More about pedals:
looking at heels
This month I am returning to the subject of pedal playing, this time to discuss heel playing. I have some general thoughts to share with students, and a few practical suggestions and exercises.
It is interesting that the use of the heel in pedal playing is an artistic issue that has a history of lending itself to controversy, becoming a political and, almost, an ethical matter. I have had students come to me who believed—or who had heard—that it was out of the question to use heels in music written before a certain date: that is, essentially in Baroque music. On the other hand, I have heard students and others say that failure to use the heels in Baroque music could only be motivated by a pedantic insistence on academic correctness at the expense of artistic considerations. I once heard two musicians passionately agreeing with each other that “heel and toe” was the only way to play the organ, even though neither of them was an organist! I thought that this was—quite apart from the merits of the notion—a fascinating example of how ideas or ideologies can spread beyond their original home turf. It was also revealing how heated this discussion was and how angry (good-naturedly angry, as I remember it, but still angry) the two of them seemed at people who might disagree.
I have also had students come to me convinced that “heel and toe” pedaling is intrinsically legato, whereas “alternate toe” pedaling is intrinsically detached. (I’m not sure about the concept of “alternate heel”!) In fact, alternate toe pedaling is usually capable of creating a full (even overlapping) legato. It has trouble doing so only in some patterns involving sharps and flats. It is same-toe pedaling (using the same toe on successive notes) that is inherently detached. Also, while heel and toe pedaling can often create legato—and sometimes in places where all-toe pedaling cannot—it is also true that the use of the heel is often most natural in detached situations, where the heel can be used without resorting to an uncomfortable foot position.
Stylistic authenticity
Questions about heel pedaling are bound up, as are many other technical matters, with questions of historical authenticity. These apply in several ways, of which the most prevalent is the above-mentioned concern about using the heel in older music. Questions of authenticity do arise in connection with later music as well, for example, whether a legato achieved using alternate toes is or isn’t acceptable in music written by a composer who is known to have used, or explicitly called for, heels. Is it enough for the player’s judgment—or that of a teacher or any listener—to conclude that the effect is suitable or perhaps actually identical to what the composer intended, or is it in some sense necessary (ethically, artistically) for the composer’s technical suggestions to be followed literally?
It is certainly generally true that earlier organ playing probably made less use of the heels (short pedal keys, giving little room for the heels; relatively restricted use of sharps and flats, and of pedal scale passages; non-legato style attested through surviving fingerings, among other things) and later organ playing more (big and, eventually, “AGO”-type pedal boards; more sharps and flats and scale passages; legato style; the need, some of the time, to assign one foot to the swell pedal), though, as with so many issues, we do not know everything about the historical situation, and what we do know contains intriguing anomalies. These include, for example, the Schlick work Ascendo ad Patrem from about 1512, which has a four-voice pedal part clearly requiring the use of heels, and the (mid-to-late-nineteenth century) organ playing of Saint-Saëns, who apparently never used heels.
(If the one surviving pedaling by Saint-Saëns,1 along with contemporaries’ comments on his playing, were all that we knew about nineteenth-century organ playing, we would assume that Franck, Widor, Reger, and the rest all used only toes! If the Schlick Ascendo were the only surviving organ piece from before, say, 1610, we would assume that in the late Renaissance, multi-voiced pedal parts and heel-based pedal playing were the norm!)
When I was first getting interested in the organ in the early 1970s, I did not, for a long time—a year or two at least—become aware that there were these sorts of historical or musicological polemics—or such strong feelings—surrounding heel playing. I did absorb, however, the idea that it was more difficult to create clarity and precision with the heels than with the toes, and that, any concern for authenticity aside, a player has to be sure that heel pedalings in any given situation really work to create the desired effect. This is an issue with heel pedaling in a way that it is not with toes.
I recall hearing that Helmut Walcha insisted, with his students, that the famous pedal solo in Buxtehude’s G-minor Praeludium, BuxWV 149, be played with all toes, the left toe moving up to play the off-beat F-sharps. (See Example 1.) The purpose of this was to achieve the greatest possible crispness and accuracy of timing, not necessarily to be historically accurate, although it probably was that too, or at least might well be. (Other players might use the right foot to play all of the upper notes—heel and toe—while the left foot remains in the lower half of the pedal keyboard rather serenely catching what might be called the melody of the passage. It is an interesting exercise to work the passage up both ways and listen to the difference(s) in articulation, timing, and pacing between the two.)
Anatomical issues
The fact that playing with the heel is, in general, harder to control with great precision than playing with the toe stems from the basic anatomical fact that the foot is hinged in a way that gives the toes more leverage, a better mechanical advantage. In other words, the heel is closer to the ankle than the toes are: simple, but very important for organ playing. To some extent, whereas the toes play a pedal key through the flexing of the ankle, there is a tendency for the heel to play a key by dropping the leg onto the key.
