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Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. The question today is: What is better, bright or warm voicing? Choosing between a warm or bright voicing for your piano can be a complex decision, but understanding what each term means can help you make the right choice for your needs.

What is Piano Voicing?

Voicing refers to the tone quality of a piano, which is influenced primarily by the hardness or softness of the hammers. Each of the 88 hammers in a piano must be individually adjusted to achieve the desired tone. This process involves not only adjusting the hardness of the hammers but also shaping them precisely and aligning them correctly. Regulation also plays a role in how the piano’s tone is perceived.

Factors Affecting Piano Voicing

Room Acoustics

The acoustics of the room where the piano is placed significantly impact its tone. In a small, acoustically bright room, a piano with a bright tone might sound harsh and overwhelming. In such cases, a warmer voicing can help mitigate this harshness. Conversely, in a larger space where the sound needs to travel farther, a brighter tone might be more suitable.

Musical Style

Your preferred musical style can also influence your choice. For example, a pianist who plays rock music might prefer a brighter tone for its cutting effect, while someone who plays new age music might lean towards a warmer, mellower sound to create soothing, sonorous qualities.

Playing Style and Power

The power and technique of the player are crucial considerations. A powerful player might prefer a piano with a broader dynamic range and warmer voicing to avoid a harsh sound, whereas a player with less strength might benefit from a brighter tone that requires less effort to produce sound.

Piano Types and Voicing

Different types of pianos naturally lend themselves to varying tonal qualities. For instance, American pianos like Steinway and Mason & Hamlin are often noted for their warmer tone compared to European pianos, which may have a brighter sound. However, every piano can be voiced to suit either preference, so the choice ultimately depends on personal taste and the specific use of the piano.

The More a Piano Is Played, the Brighter It Gets

Pianos tend to become brighter over time with regular use. The felt on the hammers compresses and hardens, leading to a brighter tone. To counteract this, it’s beneficial to start with a piano voiced on the warmer side. This allows for a more controlled and pleasant sound as the piano naturally brightens with use.

Seeking Professional Voicing

Voicing is a specialized skill. It’s essential to work with a skilled technician who can finely adjust the voicing to meet your specific needs. Look for a technician with experience in concert-level work, as they will have the expertise necessary to achieve the best results. Voicing needs to be even from key to key, which is a real challenge to achieve.

Personalized Voicing

Many pianos can be voiced with different tonal characteristics in various sections. For example, you might prefer a warmer middle register with brighter treble and bass notes. This customization can enhance the overall sound and suit your personal preferences. I have a personal story to share about my father, Morton Estrin. He was an incredibly powerful pianist, but he had remarkable control over his pianissimo playing as well. He truly loved exploring the full range of the piano. I remember visiting the Baldwin showroom in New York City with him, where, as a Baldwin artist, he would head to the back room filled with concert grands to test them for his New York recitals and recordings. He always sought out the piano with the warmest tone, knowing it would allow him to express himself fully without the risk of a harsh sound. His preference for a warmer voicing was because it enabled him to produce beautiful, delicate tones and, when played with more power, to reveal a range of rich, varied sounds. To contrast that, Vladimir Horowitz’s piano was known for its exceptional brightness. Horowitz’s control over this brightness was remarkable. His piano had a shallower key depth, allowing him to achieve a wide range of dynamics—from subtle nuances to powerful crescendos—with ease. His technical mastery and the unique characteristics of his piano created a dynamic and fiery performance.

Conclusion

The choice between a warm or bright voicing depends on numerous factors, including the acoustic environment, musical style, player strength, and personal taste. Each option has its benefits, and the ideal voicing will complement your piano’s natural characteristics and your individual needs. If you have any questions about the voicing of your piano, please feel free to share them in the comments here at LivingPianos.com and on YouTube! I’m Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store. Thanks for joining me!

