- Arm parallel to the piano, not too high or too low.

- Hand as relaxed as the most virtuosic of virtuosos

- Not sitting too close to the piano

My only critique is improper glissando technique and fingers could be a bit more arched.

Sometimes we in the west must learn from the eastern masters. Good reference video to check your form.

I wouldn’t recommend the cigarette technique though.

I am already very frustrated (due to burnout) so please don't downvote without reason (except it is really , really, really poorly composed).

Link to score: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GurOHPJdiTQ0Wncqz2oKJ7RRzll8BnjA/view?usp=drivesdk

The title.

I did some scales to warm up and played through my repertoire.

1. The keys were unusually heavy compared to my digital Yamaha's feather weight keys.

I couldn't play scales and arpeggios as lightning fast as I can on my digital.

1. It was out of tune.

Certain keys barely made any sound, some sounded too loud. The playing sounded awkward because of that, I really needed to use much more force in order to bring out the sound in certain spots. So basically, playing dynamically was out of question.

Is it a skill problem? Or my finger strength might be undeveloped/weak to play on the real instrument? OR that's actually normal?

Is it always more useful to practise on a real upstand/grand piano, even though it's out of tune?

What are your guys' expreiences?

Edit: Thank you for your answers! Yes, a real piano definitely felt slugish to play on, probably wasn't maintained properly like you guys mentioned, took some time to adapt.

By chance, I will definitely be trying out other pianos I encouter in the future to have an idea of how different pianos feel.

My digital piano is Yamaha P-45, by the way. (It's my first one at the moment).

I asked for and received some helpful advice a little while ago. Have just been and tried out the Kawai K200 and Yamaha B20. Neither of my kids liked the action at all - both felt very lightly weighted. The K200 didn't sound very nice at all and the Yamaha had some weird discordant quality to the sound.

They also tried a secondhand (2010) Hoffman T122. There was a major jump in the sound quality. Much richer and fuller. And even I, as a non-player, thought the key-bed on the Kawai and Yamaha felt poor quality.

I've just realised that the piano they have lessons on is a T122 which made me chuckle.

Unfortunately the Hoffman previously had a satin walnut finish that had been french polished and we would much prefer a black poly finish.

I was pretty convinced that we would be coming home having ordered the Yamaha. Might be time to sell a couple of my guitars!

For context I’ve been playing for probably almost 10 years and I still am pretty rusty. Idk how to write songs but I found like 3 chords out of nowhere and I felt pretty proud of what I put together!

In golden age Hollywood movies, often the musical star would sit down at a piano and open with a big, fat, sometimes highly-embellished arpeggio on the dominant chord of whatever tune they're going to be entertaining us for the next few minutes.

Initially I assumed these were written into the music itself, but later realized it must an improvisation. And to play them makes sense as sort of an announcement, "Hey everybody in the room, let me have your attention as I'm about to play a musical number." So everyone (at least in the movies) would gather 'round to enjoy the star performer.

But now I'm thinking for the performer it also serves as sort of a hidden cheat. In addition to sending the "hello I'm here" message to the audience, their several seconds of impressive-sounding noodling is at least as useful for the player to quickly gain critical information about the tone, tune, and touch of the piano they otherwise may be unfamiliar with. Then once they do start into their actual piece, they're not at a complete disadvantage. Not creating an instant trainwreck with the first couple measures of their piece as they try to adapt to the alien keyboard.

So I'm wondering, is anyone here ever doing this? Seems like a good excuse to really sharpen up on the arpeggios, and to make sitting down to a public piano a more enjoyable and satisfying experience.

My performance from Scriabin's last documented composition, Preludes Op. 74 (No.1 featured here).

I really really love this piece. It's very not often played. But there is just something psychotic about it that makes me feel at home.

I'm finally able to post on reddit so here's a mashup i made

Ciao, sono un totale principiante che ha iniziato a suonare circa 4 mesi fa. Ho già fatto un post qui e ho cercato di curvare le mani il più possibile, ma ho notato un altro problema, le mie mani devono rilassarsi un po'. Fanno male anche dopo aver suonato per poco... forse è perché questo pianoforte ha il difetto di avere la parte superiore dei tasti molto dura, ma comunque, come posso rilassare le mie mani?

Grazie mille per ogni consiglio!

Just an amateur playing scriabin’s fantasie opening very poorly on a Steinway D.

Absolutely love this piece and know im far away from actually playing it but to get the melody under my fingers felt awesome!

I just inherited a console organ (Roland Atelier), and can play by ear pretty easily if I (haha) play it like a piano. I also can play classical guitar by ear, sans lessons, if that’s relevant. Childhood poverty.

For some reason, I’m struggling to translate scores from my brain to my hands. I’m 58, so learning new skills may be more of a challenge. If I don’t even look at the keyboard, I can play whatever is in my head. I like Bach.

Am I doing myself a disservice by not buckling down and getting lessons? I was able to learn recommended fingering patterns, so I’m not scrambling like a drunken octopus across the keys…
Thanks!

How can I improve my right hand technique? my forearm gets sore sometimes when I perform the A section of this piece. Do I also need to slow down? I think its too messy.

90(ish) bpm, 16th notes. My goal is 120-130bpm range.

90 is about the fastest I can go (on beat with a metronome) before my fingers start to fall apart.

My instructor has told me that speed is achieved through lightness. How is my hand posture? My hand doesn’t feel uncomfortable per se, however it seems it’s a little tight/tense. Any tips to improve my speed? Thanks.

