspects of piano playing, your flexibility as a pianist, polished with attribute and signature playing style (mostly developed in YOUR OWN playing, your own study time, and not just from a teacher or a famous pianist).

YOU need to do some researching, and make it your meditative ritual. Start a notebook, or regurgitate somewhere to someone. A question of this level is DYING to be answered, and once you become open and less ashamed of asking such strong questions, you will see a pattern and you will explode with answers.

Another reason to start a notebook is so you can record your trial and error in developing this specific technique or any technique. In writing about your and any professional piano playing, you are developing your vocabulary.

Wax on, Wax off.

[awesom_o]

She is correct about everything except for one thing....... the FURTHER you go Rach.... the DEEPER you go Bach..... 

[flashyfingers]

 

This is so true, as I sit down this morning, working on the fugue in D# minor from book II. HAVE YOU LOOKED AT THAT THING? It is short, but it gets higher and higher in pitch...so much A# minor to get back to D#minor, the subject keeps repeating and the embellishments are always moving in pitch, higher and higher, HALLELUJAH!!
:')

I hardly find Bach tonal, sometimes hahahahah
X)

[awesom_o]

Do you mean no. 8 in Eb minor?

[flashyfingers]

Do you mean no. 8 in Eb minor?

BACHAHAHAH but yes, no. 8

[michaeljames]

In several of the pieces I've played, I've never managed to obtain a lightness in the sound that is kept when I reach a Forte or Fortissimo part of the music.
I know that it is possible, since in many of the recordings that I've heard of, the pianist achieves this, and now that I've started with Chopin waltz no. 14 (posthumous), I really need help with this!  So can anyone give advice on how to do so?

One of my teachers gave me the most succinct and beneficial answer to this query.  To play loudly without harsh sound resulting, your fingers must be on the keys while the down movement  comes from the arms and NOT the hands/wrists or fingers.  I happened to be wearing a muscle tank and he pointed out that when I performed the movement correctly, he could see my triceps engaged.  It's important to keep the fingers resting ON the keys and pushing with the arms; Instead of striking the keys from high up and "hammering" on them.

Give it a try.  Hope this helps.  It did for me.

Michael

[flashyfingers]

Are you sitting high enough, and far enough?

[nyiregyhazi]

There's a very simple explanation if you look at the mechanics. A collapsing hand crumples up. That means your fastest speed in the body does not reach the key. The knuckle is gaining on the fingertip because the key and fingertip is moving slower than the knuckle. So the fingertip is not cutting cleanly through the key or passing on the full speed you are generating. Excess energy hits after sound occurred rather than get channelled into hammer speed. This gives a thudding impact just after sound. The standard way to try to avoid this crumpling is to stiffen. But nothing is perfectly stiff and stiffness is not healthy. It reduces the wastage but impacts on tense muscles and still gives way a bit.

There is a simple third way that only the lucky discover (because virtually nobody in any methodology teaches it with any directness, except notably Alan Fraser). A hand which is expanding is not collapsing- which means energy is passed on and you are not stiff. Simple as that. speed generated by the arm is not only passed on in full but is added slightly to by the slight opening of the hand. Thus less energy is needed to get the hammer moving fast and less is wasted on impact. More efficiency equals less noise from key against keybed, for louder levels of tone.

I assure you that it really is that simple. I've been teaching a concert pianist from Mexico this last week who is very accomplished but had the habit of stiffening and then drooping for big chords. When I showed him how to simply get the hand opening both during and after sound, he made a bigger sound with less effort and didn't have any excess tensions to relax from - just a simple strong and open hand that was not jarring into impact and then suddenly drooping but instead growing steadily into comfort. Until I discovered this simple and scientifically irrefutable principle about how speed is passed on to the key at the point of contact, none of the methods out there helped and a great many did more harm than good (especially arm based ones that neglect to clarify that a hand that is not opening at least a little cannot transmit arm force without aggressively stiffening. if a pianist is not lucky enough to have an instinct for the hand expansion then arm based methods can only ever contribute to impacts and stiffness unless the hand should learn to expand).

[nyiregyhazi]

One of my teachers gave me the most succinct and beneficial answer to this query.  To play loudly without harsh sound resulting, your fingers must be on the keys while the down movement  comes from the arms and NOT the hands/wrists or fingers.  I happened to be wearing a muscle tank and he pointed out that when I performed the movement correctly, he could see my triceps engaged.  It's important to keep the fingers resting ON the keys and pushing with the arms; Instead of striking the keys from high up and "hammering" on them.

Give it a try.  Hope this helps.  It did for me.

Michael

That's fine if the hand learns how to be in expansion as a result of what you describe. When I used to attempt this by placing a floppy hand over the keys, all it did was encourage me to stiffen to fight collapse. I had to learn to stand my fingers effectively over the keys and get the hand opening before deliberately thinking of the arm pressure was anything but a negative. It's only very recently that I've been able to do this truly effectively, because my hand was so far behind that it was the only real issue. The hand is the single most important link in the chain. Anyone of even moderate strength can figure out how to press with their arm. It's insanely easy to generate force from the triceps. Passing it on efficiently is the hard bit and its the hand coordination which is difficult to get right. Aiming to exclude the hand from generating some  movement (without which it can only stiffen, to lessen the severe negative effects of collapse that arm pressure will generate) is absolute disaster for anyone who does not have super-evolved instincts for the expanding hand.

PS. I can play very loud and be very comfortable without so much as a visible flicker in my triceps. I use this in the chords before the coda of Chopin's fourth Ballade, where a simple flick of the fingers bounces the hand up and away without even an instant of shoving down from the arms. They just rest a small weight through the fingers on the key surface and then hand opens pushes back up against this very small resting sensation. Most pianists who have problems have very active triceps indeed. When you pass on energy efficiently, the level of activation required can be very small or even nil. They should only be an optional part of a whole mechanism, not a primary basis for the whole technique.