Ask Augustin 36 - Chromatic Scales

In this episode I talk about chromatic scales. They can be tricky to play evenly and cleanly, because they require quite a lot of shifting, but they are encountered in so many pieces that it's a great time investment to work on them. You can reuse similar fingerings no matter what key you are in (since it's a chromatic scale), unlike other scales, where the fingerings will change depending on the key.
I personally like fingerings for chromatic scales that have more shifts that are all very small (just half-step shifts), rather than fewer shifts that are big, which make it harder to play the scale smoothly. But both types of fingerings have their uses and are worth practicing, and practicing either one can be useful for your left-hand technique overall. If chromatic scales are an issue, it is useful to practice them at different speeds and starting on different notes. The main things to pay attention to are: that the shifts are clean, the half-steps are all evenly spaced, that the scale has musical direction, and that the right hand remains independent and is not affected by everything going on with the left hand.