Description

Alan Fraser’s new understanding of hand structure & function promises to improve any pianist’s technique.∙ Frees your hand from stress by accessing its innate, structural potency.∙ Teaches your hand to move powerfully and accurately by honing skeletal alignments.∙ Develops an intelligent hand – one with integrity, strength and suppleness.∙ Increases awareness of hand’s skeletal structure to cultivate “sensory-motor learning.”∙ Brings a wealth of physiological knowledge to the nuts & bolts of piano technique.∙ Informal and informed presentation of cutting edge technical knowledge.• New discoveries in biomechanics evoke a completely new experience of the human hand.Over 35 years of intensive research…Since 1965 Canadian pianist Alan Fraser has immersed himself in the German, French and Russian schools of piano technique, subjecting the best aspects of each to rigorous analysis in the light of his 20-year experience in Feldenkrais Method and his even longer ongoing collaboration with Croatian virtuoso Kemal Gekich. The result is a totally new approach to piano technique that builds on and goes beyond the finger action and arm weight schools, returning to the very structure and function of the human hand to unlock its innate capacity for powerful, evolved action on the keyboard. The potent stability of the hand’s natural arches, “skeletal alignment,” and “unstable equilibrium” are just a few of the concepts that lace this easy-to-access and empowering look at how we do what we do at the piano.    Craft of Piano Method: in the past 50 years, the single most significant advance in the study of piano technique.∙ Offers new, effective solutions for your most common technical problems.∙ Greatly enhances your colour and sonority – brings your sound to life!∙ Clarifies your hand’s innate structure and function to increase your power and sensitivity, the relaxation and agility of your technique.∙ Corrects your counterproductive movements to increase the potency of your hand structure, enhance tone and avoid injury.∙ Frees you from both tension and over-relaxation by teaching you effective hand activation based on optimal skeletal alignment.∙ Although The Craft of Piano Playing is designed to empower already healthy piano techniques, it also eliminates the risk of tendonitis, carpal tunnel syndrome, focal dystonia, Repetitive Stress Injury (RSI) and other performance injuries.∙ Links your physical technique to musical expression to create an “absolutely natural way of moving at the piano, powerful, flexible, and musical.” (PianoNews, Germany)∙ 90-minute colour film in English: PAL & NTSC formats, all regions compatible.∙ Detailed menu gets you easily to any point in the film – a highly effective pedagogical tool. ∙ Designed for use in conjunction with the book, the DVD also stands well on its own…   – Watch the DVD for an immediate, graphically effective presentation of Alan Fraser’s ideas.   – Read the book for more detailed explanations, fleshing out the ideas and deepening your mastery of these core elements of piano technique.   – Return to the DVD for an ever more powerful integration of the ideas into your playing.