Fingerings

Fingerings are about which fingers you should use and consequently the position of the hand when playing piano. There are rules and instructions for fingerings in general and depending on the situation.

When exercising on scales it is important that you use the right fingerings. Doing this in the right way gives a foundation for a development of good technique. Sometimes you will see instructions that tell you which fingers to use by the numbers 1-5 on piano sheets.

1 = thumb | 2 = index finger | 3 middle finger | 4 = ring finger | 5 = little finger

Some general tips about how to position your hand and use your fingers

The way you move your hands and which fingers you use will affect the outcome of your piano playing. If you, for example, are using few fingers with high frequencies, it will result in disjointed transitions when smooth transitions are required. Here are some rules of thumb:

1. First the most obvious: don't use your index finger exclusively.
2. Include all the fingers, this makes the movement of the hand more smooth and economical.
3. In most situations, you should avoid playing on the black keys with your thumb.

Learn to play piano without looking down on the keyboard

Most people who study the piano will sooner or later learn how to read notes. The challenge of reading notes are often overestimated – the real challenge is to read and play simultaneously. The only way to read and play at the same time is to not look at the keyboard. The more notes on the score, the less time for you to look down at the keyboard without losing the accurate tempo.

This is something that takes much practice to achieve, but an important foundation is to position your hand correctly and use good fingering technique. By using all the fingers you don’t have to change the position of your hand as often or make long “jumps” with the same finger. This is critical when playing with only short glances on the keyboard.

The right practice

In the picture below, you can see the notes of the C major scale. Above the notes there is also numbers.
The first sequence is 1-2-3-1-2-3-4-5 and it involves a movement with the thumb going under the index and middle finger. After you reach the next octave you turn around and this time it is the other way around: you move your middle and index finger over the thumb (5-4-3-2-1-3-2-1).

The secret as you can see is to move the thumb under the fingers (index and middle) and lift the same fingers over the thumb. By this method you can reach eight notes (one octave) on the keyboards by minimum movement of the hand.

For the most common scales you can find fingerings written out together with scale pictures on this site. In cases the fingerings are not written it should not be a huge problem for you. If you minimize the contact with the thumb and the black keys you will in most cases naturally find the right fingerings