Lmao you're in no position to tell anyone what's hard for them or what kind of problems they'll have down the line.
I agree that I am not a medical professional with the expertise to pronounce on such matter, for I am not an osteopath, physiotherapist, chiropractor or whatever else; likewise I do not seek to "tell" anyone what is hard for them for the sake of it. I do, however, accept what such medical professionals have said and published on such matters as the genuine outcome of
bona fide medical research and can see nothing wrong or misguided in that!
You have trouble using pedal with an elevated heel. Well that's your problem.
I don't and it isn't, respectively because, as it is not something that I've ever done (apart from putting the klavieronin suggestion to the test), it is not and indeed cannot be a problem.
If the type of shoes REALLY drastically changes your ability to use the pedal then shoes aren't the problem your joints or whatever are the problem
Now, with respect, that really borders upon the absurd and, in any case, it's not "
my" ability under question but "
anyone's". It is inconceivable that operating piano pedals when one's heels are above their surface level could be no different from doing so when they're almost at ground level and therefore well below pedal surface level; it's also obvious that the latter presents less difficulties to the player.
Indeed, it's not so different in principle to that of wrist and/or seating height when playing and, as we know, some pianists' preferences in that regard are for higher ones than others'. It's unlikely, though, that either a Mark Hambourg position or a Glenn Gould one (to take a couple of extreme examples) is likely to shore up tendon problems for the future, provided that sufficient care be taken to avoid unnecessary build-up of tension as a direct consequence, so, in that respect, these are different to the aforementioned ones on which medical experts have pronounced and which are far more general than any that relate only to pianists.
For the record and for the avoidance of doubt, I am not suggesting that Yuja
can't do what she does in the way that she does, for it's obvious that she
can; my reservations in this are confined to the question as to why anyone would wish to make life harder for themselves by exerting that extra effort to do it that way.
There are therefore two factors here, namely the aforementioned long term medical risks and the business of trying to minimise the physical difficulties of playing the piano; in respect of the latter, the excessive physical movements before the instrument of which players such as Lang Lang are famous (or notorious) exponents contrast greatly to the very economic gestures of players such as Rachmaninoff, Michelangeli and others. Try playing music as demanding as a good deal of Sorabji, for example and the scope for the former approach clearly borders on the non-existent because every muscle movement has by definition and of necessity to go into the actually production of the sounds, so there's no space for physical histrionics. Whether or not pianists want to play such music (which is another matter altogether), that economical approach logically has to be the better one.
Best,
Alistair