🎹 4 CREATIVE Ways to Practice Hanon Piano Exercises!

📚 PIANO PROF AMAZON STOREFRONT:

Are you tired of practicing the same old Hanon piano exercises the same old ways? In this video, I share 4 fresh and creative ways to practice Hanon that will renew your practice and help you improve your musicianship and facility at the piano!

These strategies can make your practice sessions more engaging by allowing you to focus on different musical and technical elements. Whether you're new to practicing Hanon or have practiced Hanon exercises for many years, these innovative tips will bring new life to your Hanon routine. Watch to discover how you can transform these classic exercises into a fun and effective part of your practice.

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Time stamps:
0:00 Intro
0:33 Transposing
3:03 Dynamics
7:09 Articulation
11:24 Groupings
12:53 Combinations

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#pianopractice #pianotips #pianolesson

[tacitvrn]

Your videos are helping me a lot. I studied piano ages ago at university but stopped playing and I am now coming back to it. This has given me an opportunity rethink how to train my technique and your videos have given me many helpful suggestions.

[brianlarter]

Thank you so much for this positive and creative approach to the Hanon exercises. I was only introduced to them after school, and encouraged to play them in all the keys and not only in C. As you say here, it makes one practise the movements in and out of the keys. A Chinese student that I taught years ago came back from a holiday in China with the Chinese edition of Hanon. In the front of the book are 3 pages of practising the exercises, not only with different dynamics and rhythms, but multiple different articulations. I made copies in PDF of these pages and if you don't know of this Chinese version I will gladly email the document to you if you'd like. It's a really good variation on the originals where one plays with even tone across all the fingers to strengthen them. I love Hanon, but I've seen on Facebook piano groups and even here on YouTube that there are widely varied opinions on using Hanon - some really aggressive and warning people about injuries, and that they are simply a waste of time. In my entire career I have never had an injury because I was always taught to use correct technique, and also with Hanon, so I never had a problem. And I subscribed to your channel as I just came across it now!

[chris_share]

As a long-time rock and blues guitarist (and sometimes piano player) I think it would be fun to practice Hanon with offbeat accents and maybe something like Clave rhythm or some other Afro/Latin rhythms. Cheers!

[lawrencetaylor]

We should nominate you for a Grammy for your Hanon Exercises.

[aBachwardsfellow]

For those who are *REALLY* interested in "Hanon" ...

-- here is "Hanon":

1 - 20 five-finger patterns -- a.k.a. "Hannon"
21 - 31 are "transcendent" which combine 4-note patterns into 8-note patterns;
32 - 37 involve thumb crossings;
38 is a scale prep;
39 is simply all the major and harmonic and melodic minor scales in parallel octaves;
40 is chromatic scales - parallel octaves, minor 3rds, minor and major 6ths; contrary beginning on the octave, minor, and major 3rd
41 is triad arpeggios -- all major and minor
42 is full diminished 7th arpeggios
43 is dominant 7th arpeggios (major dominant 7ths beginning on white notes, and C major major 7th)
44 repeated notes groups of 3
45 repeated notes groups of 2
46 trills
47 repeated notes groups of 4
48 wrist exercises - double 3rds and 6ths
49 stretches of a 6th between fingers 1 -4 and 2 - 5
50 legato double 3rds, scales in 3rds
51 octaves (double - in each hand)
52 common scales in double 3rds
53 scales in double octaves - major and harmonic minor
54 trills in double 3rds
55 "threefold" trills in 1st inversion triads - double 4ths (RH) with single trill in bass (LH)
56 scales in broken octaves - major and harmonic minor
57 broken arpeggios in double octaves - major and minor triads
58 double octaves held while playing inner notes of triads
59 trills in double 6ths
60 tremolo

[Keys_Hollycb]

Thank you for these videos!! I have been getting tired of Hanon! Lol

[edzielinski]

