What is the best warm up for intermediate and advanced piano players?

Just like a basketball player must stretch before practice or a game, you should warm up before practicing or performing on the piano. Warmup exercises help you avoid injury and have the added bonus of helping your brain wake up before really diving into playing.

There are scales and arpeggios, which all of the great pianists play (trust us!), etudes, and many different exercises that you can use to warm up your hands and your mind. While knowing and playing at least a few of Chopin’s Etudes would be the very best thing you can do for your piano technique, there’s one powerful exercise not everyone knows about: the 11 Arpeggios.

This excellent warm-up for pianists consists of a sequence that includes:

• Major and minor triads
• Major and minor first inversions
• Major and minor second inversions
• A dominant 7th arpeggio
• A 6/5 inversion
• A 4/3 inversion
• A 4/2 inversion
• A diminished 7th arpeggio

Here’s the progression if we start from C:

1. C
2. Cm
3. A♭6
4. Am6
5. F6/4
6. Fm6/4
7. C7
8. A♭6/5
9. F4/3
10. D4/2
11. Cdim

The YouTube video below shows the fingering for 11 arpeggios from C. I recommend that you try it from other keys – be smart about the fingering!

Remember, a piano player is only as good as their piano technique is. This exercise is excellent to warm up and improve your piano technique! Try incorporating it into your daily routine.

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