Basic Piano Fingering Lesson

Hi All

Today I will post a basic piano fingering lesson. This will help you to get acquainted with the basic fingering  techniques which will also help you to play fluently. Before you get started with this tutorial I suggest you to go through the Basic Piano Tutorial, so that you are at least familiar with the Piano notes layout.

To start off with, let us first define a Middle-C. If you remember an octave in a Piano/Keyboard has 12 keys, each signifying a particular note. So if you have a 5 octave piano/keyboard, you will have in total 61 keys. Have a look at the picture below, your Piano/Keyboard might look like this.

Each of the five octaves will have its C note. The picture below has the C notes marked in blue :

As you can see in the picture above, the Middle C has also been marked, which stands as the third C from the extreme left.

Now let us introduce some sort of numbering for your fingers also, fingers for both of your hands. Have a look at the picture below :

So, as you can see, your thumb is the number 1 finger.

Now let us go down to actual business, the playing part. 

Practice For Right Hand - 

Locate the Middle-C on your Piano/Keyboard and place your finger number 1 (of your right hand) right on it. Next place your finger number 2 on the white key immediately next to Middle-C i.e on D. Place the rest of three fingers on the next three white notes, i.e E, F and G. 

Now you should have all of your five fingers resting on the 5 white keys, C - D - E - F - G starting from your thumb. Make sure that your wrist is slightly above the level of the keys and your fingers are curved downwards.

Play - Now keep your fingers on their position and play the following numbered pattern, one finger at a time :

1-2-3-4-5-4-3-2-1. Make sure you dont move your hand, let your fingers do the work. Dont press more than one key at a time. The idea behind this is to create control over your individual fingers. Initially you will find it little bit difficult, sometimes two or more fingers might  press the keys. Practice enough to get rid of that and acquire significant  command over your each finger.

Practice For Left Hand - Locate the Middle-C, but this time since we will be dealing with the left hand, move 1 octave to the left. Place finger number 5 on the C note, and subsequently the other fingers on the next white notes in sequence. So basically now you will have your fingers 5-4-3-2-1 placed in the notes C - D - E - F - G, in this order.

Play - Keep your fingers in their respective positions, and play the following numbered pattern, one finger at a time: 5-4-3-2-1-2-3-4-5. As described above for the right hand, dont move your hand and make sure you press each note individually, one note at a time. Practice enough to acquire significant  command over your each finger.

Other patterns - 

Once you think that you are playing the above patterns quite well, you can advance towards more complicated patterns. Few of them are given below : 

Right Hand Patterns - 

• 1-1-2-2-3-3-4-4-5-5--5-5-4-4-3-3-2-2-1-1
• 1-2-3-2-3-4-3-4-5--5-4-3-4-3-2-3-2-1
• 1-1-2-3-2-2-3-4-3-3-4-5--5-5-4-3-4-4-3-2-3-3-2-1
• 1-2-3-4-2-3-4-5--5-4-3-2-4-3-2-1

Left Hand Patterns -

• 5-5-4-4-3-3-2-2-1-1--1-1-2-2-3-3-4-4-5-5
• 5-4-3-4-3-2-3-2-1--1-2-3-2-3-4-3-4-5
• 5-5-4-3-4-4-3-2-3-3-2-1--1-1-2-3-2-2-3-4-3-3-4-5
• 5-4-3-2-4-3-2-1--1-2-3-4-2-3-4-5

Playing with both hands - Playing with both hands is something which requires significant practice to do. You need to train your mind to play simultaneously, with both hands. 

At first master the patterns described above and then try o play them simultaneously, with fingers of both your hands operating together. You will find it very difficult in the beginning. Practice hard, and you will soon find that you are getting  hold of it.