Piano Scales: Similar vs. Contrary Motion

This is a very quick blog to give a very quick recap of a very simple premise and that premise is…

SCALES!

We all love them, but finding our fingers in the initial stages is quite a challenge, granted.

This blog isn’t intended to recap what sharps or flats or are in scales. For that, read up about the Circle of Fifths.

Instead, we’re just going to focus on the difference between Similar Motion and Contrary Motion piano scales, starting with Contrary Motion…because it’s a little bit easier!

So, strap in and get ready to read and learn more about...

Similar Motion and Contrary Motion Piano Scales!

Contrary Motion Piano Scales

Contrary Motion refers to the hands going in separate directions to one another, usually starting on the same note (i.e. the same pitch, such as both thumbs on middle C for a C major contrary motion scale).

Before we attempt it hands together, let’s just rethink a simple scale - such as G major - as we would play it in the right hand:

G - A - B - C - D - E - F♯ - G

Using fingers

1 - 2 - 3 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5

Where 1 is the thumb and we tuck it under the middle finger to allow it to continue playing on the C.

In the left hand, we would play the same notes one octave lower using the following fingers:

5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1 - 3 - 2 - 1

Where 3 is the middle finger and we lift it over the thumb to continue playing on the E.

When it comes to coming down, the notes naturally change as follows:

G - F♯ - E - D - C - B - A - G

And all that happens with regards our finger numbers are that they swap their numbers from the other hand’s ascension. Thus, the notes given just above are now played in the left hand as:

1 - 2 - 3 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5

And the right hand would be:

5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1 - 3 - 2 - 1

And the reason that this is super interesting and makes it a little easier to comprehend what fingers go where when it comes to playing your first hands together scales (often why I start by teaching contrary motion) is because it keeps your fingers the same:

Starting on the same note (and same pitch - G), lay your thumbs and descend your left hand down an octave whilst your right hand rises an octave. Then come back and finish with thumbs back on G!

Both hands will be using identical fingers:

1 - 2 - 3 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1 - 3 - 2 - 1

There you have it!

Note that because the left hand pitch doesn't go too far below middle C, I've opted to keep this whole contrary motion scale in the right hand treble clef part!

C major is of course is a great scale for beginning your exploration here as it is all white notes, so I’ve using G major above to exemplify how your black notes (in this case - one sharp note - F♯)  don’t go down together. This can cause confusion, so on the flip side you may be of the team that finds similar motion a little easier to start learning because - whilst the fingers don’t match - the sharp / flat notes do (in fact, all notes do!)

Read on to learn more…

Similar Motion Piano Scales

Similar motion refers to scales whereby your hands are playing the same notes at the same time - usually one octave apart. This means that they are ascending and descending together (similarly - see how it works now?!).

So if your right hand is playing the G major scale:

G - A - B - C - D - E - F♯  - G

Then your left hand is playing…

G - A - B - C - D - E - F♯  - G !

…just one octave lower!

Sounds easy?

Perhaps, but bear in mind now that we have an inconsistency of fingers, because whereas one - the right hand - would rise up a la

1 - 2 - 3 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5

Our left hand needs to rise up

5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1 - 3 - 2 - 1

And vice versa for the descent…

Familiarity of movement is a huge thing when it comes to playing similar motion scales, so whilst I do encourage learning by slow and regular rhythm (such as slow metronome learning), I do feel that it is as well to just stumble your way through the movements in your own time for at least the first few attempts of playing through them. One thumb will be going under finger three as the other hands is still rising, same for finger three going over the thumb vs. normal movement in the other hand.

Part of the success of scales is keeping a strong visualisation as to which notes your are moving to and between, hence why individual hand practice is a great way to start.

Another part of it is remembering the simple rule that when it comes to scales, aside from the discrepancies of those fingers moving under and over, fingers stick together. You don’t miss fingers, you simply ‘reset’ them!

For one of the most effective ways of learning scales - both academically and practically - try the power of visualisation.

