What Every Pianist Needs to Know About the Body

by Thomas Mark, Roberta Gary, Thom Miles

Techniques on how to gain greater fluidity of movement while playing to improve the quality of the experience are offered in this manual for serious piano players. This book encourages musicians to develop a broader understanding of the involvement of the entire body in playing—and the strains playing places on the body—by focusing on body mapping to increase awareness of the body’s function, size, and structure. Ways in which piano, organ, harpsichord, clavichord, and digital keyboard players can eliminate or prevent carpal tunnel syndrome and other debilitating conditions without traditional medical treatments are also explored.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction, Reference, Health, Self Help

155 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2004

Reviews

[Keith · Rating 4 out of 5]

I became interested this book because I increased my piano playing from an hour a day to 1.5 hours a day. The length of time at each sitting also increased and so did the amount of time I spent on scales. I got injured.

Even a look at the Table of Contents makes it clear that whole body awareness is crucial. The TOC does not just list the chapters, but the sections within each chapter. Here are the chapter headings:
1. Basic Concepts
2. Mapping the Structure (of the body)
3. Mapping the Places of Balance
4. Mapping the Arm and Hand
5. Mapping Muscles
6. Mapping Breathing
7. Mapping the Piano
8. Additional concerns of Organists
9. Injuries and Retraining
Conclusion
Suggestions for Further Reading or Reference

[Karin · Rating 5 out of 5]

The title is so true! I'm already incorporating some of what I learned from this book into my piano playing, with wonderful results.

[Thomas Feng · Rating 5 out of 5]

the later chapters are kind of slight (breathing, mapping the piano, and injuries), and kind of vague; those topics may be better covered in other sources. but as a manual for learning one’s structural anatomy as relevant to playing the piano, this is as clear, concise, and helpful as i could imagine. the first five chapters will be required reading for my students.

[Nolan Holden · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thomas Mark's What Every Pianist Needs to Know About the Body is a book about how we move our bodies to play the piano. Author Thomas Mark takes a close look about the specific needs of players of keyboard instruments, whether piano, organ, harpsichord, or digital keyboard. Using the concept of Body Mapping developed by Barbara Conable and William Conable, he presents anatomical facts, detailed illustrations and excellent commentary. This information can bring about improved body awareness, a better quality of movement, a better, freer playing from each position. It also may enable readers to cure injury without traditional medical treatments.

The principles in this book have the power to transform a keyboard musicians playing by helping to guarantee efficient movement and instilling good technique. Learning new habits of movement can be facilitated by actual demonstration in addition to verbal description. Most readers will find this book a worthwhile supplement to their knowledge keyboarding technique.

[Ken · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book contains a very comprehensive on the physio aspect of the human body, culminating converging at the last few chapters about hand injuries which afflict many pianists - some so devastating that they never regain their hands virtuosity.

The book is essential to all musicians regardless of which instruments they specialize in to avoid injuring their bodies to sustain their playing lives.

Many piano teachers have been teaching all the wrong finger movements. Although the movement if done only sporadically, it may be harmless and might even make the piano sounds nice. However, they forget that piano playing is repetitive. Movements become dangerous if repeated many times like how a pianist practises and plays the piano.

This book is essential not only to piano teachers, but also to parents of students and students themselves so that they can prevent unintended injuries - many times due to ignorance of some teachers in spite of how good their original intentions may be.

[Cindy Yin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I needed to read this for a class I took last semester. It has really helped me understand how to work with my body when I play instead of forcing these unrealistic anatomical imagery onto myself. Reading this book has helped me play better and more efficiently. I sound great.
Recommended for all pianists.

[Stefan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely phenomenal book. I had never taken a deep look at my own piano technique before this, and I wish I had sooner. The book not only teaches you how to play the piano well, but also proper posture in general, and is applicable far beyond just piano playing. A definite read for anyone trying to get better at playing the piano.

