Fingering for Piano: A Hands-On Guide

Ultimately, piano fingering choices determine the smoothness of the musical phrase and enable us to accomplish accurate hand-position shifts with musicality and control.  These are the 2 reasons we even care about fingering, and they are pretty important reasons if you care about making music.  The ideas presented below will become second-nature and will start to be applied even when improvising and sight reading, but good habits need to  be established from the start for that to happen.

Here are some principles to think about when making fingering choices.

  The thumb and 5th finger are both considerably shorter than the other fingers.  They are not an ideal length to play black keys when playing melodic passages.  The entire hand would have to shift toward the fall board (the board that faces you)  to make that happen, particularly in the case of the thumb.  So, avoid using the thumb on black keys and favor the black keys with 2, 3 and 4.  (Exceptions include times when playing primarily on the black keys or playing chords that include black keys, or, in melodic "emergencies" where there is just no other practical solution).

  When a hand position change is called for, accomplish this by crossing over or under.   In the right hand, the thumb can easily cross UNDER 2, 3, or 4 to progress upward.  And 2, 3, or 4 can easily cross OVER the thumb to progress downward.  Hand position can be shifted at that time, without losing a point of reference, which will insure accuracy.  ( conversely for the left hand ).

To shift hand position, don't resort to "hopping" - instead cross over or under. Hopping adversely affects your ability to control the melodic line and destroys the phrase. The music should drive the fingering, not the other way around.   Two different notes --- two different fingers. Design the crossing to make the rule apply.

   Design the fingering to minimize hand position shifts by utilizing all 5 fingers - only resort to hand position shifts when absolutely necessary.  The fewer hand shifts, the easier to play; the easier to play, the more one can concentrate on the music.  Observe if you are avoiding 4 or 5, a common problem!

   The thumb is strong, 4 and 5 are relatively weak -  fingering choices can affect the tone and effectiveness of the passage. Work on strengthening weak fingers to minimize the effect but be aware when it happens and, in the meantime, design fingerings to get around the problem.  Try different possibilities to see how the choices affect the expression of the music.

   Focus on the space between notes - how much, how little, is the first note hanging over into the next, is there a gap - is it appropriate to the phrase?  Design fingering that is driven by the music.

   Search for comfortable, efficient fingering, minimize finger extension with good fingering choices, find the easy way.

   Stick to a fingering (unless your improvising!).  Learning a piece with unsettled fingering will take you many times longer to learn.  In the music, write in only the fingerings at critical junctures, where there is a cross over or under, or a hand position shift - don't write in the fingering of every note - intuition will fill in the spaces.

   The span of 1-3 is pretty much the same as 1-5, curiously, depending on the hand, but that knowledge can help you when solving some tricky fingering puzzles.



   Experiment and find ways that expend the least amount of energy, that maintain the horizontal motion of the hand up and down the keyboard ( vs. in and out ) and that are the most comfortable to play.

Eubie Blake - Giant Stride Fingerings by the Master Interpreter