Adapting to weak fingers
Found in: Special Needs & Learning Differences
Heidi M., Canada
I have an adult who will come to a FIS and he is very excited, but three of his RH fingers (fingers 3, 4, and 5) are very weak/sensitive due to some previous injury (doubtful that practicing will fix that). Any suggestions? What I am thinking is for him to do the finger patterns mainly on the practice pad (no pain for the RH fingers) and if his RH cannot do it on the piano, then figure out how to let his 2 fingers do it while he still “knows” the patterns. For Accompaniment, maybe his LH can play the melody and his RH do simple 2-finger chords. But I am open to other suggestions. I’ve never had a case like this.
Laurie Richards, Nebraska
There are always ways to adapt for these circumstances. If he has 2 good fingers on his RH, he can do quite a bit with them. Also, even if he is unable to move fingers 3, 4, 5 independently, he may still be able to use the side of 4 or 5 with a wrist motion to use them. You won’t really know until you start teaching him. And you never know if he might regain at least a tiny bit of use. Have fun, and just adapt fingerings or notes as needed.
Heidi M., Canada
In the last day or so I tried playing a number of Foundation 1 songs without RH fingers 3 4 5 and was surprised how much is possible with a bit of creativity! Best of all the wonderful blues scale can be done easily with just 2 fingers!