Thumb pick or not

[Wooly]

I'm one who has always used a thumb pick. It's not something that I had to get accustomed to. It came naturally to me and I find it cumbersome not to be using one.

Which brings the question. Can one get used to fingerstyle with and without using one? In some tunes, it's almost a must to use one as in Travis picking or if you want to mute the lower strings with your palm heel. Then in some songs the thumb pick seems to be a bit too much.

How many of you do either one? How hard is it to get accustomed to?

[frankhond]

I do with and without. No reason to limit yourself. The hand position will be different with different possibilities and tones. That’s what makes it fun.

I started without and one day went cold turkey playing with thumb pick for about six months. After that I just pick and choose.

[DukeX]

I appreciate those who use thumb picks, but they are not for me. I have a thumb with a callous. Works for me. I don't grow my nails either.

[H165]

Mark Knopfler seems to get along fine without one.

[PetesaHut]

Originally Posted by Wooly

I'm one who has always used a thumb pick. It's not something that I had to get accustomed to. It came naturally to me and I find it cumbersome not to be using one.

Which brings the question. Can one get used to fingerstyle with and without using one? In some tunes, it's almost a must to use one as in Travis picking or if you want to mute the lower strings with your palm heel. Then in some songs the thumb pick seems to be a bit too much.

How many of you do either one? How hard is it to get accustomed to?

Tommy Emmanuel encourages using one, don't think I've ever seen him play without one?

[Pitar]

Naturally adapted to using one does not describe me. It took about a week to become accustomed to its use and about a month to feel natural with one. After that I couldn't play without one, nor would I want to.

Prior to using a thumb pick I was sorely needing a better bass and low mid presence in my playing. I knew that early on after becoming pretty adept at finger picking. I half-heartedly made several attempts to use a thumb pick but opted out of the trade-off between pain and gain. Add into that the excuse of being an old dog incapable of new tricks and you have me.

Seriously though, playing now without a thumb pick isn't playing to me. It's an experiment in compromising the music.

People will note that the pinch band is intolerable and the blade's distance to the strings is defeating when addressing the use of one. I say the pinch band is manageable with time and the blade distance is no more a struggle than it was when learning to use the fingers. The latter transpired so long ago for most of us that we've forgotten how we initially stumbled along until it became 2nd nature for the fingers. Same applies to the thumb.

[macmanmatty]

I use both a thumb pick and just my plain old thumb. I use finger-picks with my thumb pick and bare fingers when I use my bare thumb. I can do a lot more with my bare thumb. But when playing at a venue once you go thumb / finger picks the sound man / woman will not let you use bare fingers ever again because it makes their job much easier. With a bare thumb strumming up is possible and strumming while finger picking is possible(possible with thumb pick too but you can't strum up and it doesn't sound as nice) A thumb -pick does make it easier to do all of my fancy bass note picking though and if you want want palm mute like Merle Travis and play his fast alternating bass lines you NEED a thumb pick.

[Silly Moustache]

I'm primarily a flat -picker but I use a thumb (and finger) picks when playing dobro or Weissenborn.

Never got the hang of them on flat tops, but I have good string nails (which I keep as short as possible) so they are my choice.

[Kerbie]

I do both, probably more without the thumb pick than with. I played for decades without, then played all the time with one and now I bounce back and forth. It took a little bit to get used to it, but it wasn't terrible. I use a Fred Kelly speed pick, but I had to trim and file it down a little. It was just too long... too far from the string.

[ljguitar]

Originally Posted by Wooly

How many of you do either one? How hard is it to get accustomed to?

Hi W

With practice, it's easily done. Human hands are pretty adaptable.

[LyleGorch]

Eddie Lang used one.

[Jacob Reinhart]

I love fingerstyle for many reasons and one is that I don't have to worry about having picks nearby. I have played with one but now play entirely without. I like the simplicity of it,

[JonPR]

I'm the opposite. Find nails much more comfortable and natural, never managed to get used to a thumbpick.

I don't regard it as a "must" for Travis picking at all. I can rest my hand on the bridge to damp the strings and still get my thumbnail to pick the bass strings.

The advantage of a thumbpick is simply that it gives more volume. I can appreciate that if one is playing without amplification - as all the old blues fingerpickers were, which is also why many of them used resonators as well as thumbpicks. And of course if one's nails can't be grown successfully (without chipping or breaking) then a thumbpick makes sense.

[merlin666]

When I started playing and learning fingerstyle I always used a thumbpick, even through the years that I considered my prime playing years. Then I moved on to electric guitar playing heavier stuff and eventually stopped playing for decades. When I started playing again it was pure acoustic and I focused on accompanying my singing, and when I tried finger style again it was absolutely impossible to use a thumbpick again. I tried a bunch of materials, shapes, and sizes and nothing worked. But I was lucky to find an awesome guitar (Adamas 1687) that has an incredible bass response by just being played with my bare thumb. So I am back to some pickin all au naturel.

[Blueridgebound]

I do a mix of fingerstyle and strumming. I've tried several thumbpicks. Fred Kelly's speedpick is the closest thing to my liking. But my all time fav is the tone of my fingernails. While I prefer my fingernails. I also run into breaking them during everyday life. Every so often I try thumb picks again. I suppose if I stuck with them I'd grow to be comfortable with them. Just haven't yet.