How to Prevent Injuries While Playing the Piano

When it comes to playing the piano, injuries may not be on the top of the list of things to be concerned about. 

After all, we're just sitting down moving our hands, fingers and arms over a keyboard, right? How much damage can we possibly do to ourselves just playing the piano? 

Think about what parts of your body are involved when you play the piano:

• Hands
• Fingers
• Arms
• Back
• Neck
• Shoulders
• core muscles
• legs
• hips

Wow..that's lot, isn't it? It's actually much more than we tend to think of until we sit down and play a lot. 

Just because we aren't wearing a helmet and running around on a football or soccer field, doesn't mean that we aren't athletes and that we don't incur injuries related to our own "sport" just as much as other athletes. 

Most injuries that pianists end up having come from tension and overuse (repetitive patterns) of our tendons in our hands and arms. 

Interestingly, more pianists and string instrument players report playing related injuries more than other instrumentalists, and more women encounter injuries than men. (Maybe just more women report the injuries than men).

The most common signs of injuries reported are:

• Pain - in the hands, arms, neck, shoulders, and back.
• Numbness in fingers and/or hands from nerve entrapment.
• Stiffness and/or a loss of mobility in fingers, hands, or wrists. 
• Pain experienced while doing day to day tasks away from the piano; such as opening a bottle.

The common thread that seems to connect them all, is tension. It makes sense then, that the solution has to do with releasing that tension, and learning how to recognize it and even prevent it so we can keep playing comfortably. 

Why do we experience tension when we play the piano?  That depends in part on each individual and what a person brings to the piano with him or her, when they sit down to play. 

• Fear of the "unknown" or new can cause tension.
  
• Fear of what others think of our playing while they're listening to us can also cause tension.

But our minds are not the only source of tension in our piano playing. 

We put quite a demand on some very small muscles in our arms to make our fingers curl up and perform the specific actions needed to play the music we see on the page.

We have to keep our muscles constricted to a degree, just like we do when we sit up straight verses slouching over, in order to train them in what to do. Doing this too much, or incorrectly can cause:

• Many musicians who practice for long periods of time will experience pain from repetitive overuse of the muscles. Tendinitis and nerve entrapment are common injuries of this type of ongoing tension. 
• Other pianists have reported pain in their necks, shoulders, and in the front of their chest areas. Most often, this pain is caused by poor posture while sitting on the piano bench. 
• Nerve entrapment is very often the cause of numbness and/or tingling in our fingers, wrists, and even our elbows. Again, this stems from too much repetitive action but more, it comes when we ignore the pain we feel and keep injuring ourselves to the point that the inflammation is cutting off our nerve connections. This type of injury can sometimes lead to temporary paralysis of some part of our hands and arms. 

OK - so let's "subdivide" this whole injury issue (meaning break it down) to one basic source: tension. 

Tension is caused by two different issues:

Mental and emotional sources are related to our fears about: trying something new, fear of failing, fears about what others will think, and even fears about not being good enough. 

Physical sources are related to overuse of our muscles, playing while hurting, keeping our bodies tense and constricted while we sit at the piano, and even incorrect hand position during our playing. 

The best way to prevent injuries when playing your piano is to address the issue with focus on each of these two different sources separately.

It's like learning how to play with both of your hands at the same time. Your first practice one hand, then the other hand, then you put the two together. 

• For example: take a look at some of your mental attitudes about your piano playing. Remember that fear of any kind, and at any level, brings tension into your body somewhere, because muscles are constricting in response to that fear. See how the body responds to the mind? No need to make any type of a judgement on your fear at all. Just notice it first, and then let it go. 

Every person experiences this type of inner dialogue in a unique way and you will find the best way to address and actually change the level that you experience them as you grow in this area. 

Tune in also to your body and try to be aware of and listen to what it is saying and doing when you approach your piano. 

• When you sit down to play your piano, notice if you feel any tightness and/or pain - before you even play a note. Just hold your hands over the keyboard, and "scan" your body. Wherever you notice pain or tension, make adjustments in your position to see if it relieves the symptoms. Do you need to pull your shoulders back more? Pull your tummy in to strengthen your core? Are you hunching over as you bring your hands to the keyboard to play? 

All of us experience these issues when we play the piano at some degree. What we don't want to happen is to have them control us to the point that we end up with and injury that prevents us from doing what we want and need to do in life, and on our piano. Go into this knowing that there will be areas that you can work on and fix a lot of, on your own.

Prevention is the best goal here.

• Making sure that you are relaxed as much as possible, staying flexible instead of rigid, not over-using our bodies especially when we're first starting out and these actions are new to our body's mind, are specific things that we can do physically to help keep ourselves healthy while we learn to play the piano. 
• Keeping self-defeating thoughts at bay, recognizing our improvements and accomplishments, being willing to make mistakes a lot, and keeping a good sense of humor are all things that can help us stay on top of any days that are hard emotionally. 

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Injuries can be great teachers as far as showing us where we do need to make changes. But you can skip that class altogether with just a few minutes each day of awareness of what our bodies and minds are telling us. 

​Stay Tuned to PianoLessonsOnTheWeb to learn much more and achieve your dreams of playing the piano!