What do You

Think About

WHEN YOU
PLAY? by Ken Johansen

T his is a question every musi-

cian has been asked, yet it can
be embarrassingly difficult to
answer. By the time we per-
form a piece of music from memory,
we are no longer consciously thinking
of the mechanical means of playing it:
Ken Johansen
is a professor of
keyboard skills at
the Peabody
Conservatory in
Baltimore. In addi-
tion to teaching
and performing,
he regularly contributes articles to
various music journals. He holds
M.M. and D.M.A. degrees in piano
performance, and he studied piano
and musicianship in Paris for many
years.
AMERICAN MUSIC TEACHER
fingering, arm movements, bowing,
breathing and so on. We have analyzed
the music and made our decisions
about tempo and rubato, phrasing and
articulation, voicing and dynamics. We
have memorized the piece carefully
and no longer have to think about the
next note. In short, we have developed
an aural and mental conception of the
piece that we can reproduce with accu-
racy and consistency, at least in the
privacy of our studio or practice room.
So what are we thinking about when
we perform a piece of music from
memory?
Perhaps our difficulty answering this
question is related to the experience
many musicians have when they per-
form from memory—a feeling of
being disconnected from the music
instead of absorbed in it, of watching
our performance from outside instead
of guiding it from within. This feeling
has sometimes been compared to an
out-of-body experience: the limbs and
muscles go through the motions they
have learned, but the mind and spirit
seem to be elsewhere. With this lack of
concentration comes a dangerous level
of self-consciousness. The mind, not
being focused on the music, fixes its
attention, instead, on extraneous
details: the placement of our feet on
the floor, the reflection of our hands in
the shiny fallboard of the piano, the
sounds in the hall, the note we just
missed. With this last event, the mind
quickly lurches back to attention with
an increased sense of panic, and we
resolve to concentrate still harder on
the music. Even if we make it through
the piece without memory slips, tech-
nical failures or other catastrophes, we
are left with a disappointed feeling of
not having fully participated in our
own performance. If someone would
31
ask us what we were thinking about
when we were playing, we might very
well have difficulty answering without
embarrassment.
Much has been said and written
about how to prepare for a perform-
ance, especially about how to memo-
rize our music. All good teachers and
performers know we must cultivate the
different kinds of memory—aural,
analytical and kinesthetic; we must not
neglect to study our music away from
the instrument; we must resolve all
technical difficulties; and we must play
for others as much as possible. At the
same time, we also know that in per-
formance, nerves can sometimes undo
even the most careful preparation.
Such a performance leaves the musi-
cian feeling not only disappointed, but
helpless, for it is hard to know what
one can do to avoid a repetition of this
unpleasant experience. Performing
more often certainly helps, but does
not guarantee we will become less
prone to mental distraction. We some-
how need to develop our power of
concentration so all our careful prepa-
ration does not unravel when we
perform.
When we speak of concentration, we
usually think of it in terms of what we
must exclude from our thoughts: “I
must not listen to the man coughing
in the fourth row.” “I must not worry
what my teacher may be thinking.” “I
must not wonder what is for dinner
tonight.” This is a losing battle because
we cannot exclude thoughts from our
mind without thinking about them.
The only way to keep the mind from
thinking negative, irrelevant thoughts
is to fill it with positive, relevant
thoughts. I am not referring to the
vague, wishful “positive thinking” of
the self-help books, but to a specific
musical activity—a way of thinking in
sound just as we think in words.
Thinking the Music
When we read a literary text, a
poem for example, we sound out the
words silently in our minds. If we then
memorize the poem, we can either
think through it in our heads or recite
it out loud. In the latter case, the mind
32
thinks the words, while the voice
simultaneously gives them utterance.
There is no separation between the
thinking and the reciting, so it would
be quite impossible for the mouth to
go on speaking by itself if the mind
went blank.
When we read a musical text we
have not seen before, we similarly
sound out the notes, either at our
instrument or in our heads, with our
inner ears. There is no separation
between the reading and the sound—
one produces the other. As with the
poem, if we then memorize the piece,
we can again think through it in our
minds. The thought—our memory—
is still connected to the sound in our
heads. But when we play a memorized
piece on our instrument, something
new—and dangerous—may happen. If
we are not careful, the mind, hearing
the sound coming from the instru-
ment, may cease to think the music
actively and begin to merely experience
it passively. Now there is a separation
between the thinking and playing.
Because we have made the physical
memory of the piece automatic, it is
quite possible, and indeed frightening-
ly easy, for the fingers and arms to go
on playing while the mind goes blank.
In this way, we become an audience to
our own performance.
The solution to this harmful separa-
tion between the mind and the music,
then, is to continue to think the music
as we play it. But what exactly do we
mean by “thinking the music”? Before
reading on, take a minute to think
through in your head a piece (or part
of one) you know very well from
memory. We all hear music somewhat
differently, but your inner hearing
probably included at least three essen-
tial aspects. First, if you really know
your piece well, you were able to think
all of the notes, either by hearing the
pitches, seeing their placement on the
staff or thinking their names (or some
combination of these). This is an
important point; if we cannot think
all of the notes, we have gray areas in
our memories that may trip us up in a
performance. Secondly, you undoubt-
edly thought of the notes not in isola-
tion, but rather in their rhythmic,
dynamic and expressive context. In
other words, you thought of the mean-
ing of the music, not just its notation.
Lastly, you probably felt in your nerv-
ous system the physical feeling of play-
ing—the location of the notes on your
instrument, the gestures and fingerings
that correspond to them—even with-
out moving your arms and fingers.
