🎹 The Sound of Touch: Playing Noise and Artistic Control

Today, let’s take a closer look at how the pianist can work with — and even shape — the mechanical noises produced by the piano action.

As discussed in earlier posts, the piano amplifies everything: not just the vibration of the strings, but also the playing noise.

This includes the physical sounds produced when the fingers strike the keys, when the key reaches the keybed, and when the action resets. These “noises” are not just byproducts — they are audible features of the tone, and they shape how touch is perceived.

This idea is not new.

The great British pedagogue Tobias Matthay was aware of it. But it was Otto Ortmann, in his 1925 work The Physical Basis of Piano Touch and Tone, who first gave it serious attention.

Later contributions include:

• J. Gát – The Technique of Piano Playing (1958)

• W. Göbl et al. – Once Again: The Perception of Piano Touch and Tone (2004)

• G. Thoma – Anschlag, Klang und Klangfarbe am Klavier (2019)

However, I believe even these valuable studies underestimate the aesthetic impact of playing noise on our perception of tone and touch.

In my view, the touch of a pianist is defined by two intertwined elements:

1. The sound produced by the acoustical system (the strings and soundboard)

2. The percussive noises that occur at the keyboard — making the piano, in part, a percussion instrument

To better understand how we can artistically modulate these noises, I’d like to propose a basic typology.

Let’s begin with two categories defined by Gát:

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1. Upper Noises

These are produced by the impact of the fingers on the surface of the keys.

They tend to be high-frequency and can add brightness or brilliance to the tone — somewhat reminiscent of a trumpet timbre.

They can be avoided by placing the finger on the key before depressing it, allowing the motion to begin from contact rather than from impact.

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2. Lower Noises

These occur when the fingers hit the keybed — the bottom of the key’s travel.

They create a thudding, timpani-like quality.

While they can be reduced by directing the playing force toward the escapement point, they can’t be fully eliminated — and they can be used expressively, particularly in deep bass textures.

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Additional sources of playing noise include:

• The lifting and falling of dampers through pedal action

• The release noise of the jack and hammer when the key is let go too abruptly

• The impact noise of the hammer on the string — which is intrinsic to the piano’s timbre and cannot be removed

All of these noises are real, and they must be consciously managed by the pianist to refine sound production.

This has deep implications for piano technique — and for the order of priorities a pianist should follow when developing touch.

A lot of exciting topics ahead — and we’re only just beginning.

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JM | Art of Piano

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