If you’ve taken piano lessons and listened to your teacher, they undoubtedly told you to play with rounded fingers – having your hand shaped like you’re holding a ball. If this is true, then why did one of the greatest pianists of all time play with flat fingers? Did Vladimir Horowitz play with flat fingers? The answer is yes; there is some truth to this!
Difference Between Round Fingers and Flat Fingers
You may wonder why you’re supposed to play the piano with rounded fingers? It’s very simple: if you play with your fingers outstretched you don’t get the benefit of using all of your finger joints. First of all, some fingers are longer than others. So thumbs and pinkies don’t reach all the keys! When rounding the fingers, they all form a straight line so your fingers are all over keys. Also, when playing fast passage work, it is necessary to play with curved fingers in order to play with speed. However, in slow passages, you’ll see Horowitz and other pianists such as Glenn Gould sometimes playing with flat fingers. This technique can allow for different tonal gradations which are difficult to achieve with rounded fingers. On the accompanying video, you will hear two versions of the beginning of Chopin’s Prelude in E minor, one with rounded fingers and the other playing with outstretched fingers.
Can You Hear the Difference?
I’m interested in your impressions of this demonstration. Do you see the value of playing with rounded fingers for fast passage work? And do you hear a difference in the tone playing with flat fingers? How many of you have tried this technique? We would be very interested in your thoughts about this. Again, this is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com Your Online Piano Store 949-244-3729 info@LivingPianos.com
A lot of people wonder if you can begin studying the piano as an adult. I often hear from people who have just retired and finally have the time, if they can begin studying the piano at their age. There are also people who never practiced when they were younger and wonder if it’s too late to take up the piano again. The simple answer is:
It’s never too late to begin learning the piano!
It’s important to have your expectations in alignment with reality. There are certain things you must be aware of. I’ve seen an incredibly wide range of results in piano progress among various people. Some have made remarkable progress at the piano in a short amount of time as adult beginners. How can this be? Your exposure to music in general is going to have a great deal to do with your success at the piano.
For example, if you’ve played an instrument like the clarinet, you are used to reading at least one staff of music as well as playing music. You’ve also developed finger dexterity. A transition to piano is going to be a lot more seamless than for someone who has never even listened to music let alone played a musical instrument. That person is going to have a harder time assimilating musical language.
A lot of affinity for music develops just from listening to it. So even if you’ve never played anything, but you’ve been an avid listener of music; you’re going to progress faster than someone who has avoided music their whole lives.
There is a parallel to how exposure to a foreign language can make it much easier to learn a second language.
There are a lot of things that enter into your success with studying the piano at any age. For example, there are different programs like Scott Houston’s Piano in a Flash. He was recently on our show and demonstrated how he helps people to enjoy the piano with his innovative chord system. His program isn’t designed to be able to play classical compositions of Beethoven or Mozart, but it offers fun for people wanting to play popular songs they are familiar with. His method of playing chords with the left hand and the melody line in the right-hand makes delving into the piano an enjoyable, casual endeavor. His program also offers ear training and guides you with improvisational skills. This is a way that a lot of people can get enjoyment out of the piano without striving to be a concert level player. For those of you wanting to play classical compositions, I suggest getting a teacher and studying the piano more formally because it’s more difficult to learn classical music on your own. Having a good teacher can help to guide your practice.
So, anyone can learn to play the piano at any age!
Enjoying the piano is what is most important. I don’t care who you are or what level you’re at, there is always going to be someone who is at a higher level and can do things you can’t do. This is for every single pianist in the world! So don’t worry. You don’t have to achieve any particular milestone. The point is to enjoy the process just like anything else in life. It’s about the journey, isn’t it? Thanks for the great question and I hope you have enjoyed this! This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com info@LivingPianos.com949-244-3729
Did you know that if you go to music conservatory or major in music at a university, you have to have a certain level of piano proficiency in order to get your degree?
All Music Majors Have to Play the Piano
Let’s start from the beginning. There are two essential instruments for all musicians. The piano is one and the voice is the other. They are diametrically opposed to one another. One is the most natural instrument we all carry with us. You must hear something in your head before you can even produce the sound. The piano is the opposite, when you push a key it makes the sound even if you don’t hear it first.
The Piano Can Play Complete Music
Most instruments can only play one note at a time. So, in order to play complete compositions, you usually have to play in an ensemble. What’s unique about the piano is that you can play complex, polyphonic music all by yourself! You can play chords and harmony. More than that, it’s visual. The piano is laid out in such a way that you can see what diatonic harmony is all about. That is, the half-step/whole-steps arrangement which is readily apparent on the keyboard. Chords are easy to negotiate as well. Even a child can do it. It’s that easy!