Thus, your thinking of the music rep-
resented a synthesis of the notes, their
musical expression and their technical
execution. You probably also noticed
that your mind did not wander as you
thought through the music, or if it
did, the music in your head came to a
stop. If we can keep this musical
thinking going even as we play, the
mind, instead of feeling separated from
what the body is doing, will be unified
with it in the re-creation of the music.
The most important aspect of musi-
cal concentration is undoubtedly
rhythm, particularly the feeling of
forward motion, which is always pres-
ent in great compositions and in great
performances. While it is true we must
be very much rooted in the present
moment while we are playing (All per-
formers know it is fatal to think about
the notes coming up.), we must never-
theless play every note with an under-
standing of its place in the musical
line—where it has come from and,
especially, where it is going. The prin-
ciple of forward motion applies to
every aspect of music: rhythmically,
short notes move to long notes and
weak beats move to strong beats; har-
monically, movement generally pro-
ceeds toward the dominant, which in
turn moves to its resolution, normally
the tonic; and melodically, each note
moves forward to the next by means of
the intervals that connect them.
(These of course are only very general
guidelines; each phrase has its own
way of moving and each performer his
own way of hearing.) Thinking the
music in terms of forward motion
helps the ear listen through the notes
instead of from note to note. Listening
to the continuity of sound, the mind
develops continuity of attention, the
very definition of concentration.
AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2005
Practicing the
Concentration
This kind of mental concentration is
not always easy to sustain, but, fortu-
nately, it is something we can practice
every day; we do not have to wait for a
concert to try it out. Indeed, we first
must have made it a habit in our daily
practice before it will serve us in per-
formance. To start with, we can think
through our music away from the
instrument, not just at the beginning
of the memorization process as Walter
Gieseking advocated, but at regular
intervals thereafter. Glenn Gould was
known to practice a piece exclusively
in his mind for several weeks, and
only take it to the piano a couple
of weeks before recording it.
“We somehow
“Ultimately,” he said,
“you play the piano not
with your fingers but
with your head.”
Another beneficial way
need to develop our power
of practicing—recom-
mended by the great of concentration so all our
Romanian pianist
Dinu Lipatti—is
going through the
careful preparation does
motions of playing a
piece on the instru- not unravel when
we perform.”
ment, thinking and
hearing the music inwardly,
without sounding the notes. This
reinforces the tactile memory of the
piece while still ensuring the mind is
engaged. One also can think through a
phrase or small section, then play it
immediately afterwards, trying to
maintain the same level of concentra-
tion required by the inner hearing.
Our thinking of the music need not
always be done silently. Singing the
melody while we play, reciting the
note names in rhythm, counting the
beats out loud—these all are extremely
useful ways of internalizing the music
and keeping the mind focused on its
task. This is where the importance of
solfège (ear training) becomes clear. Its
purpose is not merely to teach us how
to sing various intervals and take dicta-
tion, but to cultivate an inner musical
voice. It connects the brain, through
the ear and the voice, to the music we
hear and play.
AMERICAN MUSIC TEACHER
Unfortunately, the connection
between ear training and instrumental
practice is not always made clear, and
many students wonder how solfège
can benefit their playing. As teachers,
we must make this connection from
the very first lessons. We can start by
asking our students to name the notes
as they play. I find that the fixed-do
solfège syllables work best for this.
This creates a strong connection
between the score, the sound and the
ear, and has the further advantage of
causing most children to match pitch
with their instrument and start
singing. It also is an excellent way of
testing our students’ memories; if they
can recite or sing the note names of a
phrase in rhythm, we can be sure the
music is in their heads and not just in
their fingers.
Pianists can benefit greatly from
singing one part while playing another.
We can, of course, sing the melody
and play only the accompaniment, but
it is perhaps even more beneficial to
sing the parts that are hardest to hear
and think: the bass line, an inner chro-
matic voice or long notes whose
sounds fade away. Like a flashlight in
the dark, singing trains our minds on
the areas needing clarity and illumina-
tion. We need not worry if our singing
is not beautiful in tone or even accu-
rate in pitch; it is much more important
we sing with character and rhythmic
vitality.
Counting the beats out loud is a
time-honored activity, one that, in my
opinion, is abandoned too early. When
advanced students are capable of mak-
ing such rhythmic mistakes as adding
a half-beat to a measure and not notic-
ing it (something I have encountered
fairly frequently), it is clear they have
not developed an inner sense of pulse
and measure. Counting aloud instantly
makes mistakes like this obvious. The
counting must be expressive, however,
reflecting the rhythmic character of the
music, not merely a metronomic rat-
tling off of the numbers. If it
becomes a habit, counting out
loud––or simply inside
one’s head––will
become an auto-
matic reflex, a
sort of inner
conductor
guiding the
music through
its course in
time.
All these men-
tal and vocal
activities are ways
of learning to
think the music.
No doubt there are
many other ways as well. These
are specific, practical things to
help keep the mind concentrated on
the music, both in the practice room
and on the concert stage. Eventually,
the activities should become so
ingrained they no longer seem like
conscious thought. Then everything is
absorbed in the act of listening and the
performer enters a state of rapt atten-
tion. In this blessed state, we truly feel
one with the music.
I urge you to try these ideas for
yourself. They are only a beginning,
and surely will lead to other discoveries
and new perceptions. Then, after your
next performance, if someone asks
what you were thinking about when
you were playing, you can smile know-
ingly and reply, “I was thinking the
music.”
AMT
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