Fingering & Pedaling

Good fingering and pedaling offers two important rewards:

• SECURITY IN PERFORMANCE. Most people tend to feel less secure in performance than in practice. Even though you should not focus on reading the fingering and pedaling when you perform, your eye can see a written indication in a fraction of a second. This can trigger the fingers or feet to recall a familiar pattern automatically. This results in far greater security than if you had to wait for the motor memory to stumble upon the familiar pattern, or for the conscious mind to produce a new pattern.
• RETENTION. Pieces that are learned thoroughly are retained better. Scores that have well worked-out and practiced fingering and pedaling are most likely to be learned deeply. The long-term memory can recall such pieces with amazing accuracy even years after they were abandoned.

Either one of these reasons makes the time spent planning and marking fingering and pedaling an excellent investment.

Index Screen