Article by : Yamal Vora
Have you ever felt dizziness or uncomfortableness or some pain in your back or around your wrist after you finish practicing piano? If yes, well.. it should be a subject for you to worry about. You are in distress because of your unsuitable body posture while playing. Proper body posture is basic and one of the most important characteristics while playing Piano. Just as we maintain a perfect body posture while exercising, we have to keep track of correct positions while playing an instrument, even when one is not professional. You might ask the reason for it. The reason is, practicing an instrument heavily (for several hours) overuses your muscle power and can be really painful and can even cause injury if correct body posture is not maintained.
If you are not a professional and play music just for One hour or less, STILL maintaining inappropriate posture is detrimental.
From what I have experienced, maintaining a perfect body posture can even make a hard song to play easier !!
You actually “connect” with a piece when you play with correct postures.
So these are some correct, effective and important postures when you perform or play Piano or Keyboard :--
You should have a straight back when you are playing-
This is one of the most important and basic posture. Your back should be relaxed but steady while playing (refer Posture 1), your shoulders raised to a straight yet comfortable position. You can refer to the picture given. It’s not necessary that you always need to ‘command’ your back to be always straight, you can level the instrument according to your height or sitting position. Distance from your instrument also matters in back positioning. You can also buy chairs specifically designed for your UBER comfortness.
Also, don’t stretch your neck forward, keep it well-aligned with the spine. When positioned correctly, you will look smart while playing.
Keep your feet well grounded-
Don’t keep your feet under your chair or bench (refer Posture 1). It will help you to be stable. If you sit cross legged, it will be difficult for you to move around and you will struggle to cope up with different octaves.If you are playing a piano, the position of your feet (on the pedals or near the pedals) depends on the piece you are playing.
The position of your hands while playing-
Keep your arms relaxed like wings of a bird! Don’t stiffen up your shoulders and elbows,
keep it at a comfortable distance from your body. Also, people often tend to play the keys with flat hands, but that is not correct. Your wrist should form a dome with rounded fingers.
You palm should be as if you are holding a ball. For your reference, you can check out the picture.
Now as I talked about the correct ‘physical postures’, I would like to draw your attention to the mental state while playing.
Relax !!
I know you might be bored by hearing this word repeatedly, but it is the most important “mental posture”. Don’t stress out when you play a piano, just take a deep breath and start playing lightly first, then continue your practice. Don’t get frustrated when you can’t play a particular piece or find it really hard. As I have told you earlier, when you play music, it reflects your emotions. So when you are upset or stressed or etc, you reflect all that in your piece and it will affect you again.So just imagine that you are in some peaceful place, far away from your difficulties and enjoy your practice, relaxed, heart leaping with excitement, blood running profusely in your ears and fingertips…
Keep it up!!