Are You Left or Right Handed? and how do you play?

[Silly Moustache]

Hi, I just stumbled on some Y/T vids about lefthanded guitarists etc., and it made me think.
I'm left handed but play righty and I know from a quick search that there are lots of us who are the same.
But another google search suggests that only 10% of us humans are left handed and I wonder whether that is true here.
So here's a quick poll to see what kind of percentage we get.

[Steadfastly]

Ambidextrous but only when playing hockey.

[Mandobart]

You are correct in the numbers. According to Google about 11% of the US population is sinister. I've been working in the nuclear power field all my adult life (started on nuclear powered subs in the navy as a child -17). I'm now a senior reactor operator and shift manager at a 1200 MWe power plant. I've found over my 37 year career that about half of all power plant operators are southpaws.

I started playing violin when I was 10. I learned right-handed (early orchestras found there were too many bow to the eye injuries involving mixing dexter and sinister stand partners I guess). Anyway playing violin left handed felt just as unnatural to me as playing right handed. The pattern remained as I learned guitar, bass guitar, mandolin, etc.

[swarfrat]

Righty but my son is lefty. I tried to convince him that I don't care what hand you write with, and I will do everything in my power to remove obstacles from your path. But if you play guitar left handed don't whine to me when you set your heart on a 57 p-bass in Sherwood green and can't find one. (No clue if that's an actual combination, but you get the idea.)

If we waited until he was 9 or 12 to start i might have succeeded. But he wanted to play bass when he was 3, and I could not get him to pick it up right handed to save his life. Now he's five and switches around, but seems pretty consistently left handed on writing.

(And yes, I did manage to put a left handed u-bass in my 3yo's hands. We had to make our own body tho)

As a righty, when I pick up his instruments, I find it far easier to play upside down right than left handed. My right hand does not know how to fret, and my left does not know how to pick. I have set my drum kit up left handed before, and it rocked for my hands, but my feet could not switch jobs.

[Steadfastly]

Originally Posted by swarfrat

Righty but my son is lefty. I tried to convince him that I don't care what hand you write with, and I will do everything in my power to remove obstacles from your path. But if you play guitar left handed don't whine to me when you set your heart on a 57 p-bass in Sherwood green and can't find one. (No clue if that's an actual combination, but you get the idea.)

If we waited until he was 9 or 12 to start i might have succeeded. But he wanted to play bass when he was 3, and I could not get him to pick it up right handed to save his life. Now he's five and switches around, but seems pretty consistently left handed on writing.

(And yes, I did manage to put a left handed u-bass in my 3yo's hands. We had to make our own body tho)

As a righty, when I pick up his instruments, I find it far easier to play upside down right than left handed. My right hand does not know how to fret, and my left does not know how to pick. I have set my drum kit up left handed before, and it rocked for my hands, but my feet could not switch jobs.

Yes, we are right or left footed and well as right or left handed. As a ski instructor, you especially notice it when people stop. Righties usually do it right footed and lefties left footed, even when proficient at doing both. Watch this next time you see ski racing and they stop at the bottom.

[Athens]

I should have been left handed but had it beaten out of me at an early age in Parochial School.

I write right handed ( very poorly, I might add) but everything else I favor my left hand. But..... I play guitar right handed because when I started the existance of left handed guitars was completely unknown to me.

I think that's why I gravitated toward fingerstyle. Lot's more going on with your left hand in fingerstyle than just strumming and it just came easy to me.

Good poll!

[devellis]

Also, watch people kick something that's on the ground. They'll use their dominant foot, assuming the object is equally reachable with either foot. This is used as part of some developmental tests to determine kids' dominance.

Guitar (like some other instruments) is a special case because (a) most guitars are set up for righties and (b) dexterity in the fretting hand is an asset. Also, I think a lot of lefties lean more toward ambidexterity than righties do, if for no other reason than their having to negotiate a predominantly right-handed world. So, for many of us lefties, just learning the guitar right-handed makes sense and is the path of least resistance. Most other things I do lefty (writing, drawing, racquet sports, shooting, archery, using a mouse, etc.). But playing guitar (and banjo and mandolin and fiddle) right-handed always seemed perfectly natural. The left hand has a lot to do on stringed instruments and I'm glad for the strength and dexterity of it being my dominant hand. I do suspect, though, that my right hand is slower than that of a lot of natural righties, especially with a flatpick but fingerpicking, as well. Oh well. Everything's a trade-off.

[Bob Womack]

I'm profoundly left-handed, footed, eared, and eyed. I write, shoot, eat etc., lefty. But practicality has made me learn many things right-handed, including guitar.

And here's a funny one: I punt right-footed and kick off left-footed. Funny, huh? Don't know why.

Bob

[tippy5]

I got an email from Reverb that they are going to have a left handed Reverb site.

BTW: FACTS, Mam, nothing but the FACTS....
I heard it was 16% not 11%, years ago.
I used to surf right foot forward which is rarer than the other way around.

[sakar12]

Yes I am. And I play lefty too.

[Jeremy]

I'm a lefty that plays righty. I'm glad for it, because right-handed guitars are much easier to come by.

[s2y]

Lefty playing righty.

[menhir]

Another natural lefty who was trained as a rightly since 1st grade.

From what my mother told me, it wasn't a matter of forcing me (or beating me ) into right- handedness. She was told that I tested adept enough with my right hand that it was worth the change. It wasn't a dogmatic choice by the school...I know many of my classmates remained lefties.

I wouldn't call myself ambidextrous, though. Although, even today, I don't feel a strong natural preference for either hand when using a tool or utensil, if I learned something right handed, that's what I tend to favor.

I would often eat lefty because I learned that before school. I was already in college before I switched so I wouldn't be bumping elbows with my friends at the cafeteria table.

I can write with my left hand, but not nearly as well as my right. I was taught to writey rightey.

I probably taught myself guitar right handed because I never knew, way back then when I finally saved enough Green Stamps to buy my first one, that there was any other option. I couldn't even imagine playing lefty at this point.

I'm right eye dominant though. That would make sense to the archers and shooters out there. And I almost always cut myself when I shave with my right hand...never a problem with my left.

Yup. I'm all mixed up.

[Moocheng]

left handed playing lefty,

never found it a disadvantage apart from the limited choice of instruments but even thats not so much of a problem these days. When I started out most were converted rightys, real leftys were as rare as hens teeth back then.

there's also advantages /
its real easy to watch what right handers are playing.
and no one wants to play your guitar,

[JimC1702]

Left handed but play right handed.

I eat, write, throw, bowl, and shoot lefty but golf, bat, and play guitar righty.

Jim