Frederic Chopin and the Art of the Piano

A JOURNEY THROUGH CHOPIN'S TWENTY-SEVEN ÉTUDES, THE FOUNDATION OF VIRTUOSO PIANO TECHNIQUE, REVEALING HOW THE HAND ACTUALLY WORKS, IN THE CONTEXT OF THE HISTORY OF THE PIANO AND THE ROMANTIC MOVEMENT IN MUSIC

© ALAN KOGOSOWSKI 2009 GENIUS OF THE PIANO - ÉTUDE!

Aan Kogosowski's special understanding of the workings of the hand and of piano technique is due to three exceptional teachers. Leo Shalit, an old-school cultivated European gentleman from Riga, with a distinguished pianistic backround and a deep understanding of the piano and its literature, who attended masterclasses of Rachmaninoff's colleague Alexander Goldenweiser in the inter-war years, inculcated in the young Kogosowski a feeling for 'dead-weight' looseness and suppleness, a crucial element in the manner of playing developed by Chopin and Liszt. Next, Michel Block, refined French pianist steeped in the pianism of Chopin and Rachmaninoff and a protégé of Alexis Weissenberg, a master of it, took this grounding in suppleness and demonstrated how it must be understood and monitored on an ongoing basis. He showed young Kogosowski the essential key to all piano technique (see The Philosopher's Stone of Technique, chapter 10 of The Making of a Genius, and the opening of chapter 3 of Mastering the Etudes). Finally, Roger Woodward, original, Australian-born pianist who studied in Warsaw, and was trained initially by a pupil of Rachmaninoff, showed Kogosowski the crucial role of 'hand positions' - the over-riding importance of correct positioning of the body and hands in everything we do. If we prepare ourselves and position ourselves correctly, we can relax - truly relax - and immediately turn our attention to the next thing on the agenda; the fingers will automatically find their mark with the exact degree of nuance and musicality.

The distinction between 'musical' and 'technical' has been a commonplace since the time of Mozart and Clementi, and while some pianists - we are people, after all - may be more tasteful, refined, emotional or passionate than others, the distinction is misleading, and completely useless. Not only is musicality serviced by technique, but the two are so closely intertwined as to be inseparable. Technique is the means by which we produce the sounds we wish to hear. Michel Block said “fifty per cent of technique is in the ear,” by which he meant that half of any given technical question consists of accurately defining exactly what sounds one wishes to produce.

The same applies to the ethos of the music: if we don't know where it came from, what circumstances and ideas gave it birth, and what it was meant to express, then we are playing with one hand tied behind our back, listening with cotton wool in our ears. Hence the necessity of the first part of this examination of the art of the piano.

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