Visualising Scales

Whilst it is very possible to download diagrams for all manner of sources on the Internet, there is nothing quite like doing it yourself.

The reason for this is simply because it allows for another way in for learning. Finding diagrams is very much a quick reference, whereas doing it yourself attacks the problem and helps you learn it more effectively, more quickly and potentially even more accurately!

Marking out a simple diagram of a keyboard using colours and finger numbers could be a great way to visual what a scale ‘looks like’, thus eventually eliminating that temptation to veer towards the wrong note halfway through. In turn, this affects directly how you tackle key signatures - all the notes you need for any key are found in their respective scale, so learning the scales creates a familiarity in this. And visualisation is a great trick.

Marking a diagram of a keyboard - even a crudely drawn one - by colouring in or dotting the notes  and marking the finger numbers on top is a great tactic. For example:

This example digram has colour coded my left hand blue and right hand red so I can reference which hand plays what for a contrary motion scale.

This website here is a great resource to print from. Download for yourself and get marking away - you’d be surprised at how much is helps you to remember and learn!

For a video of all G major based scales referred to above, watch below:

...and whilst you're at it, don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel so you don't miss any videos (they're more interesting than this one usually, I promise!)

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Jack Mitchell Smith is a piano teacher based in Congleton, Cheshire. Click here to find out more.

Weekly blogs are posted that may help you with your musical or piano journey. Click here to sign up to the mailing list so you never miss a post!

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#pianoscales #musiclesson #pianolesson #pianoteacher #learnpiano #beginnerpiano #musicscales #learnmusic

Classical Piano Recital in Nantwich!

OK - at the risk of sounding like I am a highly successful touring pianist with a big following, I would like to add the following disclaimer:

I very much enjoy performing at care homes, retirement homes and retirement villages and Richmond Villages in Nantwich is a prime example of the latter!

On the evening of Wednesday 4th June 2025, I arrived to perform for the lovely residents - many of whom I have performed for before - and they have one simple request for me when I come to play: they love classical music!

This is in contrast to other places where I perform. Depending on the nature of who I perform for, many care homes are glad of a pianist to come along and simply bring them all together in a good old sing song. But not at Richmond Villages! And I love it! It gives me excuses other than for my own personal gain to keep focusing on learning new pieces of classical music and opportunities to perform them / trial them on people whereas I might ordinarily only ever play them for myself (or upload them onto YouTube hoping a very niche audience might stumble across them!).

More excitingly still, I have recently acquired a new microphone (a USB-C one that plugs into my phone and everything!) - so now I can take the usual videos but with enhanced sound quality (disclaimer: I haven’t yet mastered how to gauge the volume going in - some of the loud notes clip!), so I’m very excited to share with you excerpts from my classical piano recital in Nantwich!

Classical Piano Recital in Nantwich: The Set

The first few pieces of music I performed were ones I didn’t record, partly because of how short and incidental they were but partly because I wasn’t quite yet feeling the vibe of hitting that record button! -

Edward Elgar: Sonatina in G Major (ii  Allegro) - Ordinarily I opt to begin with something a bit gentler to break myself in gently to playing quicker pieces requiring greater agility, however to partly challenge myself but also to see if it made a difference psychologically, I chose this piece by Elgar. It lasts just shy of two minutes but is a great finger warm up and it did in fact allow me to feel more comfortable moving forward. So lesson learned: don’t build up complexity / fiddli-ness from beginning to end!

George Frideric Handel: Entrée in G Minor - I like to get the Baroque era out of the way earlier on, usually, as it highlights very nicely a progression through musical styles that can often be seen as it little anticlimactic if interspersed with more grandiose pieces from the classical and romantic eras. This was a lovely piece to get out of my system, having only recently learnt it. Short and sweet, like the next one!

