Reddit mentions of Hanon: The Virtuoso Pianist in Sixty Exercises, Complete (Schirmer's Library of Musical Classics, Vol. 925)

My teacher assigned the Hanon book to me way back in the day. Works well, albeit being a tad boring.

First, I would highly recommend a teacher if at all possible. Piano technique is a lot more subtle than it would seem.

Get a decent piano method (I recommend the Alfred Adult Method) and some technical studies (Hanon and/or Czerny).

My two cents as a lapsed classical pianist: If you want to go old school and learn to read music a bit too, struggle your way through the Hanon exercises for piano, specifically the scales and octave scale progression through all keys.

The book is cheap on Amazon

It is boring, dry stuff. But I will be damned if I don't still remember every scale once I start off on the right note, even if I don't remember any of the classical pieces themselves. Because of that bastard Hanon and his exercises.

I'm pretty sure you can type without looking, and I only say that because you haphazardly used the word "whilst" in your post. Therefore, you will undoubtedly get to the point where you can play without looking at your hands. I initially learned to play by ONLY looking at my hands, through the Suzuki method, and once I started reading music, I eventually got to the point where I didn't need to look down from the music. Perhaps playing some Hanon Virtuoso Pianist exercises, which are horrendously boring but very beneficial, will get you there.

The Virtuoso Pianist by Charles-Louis Hanon. It's not fun or musically interesting, but if you purely want to improve speed and technique, it's exactly what you need.

Hanon exercises are great for strength and independence of fingers.

https://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Virtuoso-Exercises-Complete-Schirmers/dp/0793525446

Ask your teacher about Hanon before buying, many don't care for his exercises while many might prefer to give exercises to you individually rather than having you practice from a book. Nevertheless progress slowly through the book, play the exercises slowly and steadily over quickly and unconfidently. Vary the exercises' rhythm as an exercise(For example you can make every other tone dotted while halfing the duration of the others). Follow the fingerings written out and get help from your teacher if something hurts or feels tense/wrong rather than just powering through it and lastly remember that Hanon exercises are NOT a substitute for other content such as learning pieces you're interested in. Hanon exercises lack in musicality and other elements that you need to learn through learning actual pieces of music that you enjoy.

Since you are just starting out, your emphasis right now needs to be on developing a solid basis of technique, . For the next 2 years I recommend you alot your practice time as follows:

• 1/3 to scales and arpeggios
  
  
• 1/3 to exercises - Hanon is the classic starter book. Czerny is a more challenging and interesting addition.
  
  
• 1/3 to pieces
  
  After 2 years, once you have built up your dexterity, then you can begin alotting a greater portion of your time to practicing pieces.
  
  Please note that this time estimate is based on my experience, playing for 3 hours/day during my formative training years. If you are practicing less, it may take longer for you to build your dexterity.

a; a minor; b; b minor; c; c minor; d; d minor; e; e minor; f; f minor; g; g minor
Then there's flats and sharps.

You can buy a hannon book for $3 or $4 http://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Virtuoso-Exercises-Complete-Schirmers/dp/0793525446/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1457979356&sr=8-3&keywords=piano+scales

Buy a Hanon's exercise book. I'm 22, and was given my grandfather's copy (from the 1930's) when I was around 11-12, and it really makes a difference in technical sections. Even though I've been playing them forever, I still use them as a tune-up when I feel a little slow. Recently just used them to prepare for a Bach obsession I'm in

edit: Here's actually the PDF of the book

The Hanon book might be what you are looking for. But your best bet is to get a good, dedicated teacher and see what he/she thinks you need.

Second the recommendation of scales and arpeggios, in all keys, major and minor. You can start off with just a few, the easiest ones (go in order of the circle of fifths if you want), and continue to add on. Start slowly and, most importantly, EVENLY, building a good foundation for speeding it up later and applying it to technical passages. But there's no real recommendation anyone can give you for "X amount of times," because scales and arpeggios are things you'll continuously practice no matter how high of a level you get to. At a higher level once you've mastered them, you may not have to do the entire set every day, but you can then apply them to pieces by choosing from your arsenal certain exercises that practice the techniques needed in a tricky section of Rach or such.

