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#1
10-08-2020, 11:49 PM
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Advice on Finger Picking
Any advice on how to improve on my finger picking? I am the guitarist at our church and I'm doing an intro to a song finger picking using a pedal (it echos the sound to give it more of a feel). At practice, due to lighting, I lost my way a little and couldn't find the B string easily.
I can finger pick fluently, but not sure if it's nerves or the dimmed lighting. Last edited by Clouds; 10-09-2020 at 12:14 AM. 
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#2
10-09-2020, 03:00 AM
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Quote:
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#5
10-09-2020, 07:08 AM
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I obviously don't know the music you're referring to, but if you can - keep your index finger on the 3rd string, middle finger on the second and ring finger on the first string you can eliminate knowing where the B string is.
__________________
Keith Martin 000-42 Marquis Taylor Classical Alvarez 12 String Gibson ES345s Fender P-Bass Gibson tenor banjo
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#6
10-09-2020, 09:20 AM
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Try practicing without looking at your hands. Then try practicing in relative darkness. That’s a real eye-opener. Not looking is one thing, but when you really can’t see you’ve got to learn to trust your sense of feel.
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-Raf
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#8
10-10-2020, 05:38 AM
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I have taught finger-style guitar (popular styles, not classical technique) for over 40 years. Now, this is a HUGELY controversial subject but I'll dive in anyway: I ALWAYS encourage my students to keep the little finger anchored on the top, slightly behind the sound hole, close to the 1st string, and (important!!!!) with the wrist bent/arched up and fingers slightly cupped with each finger over the string it controls (T = 6,5,4, 1st finger = 3, 2nd finger = 2, 3rd finger = 1). As the player progresses that string control will change from time to time but here's the take-away and why I have seen many, many hundreds of students succeed doing it this way:
If your hand is staying relatively stable over the strings (thanks to the anchored 4th finger) and the fingers are moving a very short distance to the strings they are committed to, you will be accurate and consistent. Allowing different fingers to play the same string - at least in the beginning - is a recipe for missing strings that you WANT to play. And more than anything, the less you move your hand and let the fingers do the work, the better you will play, the sooner you will conquer many, many patterns, the better you will control dynamics, and much more. I absolutely know that some here - including some very respected members - will absolutely reject the above. But as I said, based on better than 40 years of teaching individual lessons to well over 500 students who wanted to learn finger-style, I'll stand by what I said. Good luck with learning finger-style! There are certainly many, many songs that must be strummed and do not lend themselves well to finger-style but those that do sound waaaaay better finger-picked than strummed! Gene
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#9
10-10-2020, 08:48 AM
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Quote:
I'm assuming you meant the picking hand. It's a skill pianists learn. There is no prohibition to looking at your hands when you play, but if you can make the picking hand automatic. As a fingerstyle teacher, if you were debriefing with me (as a student) I'd be advising you that you need to start building skills so as not to even have to think about which string you are playing. And we'd build some repetitive exercises to develop the skill. If you meant that you could not find the string with your fretting hand, then you need to practice the lick a few hundred more times.
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Baby #1.1 Baby #1.2 Baby #02 Baby #03 Baby #04 Baby #05 Larry's songs... …Just because you've argued someone into silence doesn't mean you have convinced them…
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#10
10-10-2020, 09:38 AM
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You might find Some type of advance finger Or thumb planting to be sometimes be helpful.
Here’s a post from another thread on the topic of advance finger / thumb planting: There was a similar thread this past April: https://www.acousticguitarforum.com/...d.php?t=577250 My perspective, quoted from that thread: Whatever works for you is ok. In many situations there is a lot to be said for the stability achieved from planting or anchoring. And there are many ways of planting: - pinky on the soundboard. - pinky or ring finger on the 1st string, or sometimes on the second or 3rd string. - thumb on the soundboard - thumb on the 6th string, OR on whichever string it will play next, OR if you are playing a thumb rest stroke, leave the thumb resting on the string adjacent to the string that was just played - e.g., if you just plucked the 6th string, leave your thumb planted on the 5th string. - if you use rest strokes, sometimes it is advantageous to leave whichever finger just played a rest stroke on the string that it rested on. - palm on the bridge, either muting some or all strings or no strings. - thumb or ring finger or pinky planted on the neck of the guitar when using right hand fingers to tap a note. “ The formal Classical method taught is to loosely hover over the strings never anchoring anywhere. If you want to play and appear to be right to that audience, that's the way to do it. No Classical, or Flamenco guitarist anchors because it inhibits full extension of the fingers, the correct deflection of the strings and remains the most flexible position for the hand. By virtue of anchoring, you minimize that advantage.“ I used to believe that too. Until I studied Flamenco with someone who studied directly with some of the top Flamenco guitarists in Spain back in the 1960s, and he taught me that Thumb plant is essential to Flamenco technique. All the techniques that I mentioned, and probably more, are used by top Classical, Flamenco and Fingerstyle guitarists today. And there are also those who play with the approach that Pitar mentioned. Experiment! Find what works for you. Don’t be afraid to try new approaches, new techniques. Always seek economy of motion, hand stability, and ease of play with musical results. “ And you cannot bring your hand closer to or further from the bridge if you are planted in one spot.” Sure you can move your hand closer or further to or from the bridge while a finger (usually pinky or ring finger) is planted on either the soundboard or on a string. Just slide the planted finger in whichever direction you want to move your hand Here are some links to some traditional classical guitar Right hand planting techniques: https://douglasniedt.com/Tech_Tip_Ri...Arpeggios.html https://www.classicalguitar.org/2009...tial-planting/ https://classicalguitarmagazine.com/...and-dexterity/ Mr. Picky said “But this is dynamic and changes continuously throughout the song....” YES! It’s fine for finger and / or thumb planting and anchoring to be a changing dynamic process as the hands and fingers move, always naturally providing maximum stability and economy of movement. And sometimes best results are achieved by NOT anchoring or planting. It all depends on the finger dynamics of each individual passage, and sometimes there is more than one good way to successfully plant / anchor (or not) to best play any given passage. Anchoring the wrist to the bridge is another way of anchoring for stability that a lot of Fingerstyle guitarists use - sometimes, including Mr. Chet Atkins C.G.P. Another anchoring technique: notice how Sam Meador anchors his pinky (and maybe ring finger) to the neck / edge of the fretboard while tapping: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_8_4XRkm5c
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#11
10-10-2020, 10:54 AM
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Some folks just can't play in the dark. I'm one of them. I play some tough tunes fairly well, including Emmanuel songs. People enjoy when I play. BUT turn off the lights and I am totally lost! Probably don't need the lights, but if you've looked at your hands while learning, in time it becomes an UN-necessary habit.
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