There’s More to Piano Than Just Visualizing Your Music
If you play the clarinet, saxophone or flute; the vast majority of music is written to play with other musicians. In fact, most solo music for other instruments contain substantial piano parts. Piano has more repertoire than all other instruments combined. Piano is a tremendous second instrument because you can realize the other parts to the pieces you’re playing. You might wonder what the orchestra is doing in a concerto you are playing. There will be an orchestral arrangement on our score you can play on the piano so you can hear it!
All People Should Study the Piano
The piano is intrinsic to music. You’ll learn theory and understand chord structure. It makes an excellent tool for ear training as well. It’s visually in front of you and you can produce sounds and harmonies that are impossible to create by yourself on most other instruments. I had the good fortune of starting the piano at a very young age. Later, when I was in 4th grade, I start playing the French horn in school. I could already read music fluently and was playing somewhat sophisticated music (for a relative beginner) on the piano. It was easy for me to grasp the horn initially because I was used to much more complex music on the piano. It made me take to the French horn quickly because I was used to the complexity of reading two staves on a score. Reading music for the French Horn was easy by comparison (even though there are many challenges playing a wind instrument).
So I recommend that if you don’t already play the piano to go for it! It will enlighten you about music structure and help you with your primary instrument. You’ll get to explore a lot of music and it will be fun! You have so much to gain! Thanks for joining me, Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com Your Online Piano Store 949-244-3729 info@LivingPianos.com
There are so many things involved in studying the piano. There is everything from note reading, figuring out rhythms, considering hand position, following fingering, negotiating phrasing, expression and more. There are also skills which must be mastered such as memorization, sight-reading and improvisation. You must also have a keen understanding of the underlying music theory. But there is one intrinsic thing that is a macro to learning to play the piano which transcends everything:
How to Practice
There are so few teachers in this world who teach how to practice; not just in piano but all subjects. I remember when I was in 11th grade, for the first time Mr. Gray showed us how to to compose an English composition. Before that, any time a paper was assigned, I would break into a cold sweat having no idea how to approach such a thing! But Mr. Gray broke it down to an organized method of how to write a clear, compelling composition. I’m so grateful to him to this day. His methods have stayed with me. It’s how I do all my writing, and I write a lot of articles!
Having Productive Lessons:
I was fortunate to study with my father, Morton Estrin. From the very first lesson, he showed me how to practice as he did with all his students. Many of his students went on to teach his methods including my sister and myself. Our teaching is based upon showing students what to do the other six days of the week when they’re not at the lesson. This is the key for effective training which makes the lessons exponentially more productive. It’s not just correcting wrong notes and assigning new material. There are a myriad of things you can do in a lessons from working on scales and arpeggios, to delving into music theory.
Providing a Step by Step Approach
You must show students what to do on a daily basis. They should have a clear idea how to approach each skill set whether it is memorization, sight-reading or something else. The students must be provided with the methods for approaching each skill. The most valuable thing a teacher can do at lessons is to practice with the students. You may work with them for months or even years getting them to the point where they can work effectively independently. Once students reach that level, their progress at home will soar. Your role shifts more to a coach than a teacher being able to work on refining their playing to a high level. So, be sure your teacher (whatever the subject) provides clear, step by step instructions of how to work out assignments at home for fruitful study.
Thanks for joining me, Robert Estrin here at LivingPianos.com 949-244-3729 info@LivingPianos.com
You may have heard about the need to play on the tips of your fingers. But if you hands are weak, you may find that your fingers collapse and there is no way of playing on the tips of the fingers no matter how hard you try.
I used to watch my father, Morton Estrin play the piano with his massive hands in the rounded position that you hear about.
Some people describe the ideal piano hand position as one that is shaped like holding a ball.
If you let your hands drop down onto the keyboard, your fingers will naturally round and you will be in a position that takes no effort to maintain. That is the ideal piano position.
My father seemed to have pads at the end of his fingers which could punctuate the notes on the piano while maintaining rounded fingers playing on tips. But what if you have weak fingers that collapse, and your fingernails extend beyond your fingers? Then, you can’t play on the tips without getting “clickety-clack” sounds with your fingernails sliding all over the keys. So, you end up playing with flat fingers. This creates all sorts of problems, not the least of which is when your fingers are outstretched, your thumbs and pinky don’t extend far enough to play the keys!
So, how do you develop pads at the end of your fingers?