A good resource for other technique exercises is the book of Hanon exercises. It's been used for many decades, and includes lots of scale/arpeggio-type exercises, and you can work your way through them. Be aware, though, that they're VERY tedious (literally just pattern building through each key), but it sounds like you have the ability to self-motivate yourself. Be careful not to treat these just as exercises, though, and go through them robotically and monotonously, because it's very easy to see them as such. They're just tools developed to help finger agility, speed, and recognition of patterns so you can apply them to full-blown pieces. It's like a tennis player who practices a certain type of grip for 50 serves a day. Great if she can do it through the exercise, but if she reverts to her old grip when she starts playing a game (putting it into action), the grip practice was wasted. Application of theory into pieces is sometimes the hardest thing to do.

I know this has been a giant essay, but lastly, none of us can really give you an individual recommendation. It seems like you've got the self-motivation to learn yourself, but if you are interested in really getting a structured routine, get a private teacher, if only for a few lessons, to help you develop what kinds of things you need to work on.

Give YouTube a shot. If she is musically inclined and puts in the time they might do the trick. I was surprised by the number of quality, free lessons out there.

I also recommend this book. Follow the directions exactly, put the time in, and the results will come. http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0793525446

There's a Hanon book of exercises, I used it when I was taking lessons. It will help primarily with dexterity, but it can help you learn to read music as well.

edit: http://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Exercises-Acquirement-Independence-Schirmers/dp/0793525446

cheap, worth it.

I'd agree with all of this, I honestly can't remember how I learned the notes myself. I think it just came naturally from playing.

In terms of finger exercises a really good book I have is "The Virtuoso Pianist" by Charles-Louis Hanon. As you can see by that link it seems to have a good few criticisms but I found it really good myself. I'd say you should go over them with your piano teacher now and again just to ensure you aren't drilling them incorrectly. A possible way you could learn the notes as well could be by saying them out loud as you are doing the exercises.

You can check it out on IMSLP here anyway and decide for yourself, or if you'd prefer a hard copy of it there are plenty on amazon too.

That's good that you recognized it. It's always tempting to rush past tough fingerings, but you get the most out of practice when you can isolate a technique, break it down, and focus on it.

Check this video out: http://youtu.be/AoLvhHjacMw?t=56m14s
It's Valentina Lisitsa working on a brand new piece (to her).
Here she repeats a single section repeatedly until it's almost 100% before moving on. Even the top pianists have to replay sections until it's in their fingers. Hold yourself to a similar high standard when you practice. Really try to get at least get one solid pass without mistakes, even if it's at a much slower tempo. Here's a story about Rachmaninoff practicing a Chopin etude so slow it was unrecognizable: http://www.practisingthepiano.com/enjoying-ultra-slow-practice/

Also, I recommend you get Hanon: The Virtuoso Pianist in Sixty Exercises. Lots of good exercises. Even Rachmaninoff recommended them. Good luck.

Piano teacher for 5 years here. This is more or less a directly copy and paste from a previous comment of mine.

Obviously, I'm going to recommend you find a teacher as soon as is possible if you really want to advance. BUT there are a lot of things you can do on your own to learn effectively.

• First, do not practice to the point of frustration. This may sound odd, but 20-30 minutes spend at the piano at the same time each day is much more effective then an hours on end. It more about building up patterns of behavior that are conducive to learning. Set a pattern that you follow every day and be sure to set aside extra time to experience more piano music. Listen to jazz, classical, pop, broadway, film scores, anything that is mostly piano and is recorded by a professional. This ear training will be much more valuable then hours at the keyboard.
  
  
• Secondly, aim a little lower at first. There are tons of method books out there and all of them have value. At this point in your education note reading and ear training are the most important to focus on. Get books that you can easily understand (even if they are children's books!) and read, read, read! the more you read, the better you'll get! Think of how you learned to read when you where a child. At first everyone reads small books with three or four letter words and they read a hundred of them. Then they move on to pop-up books and read hundreds of those. Then short stories, also in the hundreds. This processes is not up for debate, it's how we learn. Apply that to you piano study! The pieces you have already learned are great but have obviously left a few holes to fill in your education. Don't be discouraged, it takes years to become proficient at music reading but you can do it if you put in the effort!
  
