Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner An annoying mannerism?

Well, for me it is but I suppose some think it's irrelevant. I'm talking about the "fly on the ceiling"(looking upward) habit some pianists have. I personally find this very distracting and annoying but some very good pianists seem to do this. I realize that most good pianists certainly don't have to stare at the keyboard(although Horowitz basically does this), so I don't mean to imply I think that approach is necessary.

I wonder why some pianists look at the ceiling or at least tilt their head back so far that they could? Is there a reason? Does it help them listen better? I cannot think of any "world class" pianists who do this(well, maybe one who does lots of other stuff also) although I'd guess there are some. I'm not talking about doing it very occasionally, but about those pianists who do it with incredible regularity...like every 10 seconds.

So my questions are:
1. Do you find it annoying and to what degree?
2. Why do you think some pianists do this? Do you think it is done almost subconsciously?
3. Any world class pianists who do this? Post a video if you can find one.

Not annoying for me. Why do they do it? My guess is it creates a spiritual feeling. A connection to the composers "up there". Also, high ceilings of grand halls are nice to look at.

I wish I could do it for ten secs!
Actually if you try it you should find it relaxes the quadriceps muscle(s).

I think it's to make sure you're looking at nothing.

It's probably the main place to look if you want to be sure of being free of visual distractions. Or maybe a better way to put it is, being free of visual input, to the extent possible.
(Not that I'm any example of anything but, I don't do it; I just look slightly toward the backstage side of the stage, away from the audience -- for that reason. And it's my guess about why some people look up like that.)

After all, isn't that why we close our eyes sometimes? (And I don't mean just pianists.)

Well, the way to test your hypothesis would be to see if they did it when they played works by living composers. My guess is that pianists who look up do it whether or not the composer is alive.

Why not just close your eyes then?

See my edit/addition.
I do that a fair amount too (and so do others, probably more so than looking up at the ceiling). I'd do it more, but I think it would look like I'm showing off.

There are plenty of world class pianists that do this!

By removing the activity in visual space, the brain has less noise to sort through. This makes it easier to focus on sound and sensation during play. The information throughput is increased because there is "one less" sense (that is, sight) coming in.

This is similar to how those that go blind develop an acute sense of hearing, etc.

That's really all there is to it!

I was working with a teacher/adjudicator a few weeks ago on Ondine, and she asked me "where" I'm listening. She pointed out that "where" you listen for the sound affects how you're playing and the mood you're conveying to the audience.

If you listen outwards towards your audience, your playing tends to be more 'descriptive" and communicative.

If you listen to the left, towards the bottom keys, your sound shies away and becomes more mysterious.

If you listen downwards, there is a tendency to become more sonorous.

And if you listen upwards there's a tendency to be more ....sort of 'reaching up to the heavens', or at least the ceiling.

Relating to this topic, sometimes it helps you to aim your listening by physically moving your head.

If - and when - I'm very familiar with a piece, I'd often look without focusing, at the distance, in order to concentrate on the sound I'm producing. I do that sometimes too, when I'm concentrating on memorizing a piece, so that I can better feel the movements my hands & fingers are making, and the way the keys move beneath my fingers, and marry that to the sound I'm hearing. Whereas if I look at the keyboard instead, I'd have to focus on it, which detracts slightly from concentrating on the actual sound.

Craning my neck to look at the ceiling is somewhat uncomfortable for me, however, so I don't do that. But many concert pianists do gaze unseeingly into the distance while playing - though few actually look upwards.

Which ones do it? Remember, I'm not talking about someone like Rubinstein who did it very occasionally. I'm talking about those who do it perhaps as often as every 10 seconds, i.e. moving their head up and down very frequently.

The last time I saw Jeremy Denk, he was a masterpiece of distraction. Like a praying mantis on a hot griddle. The fidgeting and fluttering was all I remember from the perf -- not what he played...also, Ollie Mustonen and all the gyrotonics - what he played was not that hard.

Oh dear, I look down to the left, (edit: oops, the other left; I mean my right.) Where does that leave me?

I don't know if this is from a reliable source but I just found it:

Off the top of my head:
Yundi Li
Yuja Wang
Valentina Lisitsa
Lang Lang
Kempf

Some more than others, but I would argue, nearly all experienced pianists do this to some extent. It's a very helpful, in-born mechanism that we humans have.

It doesn't annoy me at all. A slightly more scientific explanation might be discovered in how neurons react in given situations; for example, if you turn your eyes upwards without tilting your head your ability to spell increases (no, I'm not joking ). Um..when we experience trauma we often *hang* our heads, when we try to think of solutions we peer more or less straight...um...when we think happy thoughts our eyes also dilate by a fraction, when we think of mundane and untaxing things our pupils constrict. My scientific answer, therefore, would be that it's, in the majority of cases, a subconscious reaction to emotions present in the act of playing....um...some would, of course, emulate such actions to give the impression that such emotions are present. Emotions definitely affect posture; would it not make sense that postures may affect emotion? Um....my less scientific explanation would be that certain transcendent emotions have the ability to affect physicality without, themselves, being physical. That, indeed, impression and intent will leak out through an experience of art to mould the physical plane; they do not choose to look up when they play, they are made to
Xxx

Do you agree with what the teacher said? I'm not convinced that turning your head a few inches in one direction affects what you hear.

My impression is that only LL does this with any frequency and I have seen endless videos of all these pianists. However, I will look at some more videos of the other four. Or perhaps you can posts some YouTube videos?

Edit: I just watched Lisitsa in the first and third movement of Beethoven's Moonlight and saw zero ceiling gazing in the first few minutes of each piece.

For Yundi Li I listened to the first two minutes of this Chopin Nocturne and zero upward gazing:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvxS_bJ0yOU

I do agree with it, but it's not really where you're moving your head, but more as to where you're trying to listen from, and where you are trying to 'aim' your sound.

Ondine has all of these situations - the opening is descriptive/impressionistic. The dialogue in the middle section includes mysterious shifting of voices. The climax and the build-up towards it involves getting a large sound. The second last page before Ondine disappears is quite heavenly...

I think the main message is to think about how spatial awareness of one's sound affects the mood. Of course she also said that these analogies with for some people and not for others, but I'm finding it to be quite useful.

I'll give one example (the rest are not hard to find). In this video, of what is perhaps the most fluid and convincing interpretation of this piece ever recorded (I could get shot for making this claim here!), Yundi's eyes stray from the keyboard often.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvm2ZsRv3C8

Why does it matter if world class pianists do this? Everyone does this. There is only one real explanation for it...all other explanations are just derivatives.

I'll disagree with you - it's a bit more complicated than that and it has to do with personality, training, inherent qualities that manifest in some people only, culture, technical proficiency, the kind of music being played, the instrument being played....and those are only a few examples.