Mirror Neurons : My Little Practicing Strategy

I have experienced major problems dealing with tension while playing piano. This is a little discovery from my practicing lab (AKA my living room). Maybe it is not even a discovery because someone might have already discovered and published it while I am not aware of. But I still want to share :D In the most humbling way, I am no Yuja Wang or Horowitz, obviously I am just a piano major trying to figure out how to improve my playing and my well being. But this strategy had helped me to become more relaxed and confident when performing.

Type 1 tension - categorized by me, no research supported, is tension while practicing. Type 2 tension, is tension while performing. After I figured out to let go of tension while practicing, I still have a lot of tension while performing. Simply because the nerve and the adrenaline signal the brain to squeeze those muscle during a fight or flight natural response. Madeline Bruser, the author of The Art of Practicing stated that "we are afriad that if we just relax and let ourselves work naturally and comfortably, we won't be good enough". That is true, especially during performance.

So I sat in front of the piano, trying to run through a movement of Schubert Sonata D845 in A minor. I tensed up badly trying to control the touches and colors. Schubert is just an evil composer, so uncomfortable to play. I developed a love-hate relationship with his amazing work! :P

My former teacher told me to practice slowly, separate hand, until my muscles could produce desired sound and phrasing with absolutely no tension. That technique worked wonders for me. However, sometimes it is so hard to create a line if I play too slow. I cannot listen to the balance if I only play one hand! So I played through a section, tense up sometimes and produced my desired sound/direction. The tension happened when I criticize myself heavily on pretty much every action and the brain has no time to relax the muscle controlling those actions. I recorded that section then I listened to it. I listened to it a couple of times. I criticize myself again, and I notice my shoulder tense up while listening carefully to myself playing. That does not happen when I listen to someone else's recording of the same piece. Do you guys also get this? If you do, there is something in our brain called the mirror neurons - which fire during perception of actions that our muscles already learned. It is amazing and terrifying how I tense up just like when I practice by just listening to my own playing. So I forced myself to criticize my playing, but with relaxation. Now the brain has time to control the muscles to relax, because I am not physically playing the piano. I did that several times and magic happens. I played through without any tension while still creating desired sound! And I could also do that under a nervous circumstance (like playing for my teacher :P ).

I did that for the whole sonata. A 40-minute piece played by me, recorded 2-3 weeks before my recital. I listened to it carefully TWICE while forcing myself to relax throughout the whole thing, but it was the most valuable 80 minutes of my life (HAHA).

And that recital was the first time in my entire life to perform without tension. It felt so good. I still made tons of mistakes, but it felt SO GOOD!

After all, I guess my former teacher's technique in harmony with the mirror neurons thingy, could help to solve both type 1 and 2 tension problems.

Here is the link to that recital

https://youtu.be/_Vuf4X4h2gk

Work cite:

Bruser, Madeline. The Art of Practicing. New York: Three Rivers Press, 1997.

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I cite it Turabian way, aren't you so proud of me?

Amazing book! Grab one and read it!:D

Thanks for reading! <3