Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Left hand middle & ring fingers not as strong as others

How do I fix this?

My left hand's middle & ring fingers do not seem to be as strong as the other fingers. I don't seem to have good control of them as I do with the equivalent fingers on my right hand.

So when playing, the music is 'off', out of tune, wrong speed/tempo, not uniform in strength when pressing the piano keys, awkward sound (the keys played by the middle/ring fingers) with the pinky's key causing extra loud sound.

How do I fix this?

I think most pianists, especially non professionals, can do a lot more with their right hand than their left hand because most music makes bigger demands of the RH so they've had a lot more practice with that hand. You could try practicing relatively simple exercises like scale and arpgeggios with the LH alone, slowly with the best control you can muster. Or just play the LH alone from different pieces. Playing Bach, his inventions for example, may help with your LH dexterity. Of course, if you do any of the above but have major technical flaws in terms of how you're playing, the results may not be satisfactory.

Try Hanon exercises 4,5, 10, 11, 14 and 16. Just start slow and don't push it too much if you feel tension.

My teacher used to give me a very good exercise.

Take a pantatonic of any keys or any notes really. Doesn't even need to move your hands at all. Play the same notes (one octave appart) with the same fingers on both hands (mirror style) with a metronome at very low pace. You begin with one note per beat. Then you progresse to playing 2-3-4-5 notes per beats. Mirroring the finger all the way. You will discover which fingers is problematic. Mechanical issues. When you find them (they will be very obvious) you lower the number of notes per beats or the metronome pace until you eliminate the mechanical issue than work your way back to when the issue was there.
In a short span, you should be able to iron out the mechanical issue with certain fingers.

And when you feel good about those, 26, 29 and 30 work the heck out of those fingers.

It's not the fingers that need training here; it's the brain - or more specifically the link between brain and finger.

We evolved using the "pistol grip" opposing index finger against thumb and the other fingers - as a unit - against the heel of the hand.

Our anatomy is such that we cannot use the 4th as independently as we'd like but as pianists we have to be able to play "as if" we can.

Playing five finger exercises, hands separately, can help - if you're listening carefully. Graham Fitch has a video somewhere about using the three long fingers on F#, G# and A#, thumb on E and pinky on B or C. Try holding down one key silently and playing the other four fingers up and down in good legato. Holding down the thumb, index finger or pinky is quite easy. Holding down the third or fourth finger is harder.

When you're holding down the third finger and playing 1-2-4-5-4-2-1 there's a strong desire or instinct to not lift 4 or to lift it with 3 simultaneously. This is the encapsulation of the problem we're trying to overcome. It's also harder to maintain legato between 2 and 4, which is why it's important to play one hand at a time and listen carefully.

If you use Hanon, try doing one measure of each exercise all on the same starting note (20 measures with the thumb on C), then transpose up a fifth and start again. This way you're using your brain more than your fingers and avoiding mechanical repetition, which helps nothing except playing that exercise mechanically. If you want to play Hanon hands together (though there's not much reason to) keep them two octaves apart to help the clarity between hands.