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Ring Finger
Due to an accident years ago I lost use of my DIP joint, closest to tip, in my ring finger. It’s fused straight. Well, as you can imagine, it makes guitar a challenge as I cannot arc my finger and end up muting strings. Anyway, any advice?
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7 Replies
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Play left-handed.
Easier to compensate with the strumming/finger-picking hand than the fretting hand.
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That’s funny. I can barely open a beer with my left hand!….lol.
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@SDConn So sorry about your accident but glad you are being persistent about your guitar playing life!! There’s lots of things you can try!!
Most of them might involve learning less complex chords- With your ring finger being fused, I would try to learn some chord shapes that only involve fretting 1-2 strings for each chord. That way you can fret with your more agile fingers.
You might want to start studying music theory as it will help you learn chord structure and which chord tones make a chord live up to its name… That will help you decide which notes in the chord to leave out. Also keep in mind that just because there is a barre chord staring at you from the page, you can always just fret/play the 3 high strings.
And one more thing, you could start playing around with open tunings. Open G, Open D, DADGAD. Most of the open tunings only require 1-2 strings to be fretted for many chords and arrangements. There’s tons of tabs out there for open tuning songs…
Hope some of this is helpful. And your determination and persