Description

Alan Fraser – The Craft of Piano PlayingA new approach to Piano TechniqueThis DVD is a valuable addition to any music library. Its insights into the hand’s innate capacities of movement and organization will prove valuable to pianists at all levels. And teachers can use these ideas to develop a whole new dimension in their relationship to the piano and piano teaching. Since its publication in book form in 2003, THE CRAFT OF PIANO PLAYING has won kudos from pianists on every continent. The DVD version features exercises from the original book plus several new ones, complementing the book’s in-depth investigations with an immediate, graphic and tangible experience of Alan Fraser’s teaching. The exercises develop hand structure and function, replacing both tension and over-relaxation with effective activation based on optional skeletal alignment and offering an ever more profound technical development for the assiduous student. Canadian pianist Alan Fraser has developed a new approach to piano technique growing out of his 20-year collaboration with the virtuoso Kemal Gekic and his professional training in the Feldenkrais Method. Synthesizing and moving beyond the best aspects of the finger action and arm weight schools, Fraser empowers pianists of all calibres with his analysis of the innate structure and function of the hand and its application to piano. Fraser moved from Montreal to the former Yugoslavia in 1990 and has been working with Gekic ever since. Much of the book version of The Craft of Piano Playing (Scarecrow Press, 2003) was written in 1999-2000 when Fraser was guest professor at the Wuhan Conservatory in mainland China where he worked with some of the best young talents in the country. Fraser gives recitals and master class presentations throughout Europe and North America. Fraser’s film uses recent advances in biomechanics to replace both tension and over-relaxation with effective hand activation based on optimal skeletal alignment. “a fascinating DVD, a ‘must have’ for any pianist wishing to master their technique.” – La Lettre du Musicien, France The film promises pianists from beginners to professionals an astonishing enhancement of the colours and sonority one can draw from the instrument, and offers teachers new, effective solutions for their students’ most common technical problems. ‘a guaranteed huge improvement to your piano sound‘ – PianoNews, Germany Fraser links musical expression to the hand’s innate structure and function to create an “absolutely natural way of moving at the piano, both powerful and flexible” (PianoNews, Germany). “Fraser is an engaging and informative host” – International Piano, Great Britain