George Frideric Handel: Passacaglia in A Minor - I did ask if any of the residents had previously played or learnt piano and upon learning that some of them did, assured them that they may well recognise this piece and may well have even played it themselves! With the modern complexities of the piano as an instrument, this is one baroque piece that is very easy to ‘romanc-ify’ due to the dynamic range and the sustain pedal, and I did forewarn the audience that my interpretation would not be an accurate Baroque one. That said, I don’t think I’ve heard all that many accurate Baroque interpretations of this particular piece anyway

Lights…Camera…

Franz Schubert: Impromptu in B♭ Major - If I weren’t destined to press record at this stage, it would never have happened. This piece clocks in at approximately 14 minutes (11 if I’m in a rush!), and is a simple theme and variations structure i.e. we are introduced to a theme, then a separate variation of the theme, then another, another, another and a final one - each one becoming a tad more complex. The classic variations are incorporated (one changes tone to minor, for example, as well as the time signature), but this is the latest full showpiece I have been working on and it was wonderful to finally get it out of my system!

Sergei Bortkiewicz: Prelude V - A few months ago I was asked by an old friend to learn some music to perform at his wedding (coming up in July). This is one of the pieces, as is the following. It seemed daft to not use the opportunity to perform them elsewhere as well, so that’s exactly what I did! A beautiful prelude in A♭ and one that I read my way through as it isn’t quite fully in the old brain yet!

Anton Dvořák: Poetic Tones, Serenade - Perhaps a more familiar composer thanks to the ‘New World Symphony’, this piece is great fun to play and not too taxing (although you wouldn’t think so, looking at the accidental-littered score!).

Edvard Grieg: Arietta (from Lyric Pieces) - for reasons I can’t quite recall, I didn’t record this one. This is a terrible shame, as I performed this one arguably better than the next one. But this is the opening piece of the entire suite of Lyric Pieces (Lyrische Stücke) by Grieg - a composer I am particularly fond of for his ability to weave the feeling of fantasy and magic into his music (I mean - he did compose Peer Gynt…)

Edvard Grieg: Waltz (from Lyric Pieces) - and the second piece! Ironically for the easiest piece I was playing today it was also the one that went most badly, so this should be reassuring to anybody who is worried about making mistakes. Watch the video and see if you can spot them - if you can’t then that’s great, it just shows how the art of carrying on overpowers them. If you can, same principle: you’ll notice that they don’t dominate the overall performance!

Edvard Grieg: Watchman’s Song (from Lyric Pieces) - and the third piece! Beautiful music that was especially marked upon by the residents as being so. The intermezzo here is very exciting (‘Geister Der Nacht’), and special thank you for the lorry’s extraordinary musicality as he is able to blast his horn right on the onset of a musical silence. Still, the overall performance was very enjoyable and very well received!

Edward Elgar: Salut d’Amour (Love’s Greeting) - upon completion of the first piece, I did threaten the residents that that would not be the last they would be hearing of Elgar tonight. However, this piece is much more well known and not typically a piano piece. However, I left them with this delightful piano rendition and they loved it!

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Jack Mitchell Smith is a piano teacher based in Congleton, Cheshire. Click here to find out more.

Weekly blogs are posted that may help you with your musical or piano journey. Click here to sign up to the mailing list so you never miss a post!

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#pianoplayer #classicalpiano #classicalpianist #classicalmusic #musician #pianist #pianorecital #pianoconcert #nantwich

Relatively Speaking: Finding the Relative Minor

When we start to learn about scales and / or key signatures, we often begin so by learning major keys and major scales. However, what we don’t always immediately appreciate is that by using 95% of knowledge that we already pick up from these, we can also learn an equal amount of minor scales, thus doubling our scale repertoire.

All we need to do is to learn one of a few simple tactics to help us in find the relative minor of our major scale / major key, and that is what we will explore here.

But first, a refresher…

What is Major and Minor?

When we talk about major and minor, we’re really talking about tonality. Tonality refers in its simplest form to the mood of a piece of music, and ultimately the reasons for many these moods can be traced to one of two tonalities:

• Major: can sound happy, fun, optimistic / hopeful, funny / amusing, light.