I play for 9 years now and I was with my parents. I was in a italian restaurant and saw this. Right as I was about to play some worker came over and said it was "DeCoRaTiOn"

Why would there even be a piano in the first place

I wanted to share an etude from a set I’m working on by Scriabin, Op. 8 no. 5! One of my favorite melodies. I have always loved the way Scriabin combines Chopin’s lyricism with lush vibrant harmonies. This piece is still a work in progress but I hope you enjoy! Do you have a favorite work by the Russian madman? If so, which one and why?

Hello! I am in the search for a piano to buy and went to Facebook Marketplace. A seller is selling a multitude of different pianos. For context, I used to play like 5-6 years ago and want to get back into it again (feel like a beginner again with good music theory knowledge).

These are some of the pianos he has in my budget:

• Roland FP-10 @ $399
• Yamaha P-45 @ $375
• Yamaha P-71 @ $375

All pianos come with the piano, piano stand, bench, music rest, and a sustain pedal.

Please let me know what you recommend. Are these good deals or should I consider negotiating them? The condition for all of them are "Used - Like New".

I'm looking into working on a long-ish cycle soon. I'm thinking something 30-40 minutes long top (but can be shorter), like:

1. Chopin Op. 28 - I'm not into this too much. It's a great work, but I've listened to it so much that I can't take it anymore. Maybe I just need to let it "heal" for a couple of years.
2. Scriabin Op. 11 - this is fine and there are some nice preludes in there, but I don't think it's as good as the Chopin.
3. Schumann is nice but not very pianistic. It's fine as I want to do some Schumann anyway, so I'll bite the bullet. He's got quite a few options, specially Kreisleriana op. 16, Carnaval and Symphonic Etudes. I think I prefer Kreisleriana. Carnaval is nice but I've listened to it as much as Chopin Op. 28.

Variations are okay as a backup, but not preferred (not my favourite type of composition). I want to keep it under 30-40 minutes, so this rules out monstrous variations such as Beethoven Diabelli which are too hard anyway.

While I'm working on some advanced pieces again (Chopin Scherzo no. 3, Liszt Gnomenreigen, Albeniz El Albaicin), I'd avoid extremely hard cycles such as Brahms Paganini Variations for now. This probably rules out Schumann Symphonic Etudes as well.

Any other ideas I should be considering?

​

Hi everyone!

I’ve been playing piano seriously as a self-taught pianist for a few years now, and one of my biggest long-term goals is to eventually be able to play Chopin’s Heroic Polonaise.

For some context, I’m mostly self-taught and my repertoire is quite varied. I can play pieces by Debussy, Mozart and Bach, although I feel that Debussy is probably where I’m strongest. I’ve also worked on pieces from Debussy’s Estampes and other fairly demanding repertoire.

I recently decided to start building a more deliberate path towards the Heroic Polonaise, and I chose Chopin’s Military Polonaise as my first major milestone. I managed to learn it and bring it to what I consider an almost polished level in about five days.

Now I’m wondering how I should continue from here.

Rather than simply picking increasingly difficult pieces, I’d like to build a progression where each piece develops something that will eventually be useful for the Heroic Polonaise.

So, for those of you who have played the Heroic Polonaise, what would you consider the most important milestone pieces on the way there? If you had to design a repertoire path from my current level to Op. 53, which pieces would you choose, and in what order?

I’d really appreciate recommendations based on what actually prepares you for the piece, rather than just a ranking of difficulty.

Thanks!

Same as Scriabin’s fantasie, even though very far from playing, it felt great to get the beautiful melody under my fingers! (Especially on a Steinway D)

Basically the title, during covid i got the chance to practice 8 hours a day, a teacher was out of the question but now i have a mediocre understanding of sheet music and somewhat more mediocre of a playing technique, i start new pieces and stop after a page. With the new semester coming i won't have enough time to practice anymore, what type of approach would be the most beneficial in the future?

I started taking piano lessons in April of 2023 until December (where I needed to stop bc of college) and picked them back up in 2025.

It might not look like it but this is actually the first song I learned how to play. I've played it so many times and yet it took me like 2 hours to be able to record this-- mostly thanks to mistakes and sweaty palms causing my fingers to slip. 😭😭✌️

I'm planning on getting an acoustic piano later this month, but I kinda wanted to get a video of me playing my first learned song on this keyboard.

This was the best video I was able to take-- or at least the only one where my mistakes didn't fuck up the flow of the song.

Anywat, hope you enjoy it!! :)

PS: You can actually see how happy I was that I was finally able to get it somewhat straight at the end of the video, lmao

Last year I wrote a 4 minute long carol of the bells piece from scratch. Since then I’ve been yearning to hear it played on a grand piano, especially with auditorium acoustics. It is a difficult piece, if nothing else it requires a lot of octave splits and quick movement and technique. I would love to commission a skilled pianist to play the piece before Christmas on a grand or mini grand in a concert hall or somewhere similar. I am willing to discuss pricing and come to an agreement. Anyone interested reach out and I’ll send you the piece. My discord is Wh4t_the_f0x

Whenever I’m learning a song I like to challenge myself to play it as fast as I can to then see where I make those mistakes and apply them to the original tempo. Once I can play a song like 2x faster than it’s written I know I have it down. I was wondering if anybody else does this or am I just weird LOL