  
• Third and finally, learn your scales. There are a few books used by almost all piano teachers to teach basic technique and dexterity. I like to use Hanon: The Virtuoso Pianist in Sixty Exercises and start with #32, 33, and 34. Then move on to #39, which is all the major and minor scales. I start my kids on this after a year or two, and my adult students as soon as possible. You will also benefit greatly from learning the fist twenty or so. Those focus solely on the practical study of hand coordination and dexterity, rather then the more theoretical study of major and minor keys. Another is Czerny: Art of Finger Dexterity for the Piano. There are also few others I'm not super familiar with. I would NOT recommend the Czerny without a teacher! that book is an asskicker and could seriously hurt your wrist/forearm without proper guidance.
  
  I hope this helps a little. Remember that you have just started and you have to crawl before you can walk. Take it easy and make sure you understand everything before moving on to the next step. Good luck and have fun!!

Buy the Hanon book, it's a really good exercise/method book for 6 dollars. Every pianist has a copy of this.

Playing evenly requires strengthening your finger muscles. Like the other comment mentioned, each finger has different strength depending on your usage. Hanon books are usually very good for practice. Another very good book is the Hal Leonard Schirmer's Library "Scales & Finger Exercises". Each exercise tells you which fingers it's focusing on. I honestly don't believe in the tapping on table method.

I think it's pointless to keep tapping one finger to strengthen it over and over again. You need to move that finger in a context with the OTHER fingers as well because usually it's 'alternating' between fingers that demands the most control. You can develop the muscle memory for a particular finger but when you alternate/change it become even more challenging. Hanon and the book I mentioned have the same idea. They focus on strengthening your weaker fingers alongside neighboring ones.

Link to the book:

https://www.amazon.com/Scales-Finger-Exercises-Schirmer-Schirmers/dp/149500547X/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_1?keywords=Scales+and+Finger+Exercises%3A+Schirmer+Library+of+Classic+Volume+2107+%28Schirmer%27s+Library+of+Musical+Classics%29&qid=1557982300&s=books&sr=1-1-fkmrnull

​

https://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Virtuoso-Exercises-Complete-Schirmers/dp/0793525446/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?keywords=Scales+and+Finger+Exercises%3A+Schirmer+Library+of+Classic+Volume+2107+%28Schirmer%27s+Library+of+Musical+Classics%29&qid=1557982300&s=books&sr=1-1-fkmr0

​

Bach pieces or Handel are usually also very good exercises :)

Goodluck!

Two of my three piano teachers have recommended Hanon exercises to me. The basic idea is that you play the simple patterns as evenly as possible (all notes the same volume and the rhythm constant).
I found that they really help to build muscles in your fourth and fifth fingers, which tend to be the weakest, and help to control your thumb which tends to be overly strong.
There may be other places to get the exercises without buying the full book. I never actually progressed further than the first few exercises, but they made a huge difference to controlling each finger individually.
Hope this helps!

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Virtuoso-Exercises-Complete-Schirmers/dp/0793525446&ved=0ahUKEwiKosmdlMzNAhWLOSYKHU0YDTUQFghxMAk&usg=AFQjCNFdItV_cTSzTFwtY_uszIdXP2pM5w

That's an exercise book by Hanon. As far as I know, it's pretty well known. The begining exercises are super easy, but towards the middle and end, they are good at making your fingers do paterns and things they don't commonly do. I'll pick one out and do it as a warm up kind of thing regularly. They are good for flexibility and dexterity. I would recommend, especially if you don't have a piano teacher making you do runs, arpeggios and everything else.

It depends on what you are trying to do.

Definitely scales, major and minor, hands together, four octaves up and back.

Definitely arpeggios, of both major and minor, triads and sevenths.

If you are trying to do improvisation, learning pentatonic scale exercises are really important. I do one like:

1235 2356 3561 5612 6123

Up the piano separately as well as hands together, major and minor.

(Going down would be: 5321 3216 2165 1653 6532)

(And those are scale degrees, not fingerings.)

And then there are classical exercises such as this and this

That falls under the same umbrella as music theory and is really helped with a teacher. Scales and exercises help you develop the muscle memory that guides your fingers when you read music. This book is the go to for many piano teachers. Work through the exercises slowly at first and slowly speed yourself up. It really works unusual finger movements that help you learn how to navigate the keyboard as you play. Will also help with your reading.

a purchase Url for OP: https://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Virtuoso-Exercises-Complete-Schirmers/dp/0793525446

Worth noting that it is available free, but getting it bound is worth it in my opinion.

