1-6-8 Goken-cho, Mito-shi, Ibaraki-ken, 310-0063 Japan
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Takahiro Sonoda
Mini-lecture #8: About Touch
Open Seminar for Piano Jan. 16, 2000 (Sun.)
Again, I am here to give you a mini-lecture.
Yesterday I explained a little bit about pedaling,
and now I'd like to make some general comments about the way to touch the piano when playing (maybe I should have talked about this first).
Touch is perhaps the most important thing.
Anyway, how should the piano be played? There are quite a few fixed opinions about this matter,
but leaving that as it may, I'd like you to think about as objectively as you can.
As you can see, this is how the keyboard is laid out.
Seen from the side, I think most people play the piano by pressing down vertically from above.
But that's a completely strange thing.
If there's a way to press the piano keys vertically -- obviously there's no way to press them horizontally,
because that's impossible -- then we might also consider pressing them toward the front like this,
or maybe by making a motion pulling toward ourselves.
You could also touch them at angle, like this, instead of from above.
Theoretically speaking, then, there ought to be several ways to touch the piano,
depending on the angle the keys are pressed.
In addition, while the way we now play is simply from above, like this,
another way would be to make the keyboard shaped like a parabola or something,
and then playing in a circular fashion by stroking the keyboard like this.
I'm sure it will never come to that, but you could stroke it by inscribing a circle.
If you did that, the angle of the circle would determine where you hit the keyboard,
and the angle would keep on changing.
In other words, you can bring about changes to your touch -- differences in the weight --
that are equivalent to a single sheet of paper.
By adding weight equivalent to extra sheets of paper, then, you can make your touch deeper and deeper.
Therefore, and you saw this somewhat yesterday, you all seem to be pressing the keyboard like this,
just as if you were key punchers or computer operators or something.
That is not so good. What I mean to say is that while you may think that this [pressing from above] produces uniform sound quality,
there are surprisingly disparities.
The reason for that is that the hands -- the fingers -- are not all the same length.
The little finger is short, and the middle finger is long,
meaning that the notes played by the middle finger tend to get loud,
while those for the ring finger or little finger tend to get soft.
If that's the case, playing the piano in a vertical fashion from above does not work so well, I think.
There's another obstacle that stands in the way of touch.
As you all can see, there are white keys and black keys on the keyboard, with the black keys sticking up.
There won't be any problem if you're just playing a piece that uses only the white keys -- or just the black keys in rare cases,
such as Chopin's Black-key Etude -- because you can play like this.
However, you usually have to play using both the high and low keys (black and white), like this.
Therefore, it is extremely difficult when playing chords to hit all three or four notes of the chord at the same time horizontally.
If you were to take split-second photographs,
you would find out that one finger is hitting the key before the rest,
and that another finger lags behind the rest.
And so, the difference becomes apparent when playing chords and the like.
Although it is desirable when playing chords to strike all the notes at the same time,
it takes quite a long time to become that proficient.
Another thing that you will come to understand if you reason about it is that the keyboard is this wide,
meaning that keys in the middle can be played by hitting them something like this,
running along the keyboard.
However, the keys at both ends of the keyboard have to played diagonally.
If you do that, you cannot help but change the force applied in the touch of the sound when hitting the keys diagonally.
I don't know for sure how much it changes,
but the very top key is probably quite different,
especially when you do this with the right hand.
That means that touch, basically, depends on the shape of the hand when it presses down from above.
But you must always be aware of the differences that exist.
For that reason, it is extremely difficult to make all the sounds the same.
To be a judge of that, you have to rely on your own ears --
you cannot rely on or count on your teacher's ears.
Also, when you are playing scales,
it is relatively easy to make all the notes sound the same if only the white keys are used, but if the black keys are included,
scales can be quite difficult. So you ought to start practicing Chopin's works in such keys as B major or in E major --
some people say that such pieces are good as far as finger form is concerned.
In addition, for example, you can play by turning like this.
You can practice that kind of fingering and train the wrist by playing pieces in E flat major,
and playing the third, fourth and fifth notes of the scale using the index finger,
middle finger, and ring finger, or the index finger,
middle finger, and thumb.
Another thing when it comes to touch: hitting the keys is obviously important,
but it's even more important to know how to release the strength from the fingers after playing.
When we play a lot of notes, we use the "whip" principle -- you know about whips,
and how they don't snap if you keep on exerting force the whole time.
You have to put strength into it the moment the whip hits,
and then it snaps. Afterwards, you let all the strength release from the whip.
The same goes for the keyboard.
If you do it like this, it won't do any good. You exert strength when the finger hits the key,
and then the strength is released. I'm not sure where you can look into that, though.
A long time ago -- sorry for talking so much -- I played a concert in Berlin,
I think it was, and when it was over, an blind old man came up to me and said,
"Mr. Sonoda, today was just wonderful. Have you ever studied dance?"
I responded, "Dance? Me? Never." Then he said, "Well then, how about Zen?
You're Japanese, so have you done Zen?" I told him, "Not at all."
Then the old man said, "Hmm ... listening to your playing with my ears,
your release is quite wonderful." He then said, "Have you ever practiced release?"
I replied, "I've never done that." The man said, "Hmm ... well,
I am interested in that sort of thing, so won't you come over to my house?"
Since I just happened to live near him, I visited him.
That was when I learned for the first time that he used to dance when he still had his sight,
which had lost somehow.
Anyway, he asked me then, "I talked about touch the last time.
Have you ever played a tambourine?" I answered, "No, never."
He then said, "During dances, the tambourine is tapped. Here, won't you try holding one?"
He then handed me a tambourine like this, and said, "Try hitting it with your index finger."
So I did. "Now try it with your middle finger," and I did it again.
Then he said, "Now use your ring finger," so I did.
Clearly, the sound is completely different each time when you try hitting a tambourine.
The old man then told me, "Try hitting it the same way."
As I was doing that, he then said, "Yes, if you practice it that way, I think you can work on your touch." (Laughter)
Ah, I thought, so this is one way of thinking about it.
Next, since the old man was a dance teacher,
he brought out a wooden ball about this big, and gave it to me, saying,
"Here, hold this and try to lift it this way."
I had to lift it without making it fall.
He then touched me on the shoulder, and said, "You're not putting any force into it at all." Next, he told me,
"Do that everyday if you can. Since I am a bit of a perfectionist,
I actually borrowed the ball from him and tried it on my own for about a week.
And in so doing, I thought to myself, "Hey, this is pretty good!"
When I was doing it, I was supposed to gather my strength here,
and then squeeze. Well, I guess it wasn't so much of anything after all.
I've strayed quite a bit from the topic of touch,
and have ended up just chattering with you about something totally unrelated.
The old man told me how important release was. He also said to me,
"I dance along with the music -- music is something that moves along.
It has rhythm. It doesn't move horizontally like this.
That's what I think. Also, it always describes an arc,
like this, That's why something like do re mi re do re fa mi re mi so fa mi' (sings a melody) is not describing an arc.
That's what I think. It's a mistake to play horizontally like "ta ta ta ta ta ta" (sings a melody).
You have to feel the arc as you play." Next, he said, "Now, the opposite thing,
so mi fa re mi fa so fa re mi fa mi do re mi' (sings a melody),
describes an opposite arc, I think. Listening to a person perform,
I can tell everything about whether or not he is feeling this or not."
I thought that he said such a thing because he was a dancer, but I also felt that he was a person who could sense something great,
and that he was inspired.
I often visited his house to listen to him talk.
Well, leaving that matter aside, when I listen to you performing this time,
I can tell between the people who feel this rhythm -- this movement --
and those people who don't. Now, if possible,
while I won't tell you what kind of circle that is, I'd like you to feel that movement in the music,
experiencing it for yourself and mastering it as you perform.
This is just chatting -- nothing to do with touch.
Well then, to get back to the subject of touch, I forgot to tell you earlier about how it is not possible to strike the keyboard always at a level,
like this. If you do that, well, let me tell you about a famous French pianist named Alfred Cortot,
who performed by resting the hand like this.
It's what I mentioned to you earlier about performing by making a stroking motion, from above, like this.
If you do that, it's like adding extra sheets of paper one by one -- one, two, three, four, five --
gradually increasing the weight. You can also lighten the touch the same way.
That's the kind of touch you need.
It's nothing mechanical, such as playing from above at a level,
and playing the keys vertically from above.
Also, when the keys are far from your body, you should bring your hands over like this and let them fall.
What I mean is that the farther your hands have to go from your body,
the more unnatural and strained the position will be.
That's how Cortot is said to have played -- like this (plays the piano).
He played that way with each of his fingers.
Really, that's how he played.
Let me explain this in conjunction with the issue of how to perform on the piano using the pedal,
a topic I discussed yesterday. If you play like this, clearly the touch is different (plays the piano using different pedal techniques).
If you're not convinced whether this is true or not,
try taking a pencil and striking a key directly from above.
I don't think you'll be able to modulate the sound that way. And so, it is correct, to a certain degree,
to do it like this. Also (plays a chord), if you let the hand drop from above,
it's very difficult to make all the sounds of chord even, especially when playing the chord softly.
It ends up sounding like this (plays the piano).
That means that there are many kinds of touch. Sorry for talking so long.
Copyright ©2001 Mito Arts Foundation. All Rights Reserved. Created by TK.
Mail to: webstaff@arttowermito.or.jp
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