Here is what I experienced: I was always dazzled by brilliant octaves I heard my father, Horowitz and other pianists display. When I had the opportunity to study at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria in high school, I worked furiously on the Liszt 6th Hungarian Rhapsody which has a long, demanding octave section that goes on and on at the end of the piece. There were Bösendorfers and Hamburg Steinways to practice on and I was in heaven!
Then something happened that caused great pain. I’m not referring to the kind of muscle pain you experience from exercise when lactic acid builds up in your muscles. That pain subsides as soon as you stop playing (as long as you don’t overdo it!) If you have ever clipped your nails a little too short then practice the piano intensely, the fingernail can become slightly detached at the very end of your finger. You see a thin line of blood right at the point at which the nail meets the finger. As long as you keep your fingers clean (as well as the keys) you probably won’t suffer infection. (You can even put a Band-aid over the end of the finger if necessary.) But it is intensely painful! Since I was in Austria taking master classes and had this phenomenal opportunity, I just powered through my practice and ignored the pain.
Something really interesting resulted from this. Since the ends of my fingernails became detached from the fingers, I developed the pads like I saw on my father’s hands! I was able to play on the tips of the fingers which were rounded avoiding the clicking of the nails on the keys! I have spoken to other pianists who have had similar experiences. Perhaps there is a method for developing these pads which avoids the horrific pain I experienced developing my piano technique. I would love to hear from any of you who have either shared this phenomenon or have found other ways of being able to play on the tips of the fingers without your nails hitting the keys.
This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com Your Online Piano Store 949-244-3729 info@LivingPianos.com
Today we are going to discover what is the most difficult scale to play on the piano. By the end of this article and video, you will be surprised at the answer!
When you are first learning scales, just figuring out the notes can be a daunting task. You look at a scale like B major with 5 sharps, and it’s tough to figure out. But when you start to play it, you discover something really interesting:
The thumbs in both hands play white keys at the same time.
Not only that, but the black keys are played with the other fingers in both hands. This is referred to as mirror fingering where both hands anchor on white keys with thumbs on the same notes, in this case B and E and the other fingers play the black keys. This makes it easier to play.
So, what about scales with a lot of flats – are they harder? Let’s take G-flat major which has 6 flats. There is certainly a lot of black ink on the page! You will discover that while there are 6 flats, there are only 5 black keys in a G-flat major scale. This is due to the fact that C-flat is a white key (the B key). Here again there is mirror fingering. However, in the B scale, the white keys in both hands occurred a half-step above (the very next key) the notes played with the thumb. The G-flat scale is slightly more challenging in that the first white key in the scale (C-flat) is a half step above the previous black key (B-flat), but the next white key (F) is a whole-step (2 keys) above the previous black key (E-flat). But at least you have the benefit of anchoring both thumbs at the same time whenever they play.
Next, we are going to look at a scale that you would think would be easier since it only has 2 sharps – D major. Here you have the challenge of having the thumbs both anchor together on D, but as you go up the scale, the right hand plays the thumb on G, but the left hand plays the thumb on A. So, you don’t have the benefit of mirror fingering where both thumbs play at the same time. This is somewhat more challenging to play.
So, what is the most difficult scale to play? Once you know all your scales, they are about equal in difficulty. However, there is one scale that presents challenges no other scales have, and that is the C major scale!
How can this be? It’s the first scale most people learn and it’s simple to learn because it’s all white keys. That’s exactly what makes it more challenging to master. You don’t have the benefit of having black keys to guide you.
You are faced with a sea of white keys!
There are no black keys to differentiate where you are in the scale. On top of that, you don’t have the benefit of mirror fingering where you anchor the thumbs on the same notes in both hands. I bet some of you are surprised, but it’s a fact that C major is the most difficult scale to play even though it may be easier to learn than other scales.
Incidentally, the resource for fingering of all the major and minor scales and arpeggios on the piano that the vast majority of pianists rely upon is:
Another Thought:
There are two major scales that don’t have any mirror fingering whatsoever. That is, the thumbs never play the same notes at all. Those scales are B-flat and E-flat. For that reason, it is arguable that those scales may be the most difficult.
Hanon: Sixty Studies for the Virtuoso Pianist
There is another school of thought that a small number of pianists adhere to which has mirror fingerings for all the scales. I would be interested in hearing from anyone who plays all scales with mirror fingering. Having learned all my scales and arpeggios as a young child, I couldn’t imagine relearning the fingering to them at this point any more than I could imagine typing on a more ergonomic keyboard where letters used most often were in the middle of the keyboard instead of the one we are all used to.
I hope this has been interesting for you and I look forward to comments on this presentation. This is Robert Estrin at LivingPianos.com 949-244-3729 Robert@LivingPianos.com
