Refreshing Your Use at the Piano
The teachers in my classes often ask questions about their *use, knowing that improving their own coordination will help them guide their students more effectively. I hear things like, “How can I stop slouching?” or “How can I maintain good use overall?”
In Alexander Technique, language matters—how we think is how we move. When we try to maintain our use, we often end up holding or tensing somewhere. Instead of maintaining, it’s more helpful to refresh our use whenever we notice a change might be needed.
So if you find yourself slouching or feeling tense, there’s no need to judge—it’s simply time to refresh.
Here are a few ways to do that while you’re at the piano or teaching for long periods of time:
1. Take a standing break
Stand up, and then allow your torso to stay “standing” on your sit bones as you return to sitting. Our torso begins at our sit bones, and this simple practice is a good reminder of that. It only takes a moment, but it can really help refresh your coordination.
You might also try this with students since it’s a quick and easy way to reset during a lesson. You’ll likely notice that they sit a bit differently after standing and reconnecting to their sit bones.
2. Feel your back against the floor or wall
If you have time for constructive rest, that’s ideal (and I highly recommend Imogen Ragone’s monthly classes.). But even spending 30–60 seconds with your back supported by the floor—or, if that’s not possible, a wall—can make a big difference.
Take a moment to notice the points of contact, especially across your back. Pianists often disconnect from the back, even though it’s meant to support the arms. When that connection is lost, tension tends to appear in the neck and shoulders instead.
Here’s an exercise that can help you with this—keep in mind that it will be easier to do if you’ve practiced constructive rest first!
3. Think from your sit bones to your head
Notice the connection of your sit bones to the bench, and allow your torso weight to pass through them into the bench. Then think from your sit bones up to your head. This simple idea can be practiced anytime and shared with students as a quick pre-performance warmup. It helps them feel grounded in their body rather than caught up in their head.
4. Take a “soft eyes” break
The term soft eyes (borrowed from Aikido) describes a widening of our gaze. Try it now: without moving your head or eyes, let your peripheral vision include more of the space around you.
Soft eyes can help us:
Avoid hyper-focusing and the tensing that arises from it.
See our students as whole beings rather than focus on isolated parts of the body.
Read music with a broader visual perspective—helping students see musical relationships more easily and improve their note reading.
You can read more about soft eyes here.
5. Notice the space around you
This may seem unrelated to piano playing, but it’s actually central to it. As musicians, we’re experts at narrowing our focus—and our bodies tend to contract when we do that.
Try expanding your awareness to include the space in front, behind, above, below, and to both sides. I find that noticing the space behind me in particular helps rebalance attention and release unnecessary tension. Since so much of what we do takes place in front of us, bringing awareness to the space behind can help restore a sense of balance.
Refresh, Don’t Maintain
These practices are simple ways to refresh your use. Find one or two that you like and revisit them throughout your day.
And if you catch yourself slouching? No problem. Maybe your body just needed a moment of rest. When you’re ready, you have tools to change your coordination—easily and effectively.
By refining our own use, we model healthy movement for our students. They tend to mirror what they see, so it’s worth embodying what we hope to inspire.
Once these ideas feel natural, try introducing them to your students. It’s often more effective to offer an experience—such as exploring the relationship between their sit bones and head—than to simply say, “Sit up straight.”
If you’re a piano teacher who is curious about using Alexander Technique to help your students, download our free PDF guide. It shares simple practices that help pianists move with more ease and coordination at the piano.
*Use in Alexander Technique has to do with our thinking and how it leads us to movement. If we say that someone has “good use”, they’re not interfering with themselves through tension.