Muscular memory and self-analytical practicing go hand in hand. When you feel like you’re zinging in, playing a passage or phrase like you would imagine hearing a fine pianist render it, then it’s your prime time to recapture the moment and keep it safely stored in your memory box.
Ask yourself, how did I manage to get it right?
Do a little self-monitoring:
Here are some areas of physical awareness you might think about.
Did I play “deeper” into keys to create a more profound singing tone?
How would it have sounded if I did the opposite, playing shallower without feeling “connected.” Still to your liking?
If not, try to reproduce what felt right, and notice your depth into the keys. Take a physical accounting of it, and let it register in your psyche. Click, click it’s in your muscular memory bank.
What was your feeling state?
Were you breathing slowly and deeply, without experiencing anxiety or tenseness when you produced the desired singing tone?
If so, what mental image helped you gain a sense of relaxation and surrender?
Retrieve the image again, taking note of your breathing, and playing.
***
Take a fast passage that has always seemed out of your control and mastery
Play it slowly, breathe deeply, and go with the flow.
Use every stored muscular memory that worked for you in the past. Were your wrists, elbows, total arm relaxed? Or did you feel like you were tensing up. If yes, where did the tension originate? Once identified, think thoughts retrieved from your memory reserve to unlock the muscles, knowing that mental imagery is wedded to physical expression.
Did you observe a circular motion with your arms that helped shape a passage in one hand? When comparing the motion of one arm to another when playing treble and bass parts, were the arms moving in counter-clockwise motion? Observe the motion, while “feeling” it. The two go together.
What about follow through from one note to another in slow tempo? Did you notice what helped smooth out a passage and keep it flowing without interruption? Were your wrists locked? If so, teach yourself to relax with a mental image assist. Watch yourself playing with a supple flexible wrist and observe the difference in tone. Make it a muscular memory.
Keep self-analyzing in a bio-feedback frame. Monitor relaxation, oneness with the piano, depth in the keys, weight transfer from finger to finger, and state of mind. (Make sure the housekeeping of fingering the music has been taken care of)
Keep a log of what works, and what distracts or detracts.
With each revisit, the memory center is expanded and re-imprinted given presence of mind.