[minhhai · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wish I had read this book when started playing piano. I got recommended to read this book after suffering a series of wrist injuries and difficulties in playing. After reading this, I realized that many of my techniques were horribly wrong and the root causes of all the troubles I had. This is a life-saver!

The book describes the anatomical structures of the body relevant to piano playing: bones, joints, muscles and how they move different parts of the body. It also explains how many pianists misuse them and incur injuries for themselves, and how to correct them. For example, the ulnar-deviation (or thumb-orientation) way of rotating the hands is the most popular root cause for wrist tension and injury, which I've suffered for a long time without knowing why. The correct way is little finger-orientation which requires understanding of the bones and joints of the arm.

Similarly, holding the fingers in fixed positions (like playing successive octaves) is a bad practice which many of us unknowingly do, because it promotes "co-contraction" of the opposite muscles, causing unnecessary tension. Another big mistake is back-leaning sitting at the piano which throws the body out of balance and hinders movements. I didn't know any of these of my mistakes until I read the book.

Definitely a must-read for any piano player, regardless of experience, to understand and correct their movements at the piano.

[Diogo Tosta · Rating 3 out of 5]

Extremely boring and dry. The information in it though is of great value for self taught pianists. It teaches you about the anatomy of your body: Muscles, bones, tendons, posture and WHY it is important to know about these at the piano. It's contents are scientifically proven, but they do feel a bit like pseudoscience at some times.
However the biggest downside of this book is that it shows you the problems, not the solutions (which is probably what the author wanted anyways, in an attempt to encourage the reader to "explore" his body).
The solutions can be found on youtube (Such as exercises on how to keep an upright posture, stretching muscles and how to hold the hands at the piano).

The BEST ASPECT of the book is that it can apply to virtually any situation where you feel tension at the piano.


TLDR: This book will give you general anatomical information about the body that's relevant to the piano.
It will tell you what to fix. But it's not going to teach you how to fix it.

[Teige Bredin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think this is a good book from an anatomical standpoint. I learned a lot of the technical terms and things about body mapping. In my daily life I focus more on my posture. I don't find myself applying that much to piano. I would say I have more of a focus on relaxation while playing, but there is nothing specific that I changed because of this book. I think it's a good book and worth the read. It's not very impactful, so I give it an average rating.

[Keith Wheeles · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting fact from book: our fingers have no muscles in them. Just tendons for curling and uncurling. They connect to the forearm muscles that activate them. This was more anatomical information than I was looking for, but I'm early in my piano efforts - so I may appreciate it more as time goes by.

[Ariadne · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book I was always looking for but didnt know it existed. Finally all the information I needed as a pianist and piano teacher. I also feel a total amateur in retrospective for not knowing before how to teach my students proper technique. The information depected here is very precise, which is great. It allready improved my playing and teaching!

[Elle · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an essential for every pianist. It has many details and my favorite part are the diagrams which changed the way I thought about my body as I play the piano.

[Ralf · Rating 5 out of 5]

An exemplary work of music pedagogy. Eye-opening, immediately useful, clear, concise, and logically structured.

[Pascale · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must read for any piano player!

[Marshall]

Thomas wrote in details on anatomy of a musician. He explains how the posture of a body can affect a pianist's play, how breathing pattern can affect pianist's rhythm. It's a book that covers the subject which every experienced pianist should know: how to connect the body with music.

[Blair · Rating 5 out of 5]

Super excellent book. Great information and it's obvious the author took a lot of care and effort to communicate it as clearly as a complicated subject can be. After reading this book I think many people question some of the methods they were taught years ago in piano lessons.

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

A must for pianist's who have dealt with repetitive motion injury.

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful. I learned so much from this book. I am constantly evaluating the way I sit at the piano and the way in which I use my fingers and wrists, etc.

[Rebecca DG · Rating 3 out of 5]

Just not quite what I thought it was going to be. A bit too much like a human biology book.