My advice:

Buy this book to learn your scales.

Buy this book to strengthen your fingers.

Google how to read sheet music. You can learn the basics from many sources.

I recommend the PianoWorld Adult Beginner's Forum to hang out at.

Search the google, search that forum, and browse the index of quarterly recitals on the forum to find beginner level music that you enjoy listening to.

Find the sheet music for the pieces you'd like to learn on IMSLP. It is best as a beginner to find version with suggested fingerings (small numbers near the notes).

And get to work learning what you want to learn. Print the sheets, study them, take a pencil to them, write the notes in English to help you learn to read.

You'll undoubtedly come across symbols you won't recognize from your basic google search. When that happens, look the symbol up here.

Many people recommend the Alfred books and such, and though I'll admit I've never tried them, I have seen many people lose steam because the music in the Alfred books isn't appealing to them.

It won't happen overnight, but if you truly are interested you will stick with it. The method I have outlined is what I did. I took two lessons and didn't like them. It's been nearly five years but I am at the point where I can learn to play Chopin preludes and nocturnes, and sound half-decent. I don't claim to be an expert, but you can learn to play piano as a hobby with minimal resources.

For Technique I recommend either Hannon or Czerny. Czerny can get really difficult, so I'd start with Hannon first. Don't do the whole book, the end pieces are pretty much impossible.

Hey man, I'm kind of the in the same boat you are. By that, I mean
I used to play for about 7 years with lessons once a week, but I never really practiced much and put effort into it. At the beginning of this October, I started to take it up again and started playing every single day, making sure to do scales, play from Hanon, trill exercises, argpeggios, etc... and then moving on to playing my pieces. I play anywhere from an hour to seven hours a day depending on how I'm feeling instead of playing video games or watching tv and average about 3-4 hours a day. The last piece I had played before quitting a while back was Chopin's Nocturne Op.9 no.2, but it was an absolute wreck. I was able to completely refine it within the month of October and I moved onto other stuff. I tried tackling some Rachmaninov and Beethoven, but they were beyond my skill level for now so I decided to table them and I'm currently in the middle of refining Claire de Lune and taking another stab at Rachmaninov waltz I tabled. Claire de lune a fairly simple piece, at least technically, and if you've learned a basic George Winston song, it should be well-within reach. You might have fingering troubles with the chords and the key is a little hard to play in, but that's about it.

Practice your major and minor scales. They are a huge part of fundamentals that people overlook way too often. They help with fingerings and memorization of the keys on the piano.

buy a copy of this http://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Virtuoso-Exercises-Complete-Schirmers/dp/0793525446
it has a ton of exercises ranging from trill exercises, scale runs, arpeggios, chord trills, etc... Play a few of the first 10 exercises every day maybe 3-4 times and it's a great warm-up. It's immensely useful in building up your hand strength and stamina so doing it everyday is a must. Use a metronome while doing this because keeping tempo and not rushing/dragging will be very important. It also helps to monitor your progress as you get faster and faster. Play the exercises as fast as you can without messing up 3 times perfectly before moving onto the next tempo.

Break the piece into multiple chunks. They are pretty clear sections of the song so work on each section individually until you get each section down perfectly. Write down fingerings on tricky chords or runs so that you can remember them and not have to fumble around the next time you come across it. Take it nice and slow. Rushing it will only take more time in the end. I wouldn't worry too much about tempo and just worry about getting the notes right for now.

In the end though, getting a teacher is probably your best bet as they can give you more detailed instruction. What I said for you is if you're looking to pursue this without any instruction similar to what I'm doing right now. My goal by the end of this year is to be able to play Chopin Etude Op. 10 no. 4 by the end of this year practicing about 3 hours a day at least a tempo of 140 (I think I can do it). I currently am not taking lessons either, but I personally am not at the level yet where previous training hasn't covered me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIKdCTmcTLs
This is my goal for the end of the year if you're interested.

Try arching your wrists a little more and work on your technique by playing scales, arpeggios, and exercises. I recommend this book :https://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Virtuoso-Exercises-Complete-Schirmers/dp/0793525446.