  
  

• Minor: can sound sad, melancholy, pessimistic, frightening, dark.

Our major scales follow the typical “do-re-mi” pattern of a scale, which is tone, tone, semitone, tone, tone, tone, semitone up to the root. By changing the order of these tones and semitones, however, we can create a minor scale starting from the same note. A typical minor scale might be tone, semitone, tone, tone, semitone, tone, tone, tone up to the root (natural minor), and by starting on the same note and changing those tones and semitones around a bit we create what is called a parallel minor (e.g. G major and G minor are parallel major and minor of one another - they share the root note / tonic note).

But that’s a touch convoluted to learn a system of tones and semitones. What is easier still is for you to learn minor scales as relative minors because - if you do do this - you can understand how key signatures slot together more and much more easily work out the notes in a minor scale based around the major scale.

What is a Relative Minor?

A Relative Minor is a minor key or a minor scale that shares the same rules as its relative major. By rules, we are referring to sharps or flats that are found within that key.

For example, D major features two sharps - F♯ and C♯.

Somewhere on the keyboard there is a scale / key that follows these same rules but starts on a different note, thus creating the rearranged tone / semitone configuration and creating a minor tone, but not starting on the same note - therefore creating a different key!

All we have to do is find it!

So let’s have an explore of a few techniques we can look at to establish what it is…

Finding the Relative Minor

The Interval Method

Perhaps the most straightforward method to learn is to count up or down the scale in intervals. This is straightforward because it uses what you already know - the major scale and single digit numbers - to find your answer. You just have to remember which direction and which number!

Always count your root note / tonic as number 1 and count up your major scale to 6.

Alternatively, count down your major scale to 3.

Let’s use our D major to exemplify:

Counting up:

D = 1

E = 2

F♯ = 3

G = 4

A = 5

B = 6

…or backwards:

D = 1

C♯ = 2

B = 3

…and there is your answer!

Hold that thought whilst we just explore a slightly different method…

The Triad Chord Method

Naturally, this technique comes more into its own when you’re more confident with triad chords, But when you are it becomes much easier to visualise the relative minor on a keyboard, thus getting your answer much more quickly!

Remembering that our triad chords are made up of intervals root - 3 - 5, remember that the bottom two notes of our major triad will be the top two or the relative minor triad.

So D major as a triad chords is

D

F♯

A

The bottom two notes are D and F♯, so our relative minor is (root) - D - F♯.

If you know what note needs to go at the bottom to complete this minor triad chord, you win.

It’s B!

Playing Minor Scales based around the Relative Major

Now we have established that B is the relative minor of D major, we can put into practice our skills and play a B minor scale!

All you have to do is remember that it shares the same ‘rules’ as its relative major, thus it features F♯ and C♯. Therefore, we can play a B minor scale as:

B - C♯ - D - E - F♯ - G - A - B

This creates the most basic form of a minor scale and is known as the ‘natural minor’. Be aware that other forms are available! For example, the ‘harmonic minor’ features a raised seventh and the ‘melodic minor’ comes down differently to how it goes up! Read this blog here for more information on learning the different types, but this blog you are reading now was written more with the intention of helping you identify the relative minor and putting it into practice.

One Last Trick…

Because majors and their relative minors share their sharps or flats, it is fair to recognise that using the key signature at the beginning of a piece of music could potentially mean the piece could be in either key!

So, if you see a piece that appears to be in D major because it has two sharps and flats in the key signature:…

…then do remember it might also be in its relative minor - B minor.

Take a look at this excerpt from a score by Haydn below to see a couple of tricks as to how you could learn to recognise by just looking:

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Jack Mitchell Smith is a piano teacher based in Congleton, Cheshire. Click here to find out more.

Weekly blogs are posted that may help you with your musical or piano journey. Click here to sign up to the mailing list so you never miss a post!

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