In our quest for being considered serious pianists we need to explore other fields in music that are related to each other.
Studying theory of music for example will help us to better understand what is really happening in the core of the music that we play and listen. Among other things, we learn how the notes interact together and why everything that is written on the paper is written like that.
Thus, besides the musical we may want to establish a theoretical background of what we perform. Theory of music is perhaps the elementary sister of performance, so after we have studied some basic theory of music, perhaps it would be also good to start possessing knowledge of tonal harmony.
Tonal harmony makes us feel and explain how the various harmonic sequences tell the story of our piece step by step. Identifying the harmonic progression of our pieces can also assist us in memorizing them quicker and more solidly. As a practice we should try to identify and play the various harmonic chords hidden in our pieces.
Thus, music is not only performance. Academic understanding of it will help us develop faster as musicians.