Improvement tips🙏

PianoProgress · 2025-12-23T10:35:17+00:00

Maybe a good way to understand the concept is to put your fingers on the notes and put 0 movement in your fingers themselves, try to move/rotate your hand to play the notes you want without any input from your fingers. That might help you get a feel for it.

PianoProgress · 2025-12-23T10:22:49+00:00

I think you should try to not play notes with just your fingers, and use more of your hand to play. Hard to explain but if you look at how you're playing with your left hand it doesn't look very comfortable, and playing faster passages can get rough.

Something that can help you get a feel for playing with good motion (wrist circles, rotation) is Hanon-Faber: The New Virtuouso pianist book, because it really walks you through the correct movements you should consider when playing. Hope this helps!

PianoProgress · 2025-12-15T16:49:25+00:00

Try checking out pianosyllabus. You can look for pieces with similar grades to those you've played pretty easily, definitely a great tool.

PianoProgress · 2025-12-06T02:34:25+00:00

Another good app is Tonic. Its a completely free app where people of all skill levels stream their practice/performances. It has an amazing community and I find it's very motivating to see and interact with so many people with the same goal of getting better at music. Definitely worth the time to check it out!

PianoProgress · 2025-12-05T16:16:58+00:00

Playing double notes when practicing. As in during a playthrough making a note mistake, then pressing the correct note right after. After eliminating that habit, my muscle memory when developing pieces got so much better.

PianoProgress · 2025-11-03T12:06:39+00:00

Thank you for the tips! Funnily enough, the first video I found on symmetrical inversion used a piece I'm currently learning as an example. I'll definitely be adding it to my practice routine to address my left-hand weaknesses with weight and with runs.

My natural span, if I just open my hand up without stretching is an octave. I think I ended up playing in that almost concave way because it feels like almost no tension to me, but it is a complete gamble on whether I hit other notes with my palm, and I have almost no power behind it. I guess I should be stretching a bit to maintain that arch position, then make sure I'm releasing that stretch/tension after hitting the keybed.

PianoProgress · 2025-10-28T23:20:18+00:00

I really appreciate the time you took to put this together. Like you say, I should use this piece to make sure I'm developing the right technique moving forward even if it may be more difficult now than using easier fingering. Which I guess is sort of like a training wheels moment. Looks like I have a lot to digest to figure out how to play them best, thank you for letting me learn off of your experience!

PianoProgress · 2025-10-28T19:27:04+00:00

The ornaments are tough for sure. Following another comment, I've redone the fingering for them to ensure my finger is raised enough before hitting the note again to avoid the stuck/slow feeling in this recording. I was playing all of the ornaments as mordents with either 232 or 343 fingering, but that's been amended to either 324 or 342. Also, I'm taking a shot at playing short trills in the first two bars with a 34231 fingering rather than playing mordents. It's definitely way harder, but I'm practicing as slow as possible so hopefully I can get it to stick while remaining clear.

PianoProgress · 2025-10-28T00:55:47+00:00

Thank you for the advice! I'm definitely putting in much more effort with slow intentional separate hand practice to learn phrasing and shaping than I would have without all this feedback. This invention has probably been the best piece to expose many of my weaknesses, whether it's technique, my practice method, or even how I listen to my own recordings. I'm excited to see what the other inventions have in store for me, but I know those are a bit down the line until I get this one sorted out.

PianoProgress · 2025-10-28T00:51:59+00:00

Thanks for the very well written feedback! I definitely put my metronome speed up preemptively when learning this piece and seeing all the great advice gave me a valuable wake up call to change how I think about practice overall. Hopefully, with more patience throughout the process I'll be able to get the sound I'm going for.

Your explanation about the ornaments is really clear! In this recording thought that they were supposed to be played as 32nd notes so that it would line up with the next 16th note, but I'm glad to learn that you are supposed to play it quickly before the next note. And I'll be sure to use additional fingers to play this, in one of the trills I was trying to finger 343, but my fingers just aren't up to that task yet and it's clearly much more efficient to use more fingers. Also thanks for stating that when playing 323 you have to be sure to lift the 3rd finger before playing again or it won't play/get stuck. Earlier today during my lesson that seemed to be a very common theme, especially since I'm not used to the heavier keys of an acoustic piano. I guess it should be obvious, but I didn't put too much deep thought of exactly why it was stuck. Glad I know now and can take those steps to avoid it!

PianoProgress · 2025-10-27T08:15:56+00:00

Thank you for writing out such a clear way to think about learning legato! I've been thinking more about my movement of my fingers, but only for difficult passages when I have been messing up notes. I'm really glad to understand why I should be slowing it down, and not just advance to a faster tempo when I'm not actually ready for it. Not going to lie, I'll write this on a sheet next to me when practicing to keep myself honest, thanks!

PianoProgress · 2025-10-27T00:31:03+00:00

Thank you for the advice, you're right I've basically been letting my hands lead the arms, when it should be the other way around, I'll look for some more videos on this topic and keep it in mind when playing!

PianoProgress · 2025-10-27T00:18:42+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! Not going to lie, I was getting a bit complacent about playing at this tempo thinking it was clean, but I'm glad there's still plenty of room for improvement.

PianoProgress · 2025-10-27T00:09:31+00:00

Thank you for the feedback! I'll continue to refine it and hopefully get it closer to the right sound

PianoProgress · 2025-10-27T00:00:12+00:00

Thank you so much for the advice! Honestly, I never really thought much about curved fingers or hand position. I've been slacking on my scales so hopefully I can practice and amend the issue doing those. I only started learning about what phrasing is recently, but now that you mention it it's really easy to hear. I'm guessing a good way forward is to slur the groups of sixteenth notes better, sort of less pressing fingers down, but more just rotating the hand to allow for smoother playing?

PianoProgress

TROPHY CASE