When I was younger and actually had time to practice and play, I did scales and it actually helped my left hand to gain strength and keep in tempo with the right. Especially the pinky and ring finger, which tend to be the weakest.

I actually learned from this book and it really helped.

>build functional skills for comping, figuring out lines, and soloing over backing tracks / tunes

I have this book called "Reading Lead Sheets for Keyboard". It's nice because it teaches general skills like that, as opposed to just learning how to play a given song or chords. Also teaches some theory and will leverage what you know. There are probably other books like it but that's the only one I've used.

I'm sure you'll have a blast twiddling knobs and learning the synth, but I'd recommend reserving some time for structured key practice. Set it on a simple epiano/organ/brass patch and leave the knobs alone for a bit while you practice your scales, chords, arpeggios, etc. Hanon is a classic source for good exercises, but tough (expect to spend many days on the first few pages).

I also find it's good to practice monophonic key skills separately, as it's a very different thing.

I know it's a contentious group of pieces, but I've had incredible luck with Hanon. If you can read music and play hands together, I highly recommend it.

I took lessons for 13 years, but since I've been in college I've been self teaching. I've always really loved piano and I have decent technique, but I never really learned things in a way that wasn't sloppy. I decided I wanted to change that, and I sat down and learned all 3 parts of Hanon exactly as instructed in the book. It's not a perfect method, but I play through it every day now and honestly my technique is miles beyond what it used to be. I wish I had learned as a beginner so badly it hurts.

So my suggestion to you is this: buy this book (http://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Virtuoso-Exercises-Complete-Schirmers/dp/0793525446/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1414561983&sr=1-1&keywords=hanon), play through it every day (no matter how boring it may get) exactly as instructed. It takes a little under an hour to play the whole book at tempo, and I imagine you'll be preoccupied learning all of the etudes for quite a while.

I'm a firm believer that we can all craft ourselves into excellent pianists, and all I think you need to do that is repertoire and a will to practice and make a sound that you like. Once you have the technique from the Hanon down, you can get started on any number of pieces. Another very good method is Bela Bartok's Mikrokosmos, which my mean, Hungarian teacher made me slave away at for years. It comes in 6 volumes, the first of which is (http://www.amazon.com/Mikrokosmos-Pink-English-French-Hungarian/dp/1423493044/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1414562208&sr=1-1&keywords=mikrokosmos).

If you were to learn a significant amount of the material from either of those methods, you would be a significantly better pianist. If classical piano isn't necessarily the route you want to go, you'll still be well served by either/or.

The most important thing is to play whenever the urge strikes you, in my experience. It becomes a bit of an addiction, but there's such a huge world of piano music out there that you'll never grow bored with it, and you'll certainly never run out of things to do. Best of luck.

you can try Hanon or Czerny
https://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Virtuoso-Exercises-Complete-Schirmers/dp/0793525446


https://www.amazon.com/Practical-Method-Beginners-Op-599/dp/0793525675/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_2?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0793525675&pd_rd_r=99a4ecb3-d10e-11e8-bdc5-8929d75e6129&pd_rd_w=rcva6&pd_rd_wg=2EWZ1&pf_rd_i=desktop-dp-sims&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_p=6725dbd6-9917-451d-beba-16af7874e407&pf_rd_r=X17PZ9CXNGYQ9JEAG7X0&pf_rd_s=desktop-dp-sims&pf_rd_t=40701&psc=1&refRID=X17PZ9CXNGYQ9JEAG7X0

I've used these when I first started. Assuming you are able to sit and doing musically boring exercises these are a good way to build the muscles in your hands. However I recommend you find someone to listen to you to make sure you're timing and technique are on point.

Hannon exercises are GREAT for finger dexterity and stamina. I've used them for years.

http://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Exercises-Acquirement-Independence-Schirmers/dp/0793525446/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1321469844&sr=1-1

That Hanon book of scales and exercises made me straight up quit taking lessons!

Mind you I was like 9 years old or something and I wish I kept at it as my left hand is now useless....

I got this book: https://www.amazon.com/Hanon-Virtuoso-Exercises-Complete-Schirmers/dp/0793525446

Which is meant to do exactly that. Haven't gotten too far but it seems pretty good so far. It's a bit difficult to maintain the dedication to do the exercises in since I'd rather just be playing actual songs though.