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Short fingers – small hands
Any suggestions for cords when you have short fingers. I cannot place my palm close to the neck to get my fingers to arch, no matter how many times I try. This is exactly why I gave up trying to learn 20 years ago. Frustrated!!
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6 Replies
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@NSmith Gladd you’re here and giving it another try. Try pushing your palm downwards toward the floor. This forces your fingers to arch more. Also, it’s very important to stretch before and after you play. This should help also. Ine Skills Section, there is a stretching video. You could also look into getting a guitar with a thinner neck.
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I had that suggested to me many years ago. But since my Martin was relatively new I didn’t want the additional expense. This time however I felt the time was right. At the recommendation of one of the techs at Sweetwater I ordered the Taylor GS Mini Mahogany Acoustic Guitar. Should be delivered tomorrow. I really hope this is the answer.
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Hi @NSmith Welcome to TAC. Loraine mentioned stretching and I have to iterate that point. There is another type of stretch to consider and it involves flexion and stretch simultaneously. It took me a long time to develop the muscles to be able to do it so be patient and persistent if you can’t do it now. Try touching the pads (the soft palm side parts) of your first (the distal phalages) finger sections to the bottom pad (the proximal phalanges) so that your finger do not touch the pads of your hand. I still have a hard time doing this with my pinky but getting better all the time…measured in microns. Also, You may have to position your thumb on the neck of the guitar below the center line of the neck on the back of the neck to give yourself the finger reach you need to get to the lowest bass stings easily (E and A string). One last thing. Try and find a player on youtube that has similar hand size and body type as you do and see how they adjust to compensate for the finger size. I have the problem of big fat sausage fingers and I found a guy with similar fingers and build (Paul Huemiller) and it was helpful for me to watch him play and see how he deals with it. No guarantees but you may glean a little insight that may help you. No one comes to mind immediately but someone else may know and throw out a name: one of the beauties of the TAC forum. Let us know how it goes.
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The GS mini should help some as it’s a smaller neck size. Maybe get a single in-person lesson with someone local who can actually work with you on hand position. It’s not really intuitive and, with a larger neck I can see how you could have problems but they should be correctable in most cases. Good luck and enjoy that Mini…it’s a great guitar!
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@NSmith just a quick comment here but proper form and ergonomics go really far in your case. If you are taking lessons, have your teacher review those things with you, and if you’re a self-learner, I could suggest researching classical form. Maybe borrow a few of the posture/ergonmics from that style of play, it could help you.
Also, there’s a few ways around this… Have you tried playing slide, or dobro? Also open tunings could be your friend here as well. Open tunings usually involve alot less note fretting for the left hand. Many unreachable 4 note fretted chords suddenly become 1 fretted note chords (or zero) with open tunings. If you use Tabulature for standard tuning, there’s absolutely zero learning curve, as you just change your tuning and read the open tuning Tabs just the same as with standard.
Best wishes, and wow, a mahogany GS Mini!!! Happy NGD to you 🙂
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I have a GS Mini myself and love it. I don’t think i’ll ever go back to a full size guitar. The guitar I use the most is a 1/2 size Cordoba Classical guitar. A little smaller than the GS-Mini and nylon strings. I picked it up super cheap on sale for $65. I use it all the time!! Don’t give up, you’ll love your GS-Mini, but if you still have some issues with those fingers look around for a used 1/2 size nylon string model. Good Luck!
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