Left Hand Little Finger Pain

Hi, I was glad to find your forum looking for help regarding my left hand. Having returned to playing again last year, in recent months I've been making progress with stride style left hand. In my excitement of finally getting somewhere, I think I've over practised with obvious bad technique as my pinky has been in agony for a month now. The pain is in the top knuckle, closest to the fingertip. It was badly swollen for a cpl of weeks and I can feel a knot or fluid moving in the tendon? Thankfully it now seems to be healing. I haven't practised properly for over 3 weeks... My stage piano needed some keys serviced and I took advantage and a break from playing anything else while it was away to help heal. It arrives back next week and I may leave it a while longer in fear it will only aggravate it again at this stage. I think it has came from diving for black keys and striking the corner of the key with the knuckle part of my finger at a 4 or 5 o clock position. I can remember a couple of "owe that hurt" that probably led it on. Any help or advice on healing, technique or exercises would be greatly appreciated as it is distressing not being able to play right now. Edward

Ouch! A distressing injury, and not the type we typically get reported here. If you don't want to re-injure yourself, from what you describe it sounds to me like a major revamp of your technique will be in order. Sorry for the bad news! It sounds as if you have been "karate chopping" the bass notes with the side of your hand almost more than your fifth finger itself - correct me if I'm mistaken. You're going to need to develop a sense of the functional strength of your hand's arch to remedy this - but the fifth, being relatively small and weak, is not the place to start. Get a sense of your hand's wonderful grasping power especially in the strongest fingers, your second and third, and when that's familiar, the whole hand, and then slowly learn to individuate, to get that grasping action at work in the fifth itself. This will take a good deal of time if you want to do it right. Go slow, but really monitor the changes and understand what you have learned; you should do OK. Welcome to the Forum! All best, AFF