The FIFTH FINGER...

It always seems that the pinky is more pink than plucky, and makes a sound more plinkly than pellucid. Dear Arthur Rubinstein, from which Muse did you order your statuesque pinky? It's really not fair to be a mere mortal, to have but a normal pinky that reaches only to the second knuckle of the fourth finger. But let us think it through. For the weakness of the pinky may reside not in its shortness but rather in our fear that it is short and weak. So that we grab prematurely for the top note (which distills the lyrical essence), or in fact for the low note (the voice of authority). Conclusion: slow down the action of the pinky and the move to the outside. Take time, but also use the thimb and forefinger as guide and pillar for the fifth finger. Triangulate the target and buttress the support.


- from "Piano Pieces" - by Russell Sherman, Farrar, Straus and Giroux (NY) 1996, 244pp.

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