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Contact me if you are interested in private lessons. I have many resources for you! Robert@LivingPianos.com

Understanding Piano Voicing: Warm vs. Bright

Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. The question today is: What is better, bright or warm voicing? Choosing between a warm or bright voicing for your piano can be a complex decision, but understanding what each term means can help y

Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. The subject today is about drummers who play the piano. Why do drummers love to play the piano? I want to hear from all of you drummers out there who tune in to this video. Tell us why you love to play the piano.

I have a lot of drummers in my life, and, almost categorically, they all love to play the piano!

My son is a drummer, and he loves to play the piano. And this video was inspired by my good friend Bob Friedman, the Steinway Hunter. If you haven’t checked out his book, by the way, it is absolutely the most enjoyable book to read if you love pianos. Bob said I should talk about why drummers love to play the piano, so here it is!

Drummers already have a really highly developed sense of rhythm.

Rhythm is one of the most intrinsically difficult aspects of playing the piano. Drummers are also used to playing with two hands as well as their feet, so they have a good sense of coordination. But what they don’t have is a pitched instrument. It’s all rhythm. Unless they happen to play mallet instruments, they don’t get melody. They play with other musicians, and they hear the melodies in their heads. They want to be able to enjoy that, so they go to the piano.

It’s interesting how drummers approach the keyboard.

Sometimes they’ll take solos in such an interesting fashion, playing like a drummer and coming up with patterns that you wouldn’t think of as a pianist because we’re used to using our fingers in a way that drummers are not. So they come up with interesting patterns and melodies that might not occur to other musicians. It also helps them understand the music they’re playing drums to by playing on the piano. Getting a sense of chord progressions and melodies helps them achieve a more sensitive rhythmic backdrop for the music they play. So there are many reasons why drummers love to play the piano.

The piano is a percussion instrument.

Instead of hitting drum heads with sticks, it’s hammers hitting strings. It’s activated with your fingers. But really, the piano is the ultimate percussion instrument. So, of course, drummers are going to love to play the piano because it’s a percussion instrument and arguably the quintessential percussion instrument. Let me know your thoughts on this in the comments here at LivingPianos.com and on YouTube.Thanks again for joining me, Robert Estrin, here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Resource

For premium videos and exclusive content, you can join my Living Pianos Patreon channel! www.Patreon.com/RobertEstrin

Contact me if you are interested in private lessons. I have many resources for you! Robert@LivingPianos.com

Why Drummers Love to Play the Piano

Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. The subject today is about drummers who play the piano. Why do drummers love to play the piano? I want to hear from all of you drummers out there who tune in to this video. Tell us why you love to

This is Robert Estrin from LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store with a great subject today: The fundamental importance of arm weight for producing a good tone on the piano. You might wonder what I’m talking about. Before I get into that, let’s discuss the piano as a unique musical instrument.

What was the first musical instrument ever?

The first musical instrument was obviously the human voice! Every other instrument imitates the human voice to one extent or another. Wind instruments, for example, have a clear connection with breath, flow of the phrase, natural progression from note to note, and the smoothness of the line. This is intrinsic not just to vocal performance, but also all wind instruments. String instruments have the bow to create the sense of line like the breath in singing.

What is the analog for the breath on the piano?

You might think, since phrases naturally ebb and flow like ocean waves, that you can simply calculate playing each note louder and louder towards the middle of the phrase, then gradually softer and softer towards the end of the phrase. However, if you try that, you’ll end up with a calculated performance. No surprise there! The secret of creating a smooth line at the piano is, gradually increasing and decreasing arm weight by transferring smoothly from note to note, growing toward the middle of the phrase, and diminishing toward the end of the phrase.

You can try it for yourself!

Play a phrase once while calculating each note getting progressively louder, then progressively softer. Then try playing the same phrase but using the continuous arm weight that ebbs and flows. You’ll find that no matter how much you try to craft the line based upon your musical inclinations, the first version will sound calculated. That is, after all, exactly what you are doing! When you play the phrase again, remember to use the concept of the breath by utilizing the natural weight of your arm. Instead of pushing down more, just support the weight of your arm with your fingers. Lean into it the keys even after initially playing them. Lean more toward the middle of the phrase and less toward the end. You’ll find that this creates a completely different sound. There is something engaging about imposing upon a phrase the idea of the breath and letting the notes flow naturally with that overarching concept. It creates a singing line that belies the reality of the percussive nature of the piano.

