When diving into piano playing, a common question pops up: should you start with scales or arpeggios? Both are key to building your skills, but knowing where to begin can make your practice more effective.
What’s the Difference?
Scales: These are sequences of notes moving up or down in a set pattern of whole and half steps. Take the C major scale, for example: C, D, E, F, G, A, B, and back to C. It’s like climbing a musical ladder.
Arpeggios: Think of these as broken chords. Instead of playing all the notes of a chord at once, you play them one after the other. For instance, a C major arpeggio would be C, E, G, and the higher C. It’s like spreading out the notes of a chord.
Why Start with Scales?
Kicking off with scales is a smart move for a few reasons:
Finger Coordination: Scales involve finger crossings, especially the thumb, but over shorter distances than arpeggios. This makes them a great way to get your fingers moving smoothly.
Building Blocks: Scales help you understand key signatures and finger patterns, setting you up for more complex pieces down the road.
Musical Flow: Many songs have scale-like passages. Getting comfortable with scales can make learning new tunes easier.
When to Add Arpeggios
Once you’re feeling good about scales, it’s time to mix in arpeggios. They require bigger finger movements and offer new challenges, helping you further develop your technique.
Practice Tips
Use a Metronome: Start slow, maybe at 60 beats per minute, playing one note per beat. As you get better, you can speed up.
Finger Power: Focus on using your fingers to play, not your arms. This helps with control and precision, especially as you pick up the pace.
Stay Consistent: Even just 5 to 10 minutes a day on scales and arpeggios can make a big difference over time.
In short, starting with scales gives you a solid foundation. Once you’re comfortable, adding arpeggios will round out your skills, making you a more versatile player.
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3 thoughts on “Which Should You Learn First: Scales or Arpeggios?”
BOTH!
At my students’ FIRST lesson, after going over posture, hand position, and a few tonalization exercises (i.e. playing each finger on a note several time — a la Suzuki “mississippi hot dog”), they learn to play:
1. the C major root position triad in a broken (1 -3 -5 -3) and blocked pattern in each hand alone; more adept students also learn to play the blocked triad in one hand coinciding with the first note of the broken triad, then switch hands
2. the C major scale – 1 octave, ascending and descending in each hand alone, MOVING the hand (no thumb crossing) to each finger group position — i.e.
RH ascending : 1 – 2 – 3 (move hand) 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5
RH descending: 5 – 4 – 3 – 2 – 1 (move hand) 3 – 2 – 1
LH ascending: 5 – 4 – 3 – 2 – 1 (move hand) 3 – 2 – 1
LH descending : 1 – 2 – 3 (move hand) 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5
This sets them up for success at the following lesson:
If you can play a C major root position triad in each hand (and hands together — learned at the second lesson if not at the first), you can also just as easily play the remaining 6 root position triads in the key of C (d min, e min, F maj, G maj, a min, b dim).
And if you can play the scale of C major for 1 octave moving your hands for each finger group, you can learn to cross your thumb under and fingers over to move to the next finger group ( … next is to cross under/over at the octave and go for two octaves … then three octaves).
So we have broken and blocked root position triads and 1-octave scales from zeroo to two weeks — with reasonable fluency — it’s worked out pretty well for my students … 🙂
What would you say about the relative importance of using arm weight and finger dexterity? I know that is a complicated subject but maybe there or some basic principles you would suggest. Thanks.
Arm weight is necessary in order to achieve a smooth, sustained line at the piano. The faster you play, the less arm weight is utilized to allow for greater fluency.