Piano Playing Technique Tips on Video
Technique can be conventional or unconventional and you will find both types here. Being in control of the situation utilising good piano techniques makes your audience more at ease s well as helping you
Small Hands - Octave playing - thumb crossing? - correct timing and fluency - Enrich the harmony - right hand teaches left - extra 5th finger uses - Play with a more positive left hand - light and firm touches - synchronising the hands - Simple chord based left hand accompaniment - how to improvise-- useful wrong chords - wrong boogie fingers for clarity - leave bass note out of chord
As you can see there is a lot here so you will also find videos on the various individual subject pages to avoid this page being too unwieldy.
Small Hands
A common worry of pianists is that their hands are too small to make an impressive sound on the noble 88 note piano keyboard.
However as you will see below, maybe you should increase your coverage by using not just the "outside finger" 1 and 5 as a benchmark but also exploit the extra spacing available between 1 and 2, 2 and 3, 2 and 4 or even 2 and 5.
In this case the parts can add up to greater than the whole hand!
There is also another video and more ideas on this on the Small Hands Page
Check below - So You Think that your Hands are Too Small?
Small Hands in Octaves and More
Conventional advice is to play successive octaves with the same 1 and 5 fingering but that works against being able to play convincingly phrasing.
The notes then have to be played by the wrist rather than the fingers, so they will tend to all be given the same weight.. You cannot put expression in easily with just the whole arm or wrist playing continuoausly.
So we find it is possible to use not just 1 and 5, but also 1 and 4 and maybe even 1 and 3 on occasion. Support with the pedal for a full sound and make sure your stretches are comfortable if your hands are not ready for that yet.
Octaves can actually be more secure as well as even more impressive with an extra note added in the middle.
By adding a note a fifth below in the middle of the octave.with 1 and 5 in the outside.you havea still more impressive sound than just using the plain octave. What is more by moving 1 and 4 around it you have a smooth convincing progression. The middle note then of course becomes just four notes down from the top.
You can also use continuous thirds below the top of the octave. In this case allthe fingers move together on 1, 3 and 5 and this gives you more stability too surprisingly as well as a sweeter more interesting sound.
You could use 1, 3, 5, followed by 1. 2. 4 for this but only if ytou are comfortable with it. Do not use that stretch until you are ready.
The video also shows what I will call spaced double arpeggios, with two notes played simultaneously. Going up the inversions but leaving out the middle note of each version.
This spacing allows for varying fingering at least in pairs or groups of threa.
As in
root eg C G . 1 3 (or 1 2)
first inversion eg E C 1 4,(or 1 3)
second inversion G E with 2 5 (or 1
You can Sound Pretty Impressive with Big Sounds and the help of the video Below
On Thumb Crossing (or otherwise)
Do you actually cross your thumb under?
As well as striving to follow your thumb behind the finger that is playing in a scale ready to take over there is more.
In fact you have to be careful as that can cause muscle tension so there are probably two extra moves to make it easy and smooth.
One is that a lot of the work of moving the thumb into place should be done by the arm moving along so it is in position.
And in cases where you seem to need more you can twist the wrist anti clockwise also at that point. Clockwise in the left hand downward scale.
I discuss Thumb Crossing on the Video Below
Creating Fluency inside the Timing
On creating fluency in your playing where I perhaps define it a little bit narrowly, as being able to play multiple notes between main beats.
And play a lot of notes landing exactly on the beat from the combination of regarding a run of notes as one note or one movement and from the inward expectation that it will happen.
A kind of time travel style prediction in fact!
Demonstrating creating Fluency in the Music is in the Video Below
Enrich the harmony with easy movements of the right hand under the melody
- The root chord of evenly spaced alternate notes
- The first inversion with wider gap at the top
- The Second inversion (with wider gap at bottom)
if starting with just one shape using the first inversions
Test out this way to improve your left hand phrases to be as good as your right hand
Sacred Cow Exposed - Your 5th Finger is not the End
It is always assumed that once you reach your fifth finger you cannot cross others over it.
In fact even your thumb can cross over it (in the right hand by moving the arm along and rotating anti clockwise) but this video deals mainly with crossing across to the 4th finger, again moving the arm and rotating your wrist though not so much
The video covers
- Using it with single notes
- Playing from complete chords to single notes
- Playing complete chords noholds barred with 5th
- Chromatic scales with 5th finger crossings
Not necessarily a complete list or in that order!
See and try out these possibilities for 5th fingers crossings use
Making Your Left Hand Playing More Positive
Even when you are playing quite fast with your left hand it can still sound less convincing and adding wrist or arm movements can add positive points to your phrasing.
This may also be worth being aware of in right hand playing.
New Text Area
Watch the Video on Making Your Left Hand Playing Sound More Positive Below
Sparkling brilliant Sound From Lightness of touch
How lightness of touch using a real piano action even inside a properly equipped digital piano makes for speed and brilliance of sound.
