Adventures in new fingerpicks ...

[TBman]

Originally Posted by JayBee1404

I’ve tried virtually every type of fingerpick known to man and beast, including the three kinds in the OP’s post. The Fred Kelly Freedom picks were a painful, dull-sounding waste of time, the Alaska Piks were not painful but never felt secure, plastic picks also felt insecure, clumsy, and sounded way too dull.

Propik Fingertones (the ones with the split wrap) are top of the pile AFAIC. Easily adjusted for a comfortable fit, nice warm tone but with clarity in individual notes, not ‘clicky’, and the hole in the blade gives a good ‘feel’ of the string. Their only drawback is that, like all ‘traditional-style’ fingerpicks, they don’t permit down-strokes, only up-strokes, but that’s OK for Travis picking and suits my playing style. Highly recommended.

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I forgot that I have these. I'll have to try them on my steel strings.

[K-wey]

Originally Posted by TBman

Try these. I like them and the Alaska.

https://kalenainstruments.com/products/fingerpick

Thanks, TBman. I just ordered two sets of Kalena picks.

=K

[Guitars44me]

I have tried all the above over the last 30 years. The fake nails messed with my natural nails too, but it took about 10 years. Plus the glue ons are a big pain when one comes loose at a gig!


I found I really like the Fred Kelly Freedom picks. The clear ones seem to put out a bit more treble to me… but good luck finding one on the floor at a gig!

They seem sized small. If you want Larger call them and they can make some.
Which they will still label L. Hahaha

I only use one, on my index, and a Dunlop large on my thumb. My other fingers join the dance too, most of the time, but more than one fingerpick is just too fiddley for me.

One cool thing about the FKs is you can strike the strings in both directions. Major plus for me.

They need to be a bit tight, and I find it is good to take ‘em off for a tune once in awhile. Which does give me a different and more mellow tone.

And, I too have found a dab of spit holds em well. Works on a bottleneck type slide too!

Just my take

Have fun experimenting!

Paul

[K-wey]

Originally Posted by TBman

Try these. I like them and the Alaska.

https://kalenainstruments.com/products/fingerpick

TBman - my Kalena fingerpicks arrived today and they are a clear winner.

Runner up is the Alaska pick set.

But the Kalena are my new instant favorites.

Thank you!

=K

[TBman]

Originally Posted by K-wey

TBman - my Kalena fingerpicks arrived today and they are a clear winner.

Runner up is the Alaska pick set.

But the Kalena are my new instant favorites.

Thank you!

=K

Good to hear it!

[JayBee1404]

Originally Posted by TBman

Try these. I like them and the Alaska.

https://kalenainstruments.com/products/fingerpick

Barry, following your link I get ‘404 error - page not found’.

[Silly Moustache]

Originally Posted by K-wey

For ten or twelve years, I've been CA-gluing hard acrylic nails on top of my natural nails to play steel sting guitars fingerstyle. Everyone knows that's not good for your real nails. Several months ago I had to pull off the acrylics and give my real nails a rest, and time to heal and grow out. They were in bad shape.

So I began trying out various slip-on alternatives for fingerpicks and thought some of you might be interested or might want to comment.

1) Standard plastic tortoise-shell color finger picks. These are way too loose on my fingers so I taped them down with strips of fiberglass packing tape. (An old technique, BTW - I found a video of John Fahey playing live on German TV, and he was using exactly this technique.)

Verdict: Very fiddly about getting the exact position right on the fingertip to get a consistent pluck angle. Wrapping and re-wrapping the tape for correct tension. I got acceptable results, but it takes a few minutes. Okay tone, a bit dark.



2) Fred Kelly: These slip over the end of your fingertip and don't rotate. I put these in boiling water for a few minutes to soften the Delrin plastic and then jammed them on my fingertips to mold them a bit. Uncomfortable for a minute but not unbearable. The plastic doesn't change shape much.

Playing with them on is at first like trying to ballet dance in wooden clogs. Takes some getting used to but you get used to it. They won't rotate on your fingertips. They do have the correct angle for plucking and I could get pretty accurate after a few minutes of sounding horrible. Main beef is that they take a lot of the sparkle/ highs off the treble strings.




3) Alaska picks: The idea here is that you slip them over your fingertip, then hook your nail over the last bit of pick. I get it. I also can't do that since I have no nail extension (they're all filed down, to heal). So I just put them on and played them like the Kellys. It's a tight fit and that's a good thing. They don't rotate either.

Great treble sparkle and perhaps the easiest of these three systems to get used to. Certainly the least alarming-looking. The last bit of pick is perhaps too long but you can file them or snip them back. I was initially hitting other strings with them, which while inaccurate gave a weird sort of cool sloppy Kottke ringing chime of unexpected notes and overtones. But like the others, I got used to them in five minutes or so and was playing pretty accurately.




Hope this was useful. What other kinds of fingerpicks and systems have you folks used?

=K

K-Way, I'm really concerned for you having these issues, as you seem to be using these finger picks wrongly.
I write this onlt because I'm concerned that you might damage your fingertips and nails.

The action of the "naked" finger, or nail is upward and so the finger picks are used with the blade resting on the pad (where your finger print is)
i.e. the tortoise coloured picks are upside down, and I can't imagine how you could play easily the way you show.

We have a great finger picker who comes to my club who tried the finger "clogs" once when he broke one of his nails.

It was not a great success and, yes, they seemed to mute his tone considerably.

I have a set of the Alaska picks - I have no idea why.
I found them positively painful, and potentially dangerous to your nails.

I only ever used finger picks (propiks) on Dobro and Hawaiian, and I have thick and fast growing nails - but I know that many finger pickers play with just the flesh of fingers and thumb, which I guess will harden like the fretting fingers after a short while.

[phcorrigan]

I have tried a dozen or more different styles and makes of fingerpicks, and I've come back to the old standard Dunlop/National-style metal picks. I've settled on Dunlop .025 brass picks. For my thumb I use Dunlop Ultex picks.

[garyrogue1]

I use nails/flesh, never could bet use to fingerpicks, but probably never gave them good try out. I'd do a few plucks and decide these are not for me.

[6L6]

Originally Posted by Nymuso

Yup. After trying various adhesives over the years and even gluing sandpaper inside the finger picks, I read this tidbit on a banjo forum. It’s free, readily available, works better than anything else and keeps people from stealing your finger picks.

THIS ^ ^ ^ ^ ^