Comments on: sitting high sitting low

By: stringph

stringph — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 22:56:59 +0000

Yes, the measuring business is entertaining – hilarious, in fact, as you describe it. Did Couperin really mean for the player to measure his own elbows (even were it practically possible to do so)?

You will probably be appalled to hear that I play mostly sitting on various chairs or stools with backwards-sloping seats – not through choice but practical necessity. But seldom longer than an hour each day, which probably saves my back from big problems. However, it is necessary to sit on the *front* of the seat with feet on the floor… then the main danger is cutting off circulation to the legs.

I am mystified as to how one can even consider compromising key-contact to some other factor. Anyone who has ever played a scale on a clavichord knows that there is absolutely no substitute. Those who hit the keys from on high are and always will be bad players (and typists!).

There may of course be some way of maintaining key contact consistently with a higher wrist position – such was the opinion of Griepenkerl, whose account of the ‘Bach-touch’ seems to imply moderately curved fingers transferring hand/arm weight more or less from above. The 3-4-3-4-type fingerings that WF Bach presumably learnt from his father certainly don’t work unless the wrist is high.

By: skowroneck

skowroneck — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 12:23:56 +0000

Ideally, I have my feet somehow someplace on the ground in front of me, to support me a little.
Fortepiano playing doesn’t work with crossed ankles either, no matter whether one has knee levers or pedals.

By: James McCarty

James McCarty — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 20:20:18 +0000

Tilman, are you an ankle-crosser or a non-ankle crosser? (This could be another whole blog entry.)

By: skowroneck

skowroneck — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 09:33:39 +0000

Hmmm. If I look at the path I took myself (revising my position, trying a new one, cutting of bits of bench, etc.) I can’t see much static there in any case – but I see your point.
Now. The height of the chair might need to be static. That is my point here. That’s the way chairs are, or you’d have to sit on a yoga ball (which is possible). Whether the position of the pianist should be static (no: should feel static) is a whole ‘nother bit of cake. I didn’t say it should.

By: Paúl R.

Paúl R. — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 03:13:35 +0000

Hi, Tilman,
“…it is absolutely necessary to work out a good playing position.”
You wrote these crucial words yourself, and yet your whole essay is devoted to finding a basic *static* position. Can you see the fallacy? (It’s not your fault, that’s our teaching tradition speaking through you.)
The playing position can be worked-out dynamically, and the procedure to this effect had been formulated in another way of teaching (but we need to wait for its announcement).