The book focuses on enjoying freedom, vitality, and being aware of a whole body experience, when playing the piano. It aims to restore a child-like spontaneity to playing.
Every mistake should be seen as an opportunity to discover something about the music and something about our understanding of the music. What should never be allowed is the self-centred narcissistic response of ‘I played that badly/I played that well. Through becoming so immersed and familiar with every aspect of the music, the ego is lost.
The book instils the process of relaxing through:
imagining the whole body experience of playing –the ‘feelimage’ going for it non-judgementally assessing the result.
Muscles and nerves should unconsciously organise the next function – not will. After a mistake, there should be a 5 seconds pause to assess the error and imagine how it should have been played – it takes 5 seconds for the brain to unconsciously organise the next function. It is tense muscles and nerves that are a major factor in causing mistakes.
It has useful quotes:
‘make friends with the notes’,
‘play from the solar plexus’,
‘practice demands a serene inner self’,
‘notice without guilt’,
‘never fear it, never think that was wrong’,
‘let the music happen, not make it happen’
References are eclectic - Dalcroze, Carl Rogers, John Holt, Zen, Meditation, Krishnamurti ….
Comments: The book was seen to be very useful for teachers, giving a fulsome description of aspects involved in teaching. It would be especially relevant for their adult students, though inappropriate for those students who have poor physical co-ordination, those who are going through a stage of disliking their bodies, and those who just want to be told what to do.
This book review was the result of a local EPTA meeting when the book was discussed.