I’m interested in your impressions of how this works for you. If any of you have different ways of achieving the same sound, I’d love to hear from you! Once again, this is Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store.

info@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

How to Get Good Tone on the Piano

The fundamental importance of arm weight for producing a good tone on the piano. You might wonder what I’m talking about. Before I get into that, let’s discuss the piano as a unique musical instrument.

This is Robert Estrin from LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store with a question. “Does playing the piano make you smarter?” I hope so. I’ve been playing a long time and wonder what I would be like if I didn’t play the piano! This is a serious question. Indeed there have been studies, like famous Gordon Shaw – Frances Rauscher studies at UC Irvine. These studies showed:

With a control group of children studying the piano, compared to other groups studying computers, as well as a control group studying nothing, the children who studied piano showed an increase of math and science scores and even increase in English skills!

That is exciting to think about! Later on, they even discovered the “Mozart Effect”, which had some controversy. They simply played recordings of Mozart while kids were taking tests and found that there was a temporary increase in IQ scores just from listening to the music! Temporary is the keyword here. Later on their findings were diminished when they found it was just a temporary boost, but that is exciting enough!

Why should playing the piano increase your intelligence? Did you know?

Playing the piano uses more parts of your brain than any other human activity.

This is according to the New York Times in article years ago about the human brain that showed piano playing as the single most complex endeavor of the human mind. How can this be? Think about it. You have short-term memory, long-term memory, tactile memory as well as visual and aural cues.

You have just about every part of your brain firing when playing the piano.

It is a fantastic opportunity to develop your mind. Of course if you play with other musicians you also develop social skills. It is endless. Just playing music is a great way to expand your mind. The discipline of practicing and the organization it takes to digest a piece of music make for an incredible opportunity to explore aspects of your own mind in ways that are richly rewarding. At the end of the line, you have something to show for it. You can play a piece of music or many pieces of music!

As if that isn’t enough of a reason to play the piano, being able to increase your intelligence is a benefit too! Everyone should study the piano, don’t you think? Let me know how you feel about this. I wonder how many of you are on board. I suppose if you are reading this there could be skewed results because many of my readers might already feel this way!

There are studies that prove an increase in intelligence just from playing the piano.

Spend more time with the piano and your brain will thank you! Once again, this is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store.

info@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

Can Playing the Piano Make You Smarter?

This is Robert Estrin from LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store with a question. “Does playing the piano make you smarter?” I hope so. I’ve been playing a long time and wonder what I would be like if I didn’t play the piano! This

Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store, with a great question. When do you use the soft pedal on the piano? The una corda pedal is the left pedal on grand and baby grand pianos. It is an amazing device for expressive playing because it changes the tone. Those of you who practice on upright pianos, the left pedal does not do what it is supposed to do.

What does “una corda” mean?

Una corda translates from Italian as “one string”. What does this mean? Originally, pianos had two strings for each key. By depressing the una corda pedal, the hammers would only strike one of the two strings giving a softer, delicate tone. Modern pianos have three strings for each note through most of the piano. So, depressing the una corda pedal makes two of the strings hit directly. Depending on how the piano is voiced, it may even hit all three strings with softer parts of the felt of the hammer.

The fundamental thing about soft pedals is that every piano is different.

Think about this: on one piano the hammers may strike two of the strings. On another piano, the hammers may strike all three strings, but a little off-axis. The grooved part of the hammer with the hardened felt does not hit the strings. So, you get a more delicate tone. I’m telling you all this so that you understand how different the impact is on depressing the soft pedal on different pianos.

The answer to the question is: it depends not just upon the music, the performance you are after, or the acoustics of the room, but on the specific piano and the way its soft pedal affects the tone. Naturally, a great deal has to do with how you approach the piano with your hands. In some pianos I’ve played, every time you put the soft pedal down it creates a drastic tonal change.

On other pianos, you depress the una corda pedal and you don’t even notice any difference at all!

