Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Fingering Scherzo No. 2 (Zimerman)

He who?

(It seems like you mean Zimerman, but that's not what he's doing.)

Hmm I had no problems playing Marks version.

I finally got frustrated enough to download a copy of the score and go note by note. I did have it wrong in my head (obviously). That's a really nifty fingering that I never thought of.

Ever try this?
125125 | 1 LH214 RH241 LH214 RH24 LH 15(octave)

Of course, I mean Zimerman. In the clip. Who else? And you're wrong, the fingering I listed above is EXACTLY what he is performing. I'm playing the piece now myself.

I don't know many other pianists who actually perform this piece who DON'T use the fingering Zimerman is using in this clip and the fingering I was taught. What most editors mark in scores is practically unplayable at tempo.

Look again: you'll see how the right hand is mainly 141 with the LH alternating with 1 and 5. Try the passage yourself and you'll see that's what Zimerman is playing.

Thanks for your patience.

Seriously? I know Evgeny Kissin and Yundi Li break it up, but here are just a couple of examples of pianists who play it with one hand:

Martha Argerich 1:45 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enJ6be4qLMs
**You can't see her fingers, but you can see her arms, and her left arm isn't far enough to the right to play any notes.

Rubinstein 1:35 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEKJY6A_cnc

Berezovsky 1:33 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pumSCnS14c

Earl Wilde 1:33 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9u-3csjFTJU

Martin David Jones 2:09 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uc4d0QMqvio

"Seriously?" No, I'm completely devoid of "seriousness" on this issue.

Okay, fine, you found four pianists who don't do what Zimerman, Gieseking and Godes do. And I envy the spare time you have to research such minutiae.

The point of my responding to this original post to begin with was to be helpful in offering fingering that is commonly used, as Zimerman illustrates. I don't have any more time to argue. Play it as you wish.

Maybe you're right, but I don't see Zimerman keeping his LH in each place long enough to also be playing those notes with the pinky. I also don't think that would give the hand enough time to get so smoothly to each next place.

Edit: Well, I went and tried it (never hurts) and I think it is possible after all! In fact, you've converted me -- on both what he's probably doing, and what I might try to do.

Sorry, your previous post seemed to imply that yours was the most common or even "preferred" fingering. So that is probably what I reacted to. I took about 3 minutes to go to YouTube and pull up links of performances I already knew. Nothing was, as you say, "researched".

BTW, is that something you do (or have tried) or did you derive it from my bizarro fingering?

No, I haven't tried it, and I wouldn't do it because for me, it would be too risky and probably not readily musical to keep landing on the F's. Risky, because I could easily catch Gb instead of F or along with it. BTW if I did do it, for the first note of the 2nd measure I'd use 2, not 1.

Been playing around with that a bit. It's very interesting, and sort of easy, but....for what it's worth I think I'll wind up sticking with what I indicated up there. I think it's advantageous because there are fewer shifts of the hands. Smoother and more elegant, I think without sacrificing power -- and inherently giving the 'explosion' at the end that I want. You can do that with the other too, but the fingering itself doesn't so automatically just make it happen.

It's a derivation. I either play it with one hand, or split the RH 5/41 LH 1/5. Been a few years since I played this piece, though, so I don't remember if I used the 5 or the 4 in the RH when I split it.

Actually, I played around with it a little in my head, and I don't think it would be too bad. I don't have a keyboard handy at the moment, but I think you can avoid catching the Gb because you're crossing over while your other hand is playing, so you have that extra split second to settle your hand in. As for the 1 at the start of that measure, yeah, you're probably right. A 2 makes more sense, especially considering you just played it as a 2 on the way up, right?

I normally think of "hacking" as something that completely bypasses a mechanic that is meant to thwart one's access to something. As sadistic as Chopin's music can seem sometimes, I don't think that he actively wanted to prevent you from playing it.

Zimmerman cheats here. Chopin wrote it for the right hand only, and it sounds better, but much more difficult to play. I couldn't do it at first read with my great teacher at the time, but she used psychology on me. She said to use both hands if I wasn't "good enough to play it correctly". It took me 4 or 5 days (not sure-long time ago), but it can be done. Most pianists play it as written, because they can.

Aside from his cheat, his fingering might not work for you anyway. All of our hands are different.

What is your basis for that?


IF the "correctly" referred to playing it all with the right hand (and I emphasize the "if" because I wouldn't want to assume that's what she meant), she doesn't understand about this either.

It's just incorrect.

I agree with Mark, and I'll take it one step further: get a new teacher.

I wouldn't go that far. First of all, as I said I wouldn't assume that she said it exactly how it was given here. And anyway, the thing she supposedly said, while IMO flat-out wrong and suggesting that she's more rigid than anyone I'd ever want to work with, is a not-uncommon view, including among knowledgeable people who might be good teachers for some. Plus, since for various reasons it just might not be that easy for someone to get a different teacher, I'm very reluctant to ever say that, even in person with someone I know. It gets said here a lot, but I'm not sure it's a good idea.

I've got the music; I mastered it and have performed it. It was clearly written as a RH arpeggio, and does sound different when played with both Hands. Another ex would be the e-flat seventh cord at the end of his op 53. Some play the two lower e-flats with LH, but as written, the middle e-flat should be played RH, and does have a different sound. As for teacher-she was terrific, and well respected-a star pupil of Edward Fleck.

Total BS.

What about the score makes you think it's written for RH only?

If anything, we could say it's written for both hands, because the latter part of it appears on the bass clef. I mean, that's wrong too, but I could at least see that there's some basis for it, however mistaken it is.

Do you mean because of the fingering in your edition?
What makes you think that's by Chopin?

BTW, let me say, although I'm disagreeing with you, I really appreciate that you're willing to follow through on this discussion. In my experience, most people who assert something like what you did then just run away when asked what's their basis.


Good point, and let's take a look at that.

The ways that I try dividing it, and the way I currently play it, are very much dictated by how I want it to sound -- and the way I want it to sound, it goes much better with the re-distribution than with playing it all with one hand (as I said before). That's one reason why I do it.

And if someone wants it to sound the way you seem to be implying you think it should go -- i.e. basically continuously smooth (I guess) -- part of the challenge of playing it redistributed, if they choose to do so, would be to make it sound just as it might if it were played with the RH alone. BTW I would say that's Zimerman's interpretation, and he succeeds 100%.


I think you better identify it more. I've known the piece for about 1000 years and performed it many times, but offhand I have no idea what chord you mean.

For the op 53 PolonIse: I'm referring to the second to last cord in the piece...the e-flat 7th before the final RH a-flat major with a LH a-flat octave. I just looked at my Schirmer edition of the scherzo (BTW-fingering by Rafael Joseffy), and the second measure of this Arpeggio, all but one 8th note is on the bass staff, but the notes are going up. This reads to me, and is also fingered, for the right hand. I suppose one could make an argument for this being my personal preference, but I still think Zimmerman is merely taking the easy (and less risky) route. When discussing Polish pianists performing Chopin, I prefer Blecharz to Zimerman. I like his crisp clean notes-reminds me of Rachmaninoff and Horowitz.