Right-Hand Technique: Place Fingers in Advance?

[bluesbassdad]

When I briefly took classical guitar lessons in the early 1970s, my teacher insisted that I place the fingers of my right hand in advance whenever possible.

If I were doing p-i-m-a in that order, then all four digits would be placed on the strings simultaneously.

For p-a-m-i only the p and the a would be placed simultaneously.

While this technique enhanced smoothness, it introduced some difficulty in achieving the same attack and volume for each note in the second instance, above.

How do you deal with finger placement in preparation to strike one or more notes in succession?

[rick-slo]

Originally Posted by bluesbassdad

If I were doing p-i-m-a in that order, then all four digits would be placed on the strings simultaneously.

For p-a-m-i only the p and the a would be placed simultaneously.

No in general except as perhaps a training exercise. You might do it in some cases say in a once through ascending or descending arpeggio. Most of the time there will be ringing notes you don't want to damp out and/or you fingers will not be in the right position for it with what comes before or after. Whatever rule you may have heard about don't use it if it does not fit the current situation.

[Odie1974]

I agree with Rick.
Planting RH fingers is usually an exercise / training tool to enhance smoothness of arpeggio movements in the initial stages of learning.
After a while you should be able to have the same smoothness even if you do not plant your fingers.

Generally speaking planting the fingers is useful in the following situations:
1. You want to damp the notes and create a pause in the music,
2. When you start a piece it is good practice to plant all the fingers you need for the first few notes (for both RH and LH), relax and take a breath or two - that assures a clean start of the piece (nothing worse for a morale than a fumbled start).

[sdelsolray]

As mentioned, placement is an exercise to improve technique, but it is also an articulation tool, and a good one at that.