{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,27]],"date-time":"2026-07-27T23:51:11Z","timestamp":1785196271607,"version":"3.55.0"},"reference-count":45,"publisher":"Frontiers Media SA","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2021,12,1]],"date-time":"2021-12-01T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1638316800000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/100008890","name":"University of Dundee","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","id":[{"id":"10.13039\/100008890","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":["frontiersin.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Front. Physiol."],"abstract":"<jats:p><jats:bold>Introduction:<\/jats:bold>At a professional level, pianists have a high prevalence of playing-related musculoskeletal disorders. This exploratory crossover study was carried out to assess and compare quantitatively [using high density surface electromyography (HDsEMG)], and qualitatively (using musculoskeletal questionnaires) the activity of the lumbar erector spinae muscles (ESM) and the comfort\/discomfort in 16 pianists sitting on a standard piano stool (SS) and on an alternative chair (A-chair) with lumbar support and a trunk-thigh angle between 105\u00b0 and 135\u00b0.<\/jats:p><jats:p><jats:bold>Materials and Methods:<\/jats:bold>The subjects played for 55 min and HDsEMG was recorded for 20 s every 5 min. For the quantitative assessment of the muscle activity, the spatial mean of the root mean square (RMS<jats:sub><jats:italic>ROA<\/jats:italic><\/jats:sub>) and the centroid of the region of activity (ROA) of the ESM were compared between the two chairs. For the qualitative assessment, musculoskeletal questionnaire-based scales were used: General Comfort Rating (GCR); Helander and Zhang\u2019s comfort (HZc) and discomfort (HZd); and Body Part Discomfort (BPD).<\/jats:p><jats:p><jats:bold>Results:<\/jats:bold>When using the A-chair, 14 out of 16 pianists (87.5%) showed a significantly lower RMS<jats:sub><jats:italic>ROA<\/jats:italic><\/jats:sub>on the left and right side (<jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>&amp;lt; 0.05). The mixed effects model revealed that both chairs (<jats:italic>F<\/jats:italic>= 28.21,<jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>&amp;lt; 0.001) and sides (<jats:italic>F<\/jats:italic>= 204.01,<jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>&amp;lt; 0.001) contributed to the mean RMS<jats:sub><jats:italic>ROA<\/jats:italic><\/jats:sub>variation by subject (<jats:italic>Z<\/jats:italic>= 2.64,<jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>= 0.004). GCR comfort indicated that participants found the A-Chair to be \u201cquite comfortable,\u201d and the SS to be \u201cuncomfortable.\u201d GCR discomfort indicated that the SS caused more numbness than the A-Chair (<jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>= 0.05) and indicated the A-Chair to cause more feeling of cramps (<jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>= 0.034). No difference was found on HZc (<jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>= 0.091) or HZd (<jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>= 0.31) between chairs. Female participants (<jats:italic>n<\/jats:italic>= 9) reported greater comfort when using the A-Chair than the SS (<jats:italic>F<\/jats:italic>= 7.09,<jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>= 0.01) with respect to males. No differences between chairs were indicated by the BPD assessment.<\/jats:p><jats:p><jats:bold>Conclusion:<\/jats:bold>It is concluded that using a chair with lumbar support, such as the A-chair, will provide greater comfort, less exertion of the ESM and less discomfort than the standard piano stool.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3389\/fphys.2021.743730","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2021,12,1]],"date-time":"2021-12-01T21:53:27Z","timestamp":1638395607000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3389\/crossmark-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":3,"title":["High Density Surface Electromyography Activity of the Lumbar Erector Spinae Muscles and Comfort\/Discomfort Assessment in Piano Players: Comparison of Two Chairs"],"prefix":"10.3389","volume":"12","author":[{"given":"Alejandra","family":"Aranceta-Garza","sequence":"first","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Alessandro","family":"Russo","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Samuel","family":"D\u2019Emanuele","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Francesca","family":"Serafino","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Roberto","family":"Merletti","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1965","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2021,12,1]]},"reference":[{"key":"B1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"359","DOI":"10.1016\/j.jmpt.2015.06.007","article-title":"Test-retest reliability of trunk motor variability measured by large-array surface electromyography.","volume":"38","author":"Abboud","year":"2015","journal-title":"J. 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