The Complete Pianist: from healthy technique to natural artistry offers a new and unique approach to piano playing, in which Penelope Roskell shares a lifetime's experience of teaching, performing and ground-breaking research into healthy piano playing. Containing more than 500 pages of text, 300 videos and 200 exercises newly devised by the author, this is the most comprehensive book ever written on piano playing. The book has something new to offer to all pianists and keyboard players student and teacher, professional and amateur.
Penelope guides pianists through the early stages of learning a piece, through all the technical challenges and interpretative choices, towards inspired performance. Each new aspect of playing is addressed through a series of practical exercises which proceed, step-by-step, from the basics towards more advanced applications. Penelope demonstrates all the musical and technical points herself in videos accessible by smartphone, tablet or computer.
The Complete Pianist comprises 22 sections, including:
A whole-body approach
Finger touch and tone production
Playing at speed
Fundamentals of chord playing
Advanced chords
Rotation
Lateral movements
Tone and texture
Pedalling
Learning, memorizing and sight-reading
Penelope Roskell is Professor of Piano and Piano Pedagogy at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance, London and at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. As a soloist she has played in major concert halls in more than thirty countries. She is the leading UK specialist in healthy piano playing, and Piano Advisor to the British Association for Performing Arts Medicine, where she holds a clinic for pianists with tension or injuries.
'I have known and admired Penelope Roskell for over forty years as both performer and teacher. A sensitive and insightful artist, she is a representative of modern pedagogy, as well as the leading authority on injury prevention for pianists at all stages of their development. Her recent pursuits are devoted to the field of ergonomics at the keyboard. Imaginatively explored with a view to development of artistic freedom, her observations offer numerous ways to achieve it. I wholeheartedly recommend The Complete Pianist as valuable reading for any person interested in the art of piano playing.' - Sulamita Aronovsky, Professor of Piano, Royal Academy of Music; Chairman, London International Piano Competition
'The Complete Pianist is terrific. It is for everybody; informative and accessible. It addresses the myths that have for so long surrounded the piano and how to play it. I feel I want to begin again!' - Havilland Willshire, Director of Music Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance
'This book is a pragmatic and erudite summary of a working lifetime spent considering how to keep healthy whilst playing piano.' - Mr Mark Phillips, British Association for Performing Arts Medicine, hand surgeon
'Professional pianists are highly likely to have some kind of playing-related injury during their career. Penelope's book is ground breaking in that it covers healthy technique, exploring and constructively questioning the pianist's mechanical development in great detail to help prevent injury as well as develop in artistic skill. This is such a welcome addition to performance education which needs to include an understanding of healthy practice to enable performers to sustain their career. Highly recommended' - Claire Cordeaux, Director, British Association for Performing Arts Medicine