Wow - this is fantastic! I'm learning to play scales, and I'm discovering while doing it that I'm developing an intuitive feel for the shapes of the scales under my fingers on the keyboard, and how to move across the keyboard in those shapes, and this seems like a great way to combine those two things using the transposition method. Also, I find it very interesting that when applying these variations to Hanon (or other exercises involving repeating patterns), I'm much less likely to start daydreaming, or to become focused on speed over quality, I think because the additional demands don't leave room for that to happen (as much). Also, I prefer to practice these with a metronome whenever possible, and I'd like to share personal anecdote about that, since it seems related. I used to hate the metronome, and it felt like a relentless taskmaster, but one day, I decided to think of it as the rhythm section of my own band, and instead of badgering me, it's providing the groove, and it's my choice to either play straight on the beat, or maybe swing it a bit, depending on the music, and that really helped - it feels like a partner now, instead of an adversary .😊 Thanks so much for all of your excellent videos. They continue to be a source of education and also inspiration.

Once I heard that you should spend longer of your practicing session on technique exercises and less on the pieces?? How do you recommend or what’s your take on that??

[said]

I have new book the Leschetizky method by Malwine Bree. The method is useful to strengthen fingers and and hand shaping, and memorizing the keyboard . Have you some advice on it ?

[velcroman]

The most ANNOYING thing about what you are showing is it is so, so bleedingly obvious!!! What wonderful ways to practice fingering AND really learning scales. Thank you. 👏👏

[aBachwardsfellow]

Thank *GOODNESS* you're using a close touch rather than " ... lifting the fingers high" -- as the instructions in the Hanon book describe -- it might be helpful to mention that ... or perhaps you do in another video.

I love the slurs -- very helpful.

Other ways I like to change it up (in combination with articulation and dynamics, and in all major and harmonic minor keys):

- play them in 10ths and 6ths. This adds some melodiousness to them -- almost sounds like a baroque piece -- and adds a focusing challenge. It also becomes somewhat "adventurous" in the harmonic minors (try F# harmonic minor in 10ths and 6ths ... ;-)

- combine alternate measures of different exercises. One of my favorites warmups is to alternate measures between exercise 1 and exercise 5 -- again in combination with dynamics, articulation, and in 10ths and 6ths.

- grouping (accents) in triplets -- is easy and intuitive (perhaps more so than say in five's as you demonstrated)

- accent the 2nd note -- play the 1st note as a 16th note "pickup" and make the 2nd note the "downbeat"

- for independence -- using exercise 1 -- hold the first note of each group of 4 while playing the other 3 notes (try that with dynamics, and using staccato on the other 3 notes ...)

[aBachwardsfellow]

I'm not a huge fan of "Hanon" either -- in one sense. I find that using alternate measures from Exercise 1 and exercise 5 in various keys and combinations such as you show here makes for a good warmup.

However, I always have to smile when "Hanon" is discussed. For most people, "Hanon" is only the first 20 five-finger exercises of the complete book of Hanon ("The Virtuoso Pianist in 60 Exercises"). The remaining exercises include all the major and minor scales, arpeggios, studies in octaves, double notes (3rds, 6ths), etc. of whicih most people have not a clue. For example, Hanon exercise # 39 just happens to be *ALL* of the major and harmonic and melodic minor scales in parallel octaves. So -- in reality -- when you are playing scales, can it not be said that you are playing "Hanon" - ? :-)

[dogsander]

Nice lesson! I especially appreciate that you threw in some examples beyond the first Hanon exercise, because they can be non-trivial to implement.

Some related Qs:

1. Any thoughts on playing the exercises always hands separate to focus on technique?
2. In the opposite direction, have you used Hanon Revisited? They have the hands doing different things so you can't rely on symmetry to play things. (This was incredibly hard when I tried to use it as a beginner, but much more doable after going through the vanilla Hanon 1-30.)

I'm guessing what you use just depends on one's goals, but I'll be interested to hear what you think.

[JayKumar-Official]

Awesome! Could you please tell us what tablet (and its screen size) you use for your sheet music?

[ijiquedumoulin]

i want to do these exercises, but I can't even read the notes yet lol

[xz.mayaaab]

Am I the only one who actually likes Hanon