Problem with dynamics while playing

Question

I am a musician and I play keyboard but I have a problem that worries me. Whenever I play I tend to strike the bass key(s) very hard and that note(s) is very clearly heard and obscures the right hand. I am trying to learn to strike it softer but whenever I play it is difficult to control the amount of force. The same thing often happens with my 5th finger in my right hand. Often when I hit a chord, the 5th finger strikes the note with more force than I need. I can't always control that either.

Are there any exercises to fix that?

The key dynamics on my synth are okay, because whenever I play a grand, a piano or a digital piano the same thing occurs.

Edit: I am a right-handed person. I sometimes play the guitar and I used to play it a lot before I started playing the piano. I mostly play art rock, prog rock, hard rock, blues/jazz rock but lately have started playing pieces like Jon Lord has (including his music, Before I forget and Burntwood).

Answer 1

Over the internet, I imagine I'd make the following comment if you were to play in front of me: "Don't hammer the keys!"

A pianist once shared this advice in a master class: "treat your piano the same way you'd treat your boy/girlfriend."

You'd be amazed how little force it takes to produce a sound on a piano. It is almost like, very softly touching the hand of your partner, or a new born baby. Yup I am not exaggerating - it is exactly what you have to practice for.

You said you

learn to strike it softer

That's the problem. You don't strike the keys. You just relax and let the weight of the arm sink in.

It is more difficult to keep the tone soft while playing fast. Practice slowly first. Then gradually, try to build up speed without raising volume.

Answer 2

This is a normal part of learning to play the piano. My piano teacher wrote "balance" in most of my dictation books as a child - which actually means imbalance because you want the hand with the melody (usually the right hand) to come out stronger.

Try to lighten up the touch of your left hand and develop the finger muscles in your right hand with muscle training exercises, particularly your 4th and 5th finger which often play the melody - especially when you are playing chords in the right hand as well. Take a look at this question for some examples.

Also related: Playing one hand loudly and the other quietly

Answer 3

This is one of the (many) skills that playing scales helps with. Try first playing them with separate hands, and recording it, so you can hear any differences - better to play each hand in the same octave sometimes, too.

Sounds like you have a couple of dynamics - f and ff ! Again with scales, try playing each hand pp, ff, and the same together, then split into ff r.h. and pp l.h. Practise these until there is a marked difference. On electronic keyboards, turn the volume up to play quietly, and down to play loudly. Think about that!!

When things have improved, try to get moving dynamics - start pp and crescendo to ff after two octaves of scales, separate and together. Stick with scales until the levels are controllable. Playing pieces with l.h. block chords won't help at the moment.

Answer 4

This is definitely something that happens for most players. Not only is it fairly instinctive, since most everyone is right or left handed and has a stronger hand/arm because of it, but it's also something that can be hard to break out of if you've been playing for a bit, as it is a habit that has been formed. I would recommend trying to exaggerate what you're trying to change. Try playing something relatively simple for both hands and play the left hand as quiet as you can and the right hand fairly loud. This should help your brain break the habit a little and once you feel more comfortable doing that, reduce the exaggeration, bringing the two hands to a more similar volume. As this gets easier for you, try making the parts for either hand more complicated, starting off exaggerated and moving toward a balance.

For the one finger, I don't have quite as good advice but I'd recommend focusing on the one hand, as opposed to playing with both while trying to fix the issue. You might want to try playing with that finger and just one other at a time and focus on getting the same volume out of them. You're probably just having that finger closer to the keys in general, so when they all come down, that one hits first and hardest, so you will probably notice that as you work through using different fingers. You can try holding that finger further up than the others so that it hits at the same time, or you could try extending that finger further back on the key you are hitting. The further up the key you are, the harder it is to get the note to sound, due to basic leverage, so it should naturally be quieter. The only real issue with that approach is that you don't always have the option to do that since not all chord voicings allow for you to choose where on the key you hit.

On the whole, you're needing to get your brain to break a habit, so you have to actively seek the means of doing so through mindful practice. You're probably currently doing things without actively thinking about them, so by actively thinking about it and using the right approach for you, you can retrain your brain and then won't have to think about it once you've broken the habit.