It hit home over SKYPE while I was giving a piano lesson to Australia today that THUMBS have usurped too much power!
In their octave by octave advance through scales and arpeggios, they’ve become conspicuously Napoleonic and territorial, setting up roadblocks that deter longer fingers of each hand from individually passing over and around them without a physical confrontation. And despite their short stature, THUMBS will continue to RULE The Hand, unless they’re cut down to size.
As a start, every piano teacher, in good conscience, should assertively curb thumb rule while applying a humane approach–(A complete keyboard sweep is not recommended.)
Instead, students should be urged to position their longer fingers to form a decisive center of gravity in the keyboard universe; sustaining a specific equilibrium while staving off ACCENT-uated, ill-timed aggressive maneuvers by Thumbs to tilt the balance of power.
The good news is that Online pupils in London and Edinburgh have successfully de-throned Thumbs by the power of their imagination that works an effect on the longer fingers to suppress interruptions of smooth scale transits. With a confidence-boosting arsenal of mental strategies, they’ve managed to thwart thumbs from laying flat out in arpeggio-wide wrecking maneuvers.
So at long last, a DEFENSIVE video has emerged from Sydney, Australia that deserves A THUMBS UP! for its steadfast effort to undo a DOWN-ward spiral that once robbed a D Major broken chord sequence of its free-spirited expression.
(KEY WORDS: “Invisible thumb; “featherlight,” “floating,” think UP, “lifting”)
I have so much trouble with my thumbs. I really will try and use this technique, because I always seem to trip over my thumb.
Yes it’s almost of epidemic proportion!! I’ve written extensively on this nemesis.
I thought I was in the minority. In a way it’s comforting to know I have company.
Blocking, dead weight of arms on fingers 2 and 3, and the visual clue of hands moving horizontally has made a huge difference in my thumb behaviour. Thanks ever so much!
Point taken–and very pleasantly. Thank you for the engaging writing (and the firm position on thumbs)!