Welcome to the Piano World Piano Forums Over 3 million posts about pianos, digital pianos, and all types of keyboard instruments. Over 100,000 members from around the world.
Join the World's Largest Community of Piano Lovers
(it's free)
It's Fun to Play the Piano ... Please Pass It On!
They seem to sell stretching devices all over the internet for a certian body part. I haven't seen any adverts for hand stretchers, though. You might make a fortune off gullible pianists.
They seem to sell stretching devices all over the internet for a certian body part. I haven't seen any adverts for hand stretchers, though. You might make a fortune off gullible pianists.
Just when you thought TV could not get any dumber.....
Just because I was curious, I measured my hand span. My left hand from tip of thumb to tip of little finger is 9 1/4 " (close to Jazzwee, it almost goes to a straight line). My right hand span is 8 3/4" due to a dislocated thumb in college, it's just not going any further. I do do finger stretches - I think it helps. That and practicing playing 10ths with both hands. I have long fingers though.
I can play a tenth on white keys with my left hand but not my right..I believe my playing jazz guitar 45+ yrs caused the left hand to stretch more than the right..
Sparkey, yes that's normal I guess. I can also stretch my ring finger in that same line and that makes even a longer stretch than with the pinky
Holy carp, I just looked and you're correct, my fourth finger can reach farther than my pinky of course. Why haven't I even noticed that before? I can reach an 11th with that without much of a problem but with my pinky an 11th is harder to make. Thanks for clueing me in.
Probabily not, and playing a chord may prove difficult!
Originally Posted by TX-Dennis
Originally Posted by wayne32yrs
Originally Posted by TX-Dennis
They seem to sell stretching devices all over the internet for a certian body part. I haven't seen any adverts for hand stretchers, though. You might make a fortune off gullible pianists.
That is as funny as anything I've seen . . . and more than slightly disturbing.
I always thought my hands were so large because I can barely fit into size XL work gloves. Even those are tight some times.
My thumb muscle area is very large however. Like a chicken leg/ drumstick. Maybe beefy hands and fingers take up more volume somehow. Probably. Obviously actually!
Anyway, my hands are 8 1/2 across at the widest point. I can play a tenth but only at the edge of the keys. In most cases I would probably convert the 10th or higher into a fast skip between the two keys. It can sound very nice that way, especially if played with a lot of feeling. It's a nice way to end a piece too.
Sparkey, yes that's normal I guess. I can also stretch my ring finger in that same line and that makes even a longer stretch than with the pinky
Holy carp, I just looked and you're correct, my fourth finger can reach farther than my pinky of course. Why haven't I even noticed that before? I can reach an 11th with that without much of a problem but with my pinky an 11th is harder to make. Thanks for clueing me in.
One technique for playing octave runs is to alternate between 1-4 and 1-5, so you use thumb and ring finger for the first octave, then thumb and pinky finger for the next and so on. My teacher just showed me how to do that on the first Gershwin prelude.
Sparkey, yes that's normal I guess. I can also stretch my ring finger in that same line and that makes even a longer stretch than with the pinky
Holy carp, I just looked and you're correct, my fourth finger can reach farther than my pinky of course. Why haven't I even noticed that before? I can reach an 11th with that without much of a problem but with my pinky an 11th is harder to make. Thanks for clueing me in.
OMG I didn't even think of this. My thumb and fourth finger (which is used a lot for stretches in Chopin 10/1 stretches to like 9 3/4" vs. my pinky which is only like 9 1/8".
I can do a straight line also with thumb and 4th. That took a lot of work to accomplish
Right around 8". I can do an ocatave pretty easily but not much more.
********************************************************************************************************** Co-owner (by marriage) and part time customer service rep at an electronic musical equipment repair shop.
Why have I never wondered about this before. On my (free) hardware store yardstick, I measure 8 7/8", but that is with a very flat hand. More meaningfully, with some arch, it comes out to playing a tenth comfortably on the naturals, and closer to 8-and-a-quarter inches.
One technique for playing octave runs is to alternate between 1-4 and 1-5, so you use thumb and ring finger for the first octave, then thumb and pinky finger for the next and so on. My teacher just showed me how to do that on the first Gershwin prelude.
I'm using that to play "legato" bass lines. The thumb (higher octave) jumps while the lower octave is played legato using 4/5.
Also I had the habit of using both 4 and 5 to press the lower octave note... but that gave some unwanted accents I'm playing the bass notes too loud anyway so more work to be done in that region
![[Linked Image]](http://www.websmileys.com/sm/crazy/114.gif)
![[Linked Image]](https://www.pianoworld.com/Uploads/files/RedDotMedalSmall.jpg)
