Piano Forum

oh ok. well then my technique is gross.
Question. Do pianists with superior technique experience tension?
It seems tension can only decrease but never completely go away.

1. It's not strictly relaxation. Imagine ice-skating or running. There's a sense of contact, flow, and redirection of momentum that can't be accomplished by relaxation and yet there's no excessive "static" tension.

2.For speed with accuracy, there's a particular dynamic balance needed that has a paradoxical sensation. You are down and aligned behind every single articulation (no exceptions), and yet you know you have the momentum to carry you forward. Sloppiness results from not truly being behind every note (in fact you almost already have to be aligned behind a note before it is struck). For example, even the basic CDEFG hand position causes bad habits where even the slightest sense of maintaining that position causes you to not truly be aligned behind each note if you did a five finger scale. Speed is accomplished with the understanding that the piano basically a see-saw catapult (or rather a series of them) that we chain optimally with timing. Open up a piano and see the hammers to get a better intuition of this.

3. The point of posture is at least twofold. First, a free upper arm that acts as a fulcrum for the forearm (again, think see-saw canon).  Two, enabling a "basic rhythm" that coordinates the body and the phrase rhythm of the music.  From Whiteside:

Rhythm stems from the point of resistance to the application of power. It creates its magic by a follow-through activity which involves a balancing of weight of the entire body. The point of resistance when we are on our feet is the floor; when we are seated it is the chair seat. We do not need any teaching to understand that it is not the application of power to the ice through one foot after another other that creates the thrill in skating. We simply feel the thrill of the balancing and swaying of the body, and a permeating exhilaration results from this coordinated movement. If we are skating to music the ears are involved. They dictate the timing of the push-offs so that the swaying and balancing of the body may fit the music. A rude interruption of that synchronization of the physical imagery with the music is unpleasant ant and we instinctively avoid it by not being out of step with the musical push-offs-the important beats. This synchronization of the push-offs with the music, which creates the follow-through activity that brings about the swaying and pleasure in skating, should be the same, not different, for the pianist. The push-offs are the action of the top arm taking  control of important tones, and this action by the upper arm should always be linked with the torso. That is, the torso, which contacts resistance at the chair seat with the ischial bones, and is the fulcrum which makes the power of the top arm effective, never sits back stodgily and lets the arm do the work, as it were. Rather, the torso is so vitally balanced that it participates in all the actions of the arm, and creates an outlet for the emotional response to the music. Never lose sight of the fact that playing the piano involves two very definite operations: application of power to the key (vertical action) and progression along the keyboard (horizontal action).

Whiteside on relaxation:

Whenever there is an argument about relaxation, there is also an insistence on qualifying the meaning of the word. That is one reason the word itself is bad for suggesting anything but what it does mean. Webster's definition is, "To make lax or loose." There you have it. Can you win a quarter-mile dash by being lax or loose? Is a cat lax or loose when it is being chased up a tree by a dog? Relaxation in no way suggests the alert blended coordination that is the basis for speed; and it develops habits of releasing power between tones. Rather, beautiful playing is related to the absence of releases. They ruin both a rhythm and the subtle use of dynamics-and then what have you? Speed is the result of an alert blended balance in activity-not of relaxation.

(My comment: Here think of releases as when you are NOT involved with the horizontal actions that take you from key to key--the actions/continuity between tones.  If you press a key and "relax" in such a way that you stay on that key....you're doing and timing everything wrong.  You need to press a key in such a way that you are automatically sent on top of the next key or articulation.  This is one of the main points behind Taubman style forearm rotation and key stroke timing.)