On this type of piano, you might use the pedal very liberally. On such a piano, if you want a little change of color, you might as well push the soft pedal just to make it easier to play softly.

Perhaps you’ve worked out all of the places you want to use the soft pedal. Then, as soon as you start playing with the soft pedal, the tone gets swallowed up completely. You may find that you are not going to use the soft pedal except very sparingly, in the most delicate sections on a piano like this.

That’s the long and short of it:

When playing a performance, it’s so important to have an opportunity to try the piano beforehand. Not just for the soft pedal, but all the pedals. It is remarkable how different the pedals respond on various pianos! I would go so far as to say that in trying out a piano for a recital, an audition, or just to play for someone, checking out the pedals is probably the most important thing because they vary more than any other aspect of each piano.

I hope this has been helpful for you. Again, I’m Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store.

info@LivingPianos.com

949-244-3729

Secrets of the Soft Pedal on Pianos

Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store, with a great question. When do you use the soft pedal on the piano? The una corda pedal is the left pedal on grand and baby grand pianos. It is an amazing device for expressive playing

How to Play Hands Together on the Piano

This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com. The question today is “How do you play hands together on the piano?” This is a big subject. After all, playing hands together is what the piano is all about! You might wonder, particularly if you are a wind player or if you play almost any other instrument that plays one note at a time, how piano players play different parts in each of their hands. This is something that makes the piano unique. It’s what the instrument is all about. In fact, all keyboard instruments have this in common. So what is the secret? How do people do this? Even doing something like tapping your head and rubbing your tummy can be confusing for most people! The intricacy of the parts for each hand in piano music can present enormous challenges. You might wonder, how do you approach such a thing? There is an answer!

Of course, the more you practice, spending months or even years at the piano, it becomes more natural for you to be able to play independent parts at the same time. You may even develop the ability to read at sight new music that requires independence of the hands. But that usually takes a very long time to develop for most people. How can you do it right from the get-go?

I’ve been teaching piano for many years and I always introduce playing hands together from lesson one.

Otherwise, it would be like learning to ride a bike with one leg. It misses the whole point! How do you teach how to play the hands together? Even though it seems counter-intuitive, it’s by practicing hands separately. I don’t mean practicing incessantly hands separately. I mean that each phrase you work on, you practice each hand separately first. If you want to learn a new piece, rather than putting the hands together from the start, you break things down. Initially, you may read through the piece hands together a couple times just to get acquainted. Then, you should get to work and and start learning the piece. You should learn a very small section of each hand first while observing all the details.

Anytime you have music that can be broken down into chords, learn it in chords first.

By learning the chords, you are going to find the best fingering. It’s also easier since you only have a few chords to learn instead of so many separate notes. Once you have that learned, then you learn the other hand. Then you put the hands together and get it learned. Finally, you break up the chords and play the music as written.

When learning, you should also avoid using the pedal most of the time. The last step is adding the pedal. By working hands separately, each little phrase at a time and then putting them together, you have the benefit of breaking things down to size so you can master each section. You also can really digest a score and have all of the details learned because you focus on one phrase of music at a time. There are hundreds, maybe thousands, of details in each phrase of music. How can this be? Each note has a duration and rhythm. Each note has a fingering. Each note has a phrasing and an expression. So, there are five aspects to each note. There’s only so much you can assimilate at a time!

That’s why learning small chunks of music a phrase at a time hands separately is such a powerful practice technique.

That’s the secret. You hear people playing intricate pieces of music that you want to play, and you wonder how it is possible to learn so much music with your hands doing dramatically different things. The accompanying video shows you how to achieve this with music that is relatively simple. But the same principle applies to learning any piece of music. That’s the secret to playing hands together on the piano. I hope you’ve enjoyed this here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Store. I’m Robert Estrin.

info@LivingPianos.com
949-244-3729

How to Play Hands Together on the Piano

How to Play Hands Together on the Piano This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com. The question today is “How do you play hands together on the piano?” This is a big subject. After all, playing hands together is what the piano is all abou