Piano Lesson - How To Play Major Scales On The Piano

A Major Scale is a group of eight notes beginning and ending with the same letter name. Each note in a major scale is played one after the other until it reaches the eight note. A Major Scale sounds like this: Doh,   Ra,   Me,   Fa,   So,   Lah,   Te,   Doh.

The eight note is called an octave because it is the same letter as the first note but have a higher pitch. There are twelve notes in music and each note is the root of specific major scale. Hence there are twelve major scales in music.

In our lesson today I will teach you how to play the C major scale on the piano. Please read all instructions carefully and make sure you practice.

Let us a look at the keyboard the main section of the piano.However, an octave can be lower or higher than the root note in a scale. There are twelve

Now the scale that we are going to play is C Major. Here are the letters of C Major Scale.

C      D     E       F      G     A      B      C

1          2          3          4            5       6           7          8

You should notice that the C major scale begins and ends with the same letter name. Now we will learn to play the scale with both hand in ascending and descending order. Ascending order means that the scale will be played from the first note to the eight note and descending order means that the scale will be played from the eight note to the first. In other words we will go forward and backward.

The fingers for both hands are labelled so that you can understand further illustrations teaching us how to play the C Major Scale on the piano.

The illustration below outlines the fingers used for the right hand when playing the C Major Scale.

(Please note - When play in ascending order the 1st finger will go under the 3rd finger to play the F key. Do this several times and then go the opposite direction using the same fingers.)

The illustration below outlines the fingers used for the left hand when playing the C Major Scale.

(Please note - When playing in ascending order the 3rd finger will go over the 1st finger to play the A key. Do this several times and then go the opposite direction using the same fingers.)

Remember to practice. You should practice playing the scale as slow as possible and then increase in speed as you continue. I know this lesson will help with your fingering techniques when playing the piano. I will be doing a video tutorial on this lesson soon. Thank you and have a wonderful day.

Copyright (c) April 2011 by Carlinton Singh.

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