The video about using leggierro or extreme lightness of touch is belowTo Synchronise Left and Right Hands (Or Not)
When we are taught to play first we were necessarily told of the absolute mathematical precision in which the notes are placed in a kind of mathematical grid of timing.
Four crotchets or quarter notes marching in precision clicking on each beat and then arriving spot on at the same timei in each hand at the beginning of the next bar.
Music played by humans I believe should not be like that. It is not natural or expressive to follow the guidelines that exactly. This may be why it is near impossible by the way to play to the click of a metronome beat.
Applythis precision to right and left hand simultaneously and you get a very blocky effect whereas divorcing it almost totally results in a very free and often swingy energy.
For an extreme example you may implement asense of separateness by playing the right hand almost in one finger style, prodding some notes into place with the same finger.
In this way each note of the melody so treated acheives a distinct character of its own, with a certain indepnence from the note before or after it.
See and hear the effects of separating out the timimg of the left and right hand in the video below
Easier Flowing Left Hand Arpeggios using fifths mainly
If you are playing chords in the right hand you do not have to include all the notes of the chord so an arpeggio of only open fifths can be very effective
Moreover it can also be easier and more comfortable and of course span the keyboard more effectively.
You can add the thirds when you want and most effectively when halving the note value doubling the apparent speed at any point.
Also a variation of triplet arpeggio pattern using movement from boogie bass but of course unlike boogie still in triplets!
And using playing from arm weight via the wrist helps you maintain your feeling of left hand strength to make this possible.
Reminder that I am not left handed and have a developing weakness meaning I have to be careful how I use particularly the thumbs
See the Video on these special easy to play but very effective techniques below
A Simple Chord based left hand method
Simple chord accompaniment on the left hand can be adjusted yet still be easy to do and sound absolutely right.
Once you have a bass note with its chord shape held in your hand it is just a matter of varying the order that you play them.
This can even be repeated chords where you vary the inversion you use or do chromatic changes to the inside of the chord
I demonstrate with a basic version of lullaby of Birdland
See the simplified but effective chord based Left Hand accompniment video below
How to get ideas for improvising
You can find some really nice sounds while improvising and even when connecting established tunes it can be useful to do this.
I do a lot of continuous music in order that diners are not having to put down their knives and forks to applaud!
Here I show chromatic sliding chords from where you can jump off to virtually any other key depending when you leave!
Also how variants of 7ths 9ths 11ths and 13ths can appear by extending upwards arpeggios based on quite basic chords. They can even appear from playing the top of an arpeggio just one note higher than expected.
Or of course by building up an extra third or jumping a possibility by taking the next fifth (two thirds added together) And the aim of course is to sound interesting, varied and beautiful!
Discover angles on Improvising on piano keyboard on the Video Below
"Wrong chords" or notes may be useful
With a reminder about how you can shift chords easily one note at a time and sound incredibly mobile while doint it.
All chords can be resolved to the listener's ears satisfaction, even if it takes several moves. It is the joutney towards gently har,ony that is worthwhile. A piece which stays with perfect har,mony needs no continuation, like a story that starts well has noweher to go if you are writing a novel
In the video below I try some very risky wrong chords - See what you think
How the "Wrong" Fingering can improve Clarity in your Boogie Style Bass
Choose clarity as well as agility in boogie style bass by using the “wrong“ fingering
In this case where you might have assumed that either 2,3,4, or 2,3,1, was the best, jumping fingers to 2,3,2, defines the sound as wellas being extra precise.
Also how when wandering out of range of the next phrase you should note that your thumb has to be at the bus stop (changeover point) to get you safely there.
Notice I did not always “hit the mark” on these examples but you can hear which ones were less well defined in consequence. Up to you to notice!;
See the video below about changing to a less obvious fingering to improve the sound
A Better Sound by doing the chords without the same bass note
Leaving out the bass note from the chord was something I spotted in someone else’s video.
Turns out it has implications beyond just momentarily creating a more subtle voicing
Note that in basic three note mode where you just complete the chord when you add two notes played together after this occurs naturally.
Also that the extra notes on the offbeat can be the top 3 or 4 notes of 7ths, 9ths, elevenths etc and will resolve naturally onto the basic chord.
They may however feel like a different chord - C9 can be seen as Gm7 (G Bb D F) over a C bass for example. C11 can be seen as Bb Major 7th (Bb D F A) over a C bass. Obviously these want to resolve to C Major (or less strongly to C minor)
Find out how to get a better sound on your stride bass with different notes in the chord
Playing in Tenths possible for small hands
Small hands going beyond octaves to 10ths.
These can add depth to the bass and a possible counter melody and are probably best used with an extra note, normally the fifth of the note below the octave shifted third which becomes the 10th interval
A heavier version also sounds good. And the three note version is widely enough spaced to allow following chords or arpeggios starting within the 10th
Video on Playing Tenths in the left hand which is still possible with Small Hands
| Visitor Counter: | |||||||
 | |  |  | |  | ||