Hi. My kid is doing piano grade 6 now.
I notice that his fingers (particularly RH 2nd and 3rd fingers) are always not curved properly (it has been a long while now), instead of his last bone bend outwards, they are bent inwards whenever he presses on the keyboard. I kept reminding him to change but he's still doing the wrong way. His little fingers also did not curve properly.

Does it matter actually?


Any suggestions to correct them? Thanks.

Hi,

This is a big challenge for piano teachers. If I understand you correctly your son's fingers are collapsing at the top joint on contact with the keys. This is probably because they are not sufficiently strong. Pupils often find ways to compensate for this as they progress. If you think about it, this part of your finger really doesn't have to work in the rest of your life! I would suggest a few tactics to strengthen them up:

Try making an oval shape (hard to describe without showing?!) between your fingers one at a time and your thumb. One at a time, tap your fingertip and thumb together three times.

When he can do this, try doing two taps and a press. He can do this is school or while watching tv etc.

He could also try practising his scales HS, very staccato, almost playing on his nail. Mind he doesn't lift his shoulder/arm doing this, aim just to maintain a good wrist position and pull the fingers in. Do this SLOWLY!!! Remember to be relaxed.

If 2 and 3 are a big problem, he could practise playing scales using these fingers only.

The 5th finger is often a problem. This is sometimes fixed by having your thumbs in over the keys and curved...the 5th finger then often naturally fixes itself.

Keep in mind he doesn't need to be right up on his fingertips all the time, different positions lead to different sounds and the most important thing is that he is not playing with any tension as this can cause big problems later on.

First thing is to discuss it with his teacher. You need to trust them to know what they are doing. If you don't then there is a more serious problem.

A good teacher will know exactly what is good and what is not so good in your son's technique, and will have a plan to eventually put everything into good shape.

It may be that right now the teacher is working on something more fundamental, and more important, than the problem you have noticed.

You can't fix everything at once.

pianodub:

I get what you mean. Will get my son to try it.
His 2 and 3 are very obvious especially during scales (descending)


Mad Tom:

Yup, his teacher noticed this problem recently and wanted him to correct them. In fact, he has this problem few grades ago.... I have been reminding him to change for quite sometime now.


Thanks for the quick response, pianodub and Mad Tom.

I am not an expert on this but I have the same problem. Both my children are learning and one has this problem and the other doesn't. And I noticed that my son who has the problem has the same hands as me. I have extremely flexible joints and they bend equally either way. I also have small pointed fingertips which means if my nails grow even slightly my finger joint will collapse. One of my teachers was so strict about it she made me feel as if I was disabled and I've had other teachers who haven't bothered about it.

To be honest with regards to my playing it doesn't make much difference at all. I do, however try to limit it by keeping my nails short and paying attention to my hand position. It doesn't happen so much now, but I do think it depends on the type of hands you have.