Your Piano Freedom video series is totally brilliant! The examples you give of “how not to” are very revealing and I’m learning so much from seeing you play."
How the course works
Each video in this 13-part course offers one or two techniques demonstrated at the piano.
It is a bite-size chunk approach: each video is 3-5 minutes long and with follow-up practice will take around 20-30 minutes of your time. It’s a realistic and achievable goal, designed to fit easily into a busy lifestyle.
To make the most of the course, it's essential to embed the learning. Watching the video is only part of the picture. You need to put the learnings into practice straight away. This way you unlearn habits that don't work for you and build in new, healthy ones.
Course Contents
1. Introduction
An overview of what the course involves and how you can benefit from it.
2. Finding your hidden tension
Find your hidden tension away from the piano first, so that you don’t transfer it to your practice and performing.
3. Centering at the piano
Centre yourself at the piano so you are ergonomically aligned. Learn how to breathe and play from the core.
4. Core sound
Play forte chords without forcing and piano passages without tightening. Release any tension in order to play effortlessly and work with the core to create rich, dynamic and powerful sounds.
5. Powerful fingers
Bring power into your fingers - discover finger yoga and hand press ups!
6. Let gravity do the work
Harness gravity for easy, efficient and powerful playing.
7. The wrist - staccato and double thirds
Play staccato and double thirds so that the hand doesn’t jam up with tension.
8. The wrist - lateral movements (scales and arpeggios)
Use lateral movements of the wrist so you play scales and arpeggios and pieces without extraneous movement or unnecessary tension.
9. The wrist - circular movements
Circular movements of the wrist are slight variations on lateral movements. Employ them to enable greater ease in playing and more expressive phrasing.
10. The wrist - rotary movement
Use rotary movement to play an Alberti bass in music by composers such as Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven.
11. Elastic stretches
Release tension in big stretches. Don't let a tight, outstretched hand and a tense wrist lead to fatigue or in worst cases, tendonitis.
12. Tension free trills
Trills can be easy! Play them so they are not a cause of stiffness or fatigue.
13. Jumps
Practice jumps with freedom. Benefit from the physical ease and feel more secure when you play.
14. Pulling it all together
See and hear all the techniques in action with this extract from a Mozart Piano Sonata.
It’s wonderful to have all these technique issues in one place with your demonstrations as reminders, and incredibly helpful to be able to watch them again and again."