Finger Independence for musicians, pianist, guitarist, violinist.

There has been alot said about finger independence and I've been researching myself what is it that make your finger independent.

One thing you need to know is that brain is the center of all conscious action and what you need to be able to do is to know which finger you are moving exactly and make that motion as efficient and as effortless as possible.

First anatomy:
Muscles that move your fingers are at your forearms. and you use separate muscles for bending (flexing) and lifting (extending).
3,4,5 (or middle ring pinky) share one tendon and these are usually the problem for everybody.

All tendon goes through your wrists and thus they need to be relaxed so you won't waste any energy at the wrist.

shoulder, arms, they all need to be relaxed as they are connected to the sources which is your back.

Back needs to be straight but relaxed. This gives you balance and strength.


most important thing is you need to feel absolutely no pain and completely relaxed at all times even when you are playing fast and rather hard passages.
Moment people try technically difficult thing all kinds of tension in your body starts to show up and they are all bad. Sources of injuries. So please dont' hurt yourself.

Instrument specific guides will be the next thing but If you want to move your fingers like musicians (accurately, articulated, fast, etc etc for long long hours) that is a must. If you learn how to do this at any speed or any phrase you will play your instrument like a master. (at least technically, musicality is a different mastery)

Getting better at piano (or any other instrument)

I often think of what it means to be better at piano.

You practice to get better but what kind of practice really determine your progress. If you've played bunch of notes and if you are sounding like you can play in tempo then you've been wasting time.

Practice and getting better at musical instrument really requires you to be analytical about yourself. You are the one practicing so YOU have to know that you need to practice better.

Often times teacher neglect this simple fact or they are usually afraid that you are going to lose interest in learning or continuing lessons with them. Because it is a tough process. Judging yourself is some

It's psychological issue that always exist with lessons. I'm sure teachers are aware of it but this stuff needs to be taught differently for everyone.

Ability to pick those up and correct them yourself is really critical. Yet it's true that if you don't know music enough it's hard to tell.. and Teachers are there but it's also hard for them. They can't be overly analytical. Because that may impede your progress.

Very hard...

Yet you HAVE to do it. Somehow. I wish I could tell you.

If you are reading this and you're student, you should mention that you want to know HOW and WHAT to practice and in details. Learn the very basic of producing a tone.

Do one finger at a time. Slowly until you get used to it. try doing more things at once. That initial aha is important. but you have to remind yourself of other stuff too. So You will have to be going back and forth between what's relatively hard for you and what' seemingly way too easy (playing a single note)

But if you can play a single note like no other player can you've got your self a serious talent. Just know that. That's what you should look for when you play an instrument. Your individuality. and How you can get that individuality into all notes and all interpretation.


I think all these legends have that in common. They know how to play a note like no other. So don't underestimate the power of practicing to play a single note. Very important. Could be more important that learning a song.

If you are serious about music just ask yourself what's there that only you can do. And develop and hone your talent. Be critical and motivate others (especially your teacher) to critique more. Willing to take them into account. Try recording youself and analyze what can be done or try to ask more question so you will know why who ever made that particular advice thought that way.

Turn everything into a positive energy. Take everything in.

Violin Intonation

I'm working on my violin intonation pretty much everyday. Its very interesting. You notice so many things that You don't when you are on guitar.

first pitch changes when you press. and how fast your press or "Release" into another note affects how quickly it will be in tune.. if you get the correct place to press that is...

that concept is very interesting. Right now, this is almost a disadvantage but if you could musically control this it's really cool what you can do..

bow changes pitch as well (although people don't tell you to control pitch from the bow.. ) and there are way too many thing you can do.



On playing guitar with the bow. seems like it's better to press your frets. rather than those spaces in between. You are getting semi fretless effect when you do that.

Guitar and Violin Playing - Pinky hell

I've started playing violin and since my left pinky has started to function very well.

Violin has really small, or thin neck as you know and that actually made me realize how important the grip was.

basically you have to have two things in your mind.

1. you and your hands have to be relaxed!
2. you apply necessary pressure when you need them. quick press and slight release. volume knob 10 -> 8 the moment you press it.

you have to make your pinky feel like other finger. you have to train it so that you know exactly what muscles move pinky. Flexor and Extensor muscles are almost at where your elbow is. try moving you pinky by itself and look at where it moves. that's what you need to train.

also you have to know Middle, Ring, and Pinky all are connected. shares one muscle. Finger independence is actually not possible. You really have to feel their differences and connection.

exception there is to a pinky because you can actually move your bottom joint (one that connects to your palm) pretty freely. and you have to move pinky from there.



anyway so the GRIP.
you basically have to find where your pinky can gain the most power. it is a weak finger. it's small but there is a point where you are grabbing the neck. and You feel that energy is spread out evenly onto each fingers.

next time you grab your guitar, try grabbing from your bottom joint. Obviously you only want finger tip to touch the finger board but you lay down your fingers from your bottom joint..

I wish I could explain this to you using pictures but try that.

learning the Guitar Fingerboard

It's been a while since i posted but i wanted to make a note about learning guitar.

finger board knowledge has been a biggest obstacle to me that no one seemed to know what the effective way of learning fingerboard is. (that is knowing notes)

now i have a guitar teacher who's been giving me great insights on how finger board works. and how to "memorize" them. memorizing all of them takes at least memorizing 24x6 notes without counting enharmonics. that's a quite a number. and you won't be able to just memorize. so he introduced me a couple of methods that can be done in like 3-12 minutes a day.
that was wow to me.

so here are them
1. single string playing
2. never ending scales
3. blues and chord inversions.
4. patterns.


i will tell you about 1 and 2 on this one.

just pick your favorite tune and start playing notes only using one strings. try jumping around and play melodies. it would be nice to have a tune or simple recorded chord progressions or just forever CM7 for the key of C.
this technique will make you good at one perticular string.

... but yes this is only good for one perticular string.. so not when you use all strings..here is the another technique comes into a play. The never ending scales... sounds like WTF? i know. but this is really cool.
you play scales using all strings. this sounds like normal stupid scale training but it's not.
you play the root on the 6th string and next note on 5th string, next one on 4th string and go up and down forever until you end up where you started. it will take some time but it will come back to this point.
only pitfall to this is that you can't really play melody or music with this. so you need to do single string practice. they complement each other.

cool huh but there is one more step to this, which is "do this for ALL 12 KEYS!"
after a while you know all your scales and all your notes.
simple and effective isn't it? probably a month or two to remember all notes on the finger board. if you do it every day 3-4 keys.

and this worked for me. more than any other books i've got in attempt to learn fingerboard. try this out.

Telecaster and tone.

i bought one good priced black japanese tele from my friend. it's custom and has rosewood fret board. plays really nice. wonderful except for bridge pick up which sounds horrible. not so horrible with my marshall artist 3203 distortion but yeah still it can be improved in a big way. it's never edgy enough and when i use both at the same time it sounds like it cancels each other out.

i've never owned a tele before but i always wanted them. i've just sold all my guitars i had for heavier rock stuff and i can concentrating on aquiring this my own tone i've been wanting. it's still like illiusion, or nothing solid but i'm having much fun just trying things out.

you can create all kinds of tone but having clean(or crunch to be accurate) tone handled is my current biggest challenge. it's everything you really have to pay attention to. from jack, guitars, amps, cabs, to effects... many options and many different ways of expressing.

i wish everyone really thought about tone at least a little more when they play.
recent jeff buckley birthday gig really made me say that...
way too many people just plays music... or just does it for fun "only" and i hope you find a little more depth in what you enjoy...