The approach to teaching pedal playing that I outlined in four columns in The Diapason (November 2007–February 2008) relies on using the instinctive pointing gesture of the toes as a starting place for developing a strong kinesthetic sense of the pedal keyboard. It is mainly for this reason that the various strategies deployed there and the various exercises suggested do not include any work with heel. In spite of this, however, the approach laid out in those columns actually sets a student up to learn heel playing efficiently and with great security. This can happen best after the student has become truly comfortable with the techniques developed through that approach.
Each student—each player, in fact—has a somewhat different physique, which suggests a somewhat different physical orientation towards the pedal keyboard. Some people can more comfortably play off the inside of the foot, some the outside; some people can most comfortably keep the knees fairly close together, some people are more comfortable with the knees farther apart, and so on. The key to incorporating heel playing into this overall approach is to remind the student always to monitor and make decisions about the exact physical approach of the heels to the keys: which side of the heel for which notes, where on the keys the heels should land (perhaps different for each key or different depending on previous or subsequent notes), where the knees should be in relation to the feet in a given passage, etc. These are things that only the student can judge, since that judgment depends on how things feel.
Some practice exercises
The first step in practicing heel playing is to choose a simple passage—taken from a piece or written as an exercise—and to play some of the (appropriate) notes with heel, trying out different positions and placements along the lines mentioned above. It is by far the easiest to use the heels on a natural key that is being played just before or just after a sharp or flat, so it is best to start with such a passage. The Buxtehude quoted above is a good example. It is clear that, if the right heel is going to be used in this passage, it will be used on the G that is the second overall note and its reiterations. A student can try—slowly and keeping everything physically relaxed, as always—to play G–F#–G with heel-toe-heel, using first the inside of the foot, then the outside, letting the knee move to where it is most comfortable. (To play on the outside of the right foot the right knee will probably need to be farther out—to the right—than to play on the inside of the foot.) A player with slender feet might find that the center of the foot works. For most players, one of these configurations will be the most comfortable and should be practiced until it feels reliable. If more than one feels equally comfortable, then both, or all, should be practiced.
A short exercise like Example 2 can be used in the same way, again trying out different angles and positions for the feet and keeping track of what is comfortable. (Note that this, on its own, can well be played like Example 3. It is interesting to compare the differences in sound and feeling, if any, between the different pedalings. In the context of a longer passage, one or the other might be better or actually necessary.)
Here are two matching exercises for heel at the extremes of the keyboard. (See Examples 4 and 5.) Again, they should be tried with every different alignment of inside/outside and knees. The teacher can help the student remember what all the possibilities are, but only the student can tell for certain what is and what isn’t comfortable. They should be tried both fully legato and lightly detached.
The well-known Vierne theme, from the Carillon from Op. 31, is an interesting one on which to try various different heel-based pedalings.2 (See Example 6.) It is possible, while keeping this completely legato, to use alternate toes (left first) except for left heel/left toe going across the bar line. It is also possible, however, to make more extensive use of the heel, for example, using left heel on all of the C’s and fitting the other notes around that. The student can try it a number of ways. For using this as a learning tool, it is crucial to remember to keep it slow and light.
Example 7 is a somewhat arbitrary heel-based pedaling for a scale. I’m not sure that I would use it in “real life,” but it works as an exercise. The challenges here are 1) to orient the left foot in such a way that the toe is aimed easily at the F-sharp after playing the D; 2) to reorient the left foot to execute the more difficult G–A with heel-toe; and 3) to move the right foot securely to the B after leaving the E.
In beginning to practice playing with the heels, as with any pedal practicing, it can be useful to practice separate feet, in the manner that I have discussed in earlier columns. In the above scale, for example, the right foot can practice moving from the E to the B. Really what this means is practicing moving the right heel from the position in which it rests while the right toe is playing the E to the position in which it (itself) plays the B, while turning the foot so that the toes are poised to play the C-sharp. This is a bit more abstract than moving the toe of one foot from one note to another, but equally subject to being analyzed and practiced systematically.
Students themselves, and their teachers, can create little exercises like this, and can extract bits of pieces with which to try out the use of the heel. I want to reiterate that the key to integrating heel playing comfortably into pedal playing is to pay attention to—and make choices about—the position and angle of the feet as they address the keys. This should be done, in the manner discussed at length in my earlier columns, without any particular preconceptions. It is in the end up to the student to determine what is comfortable and what works. The teacher can certainly make suggestions, and can help evaluate the results, but only the student can actually tell how it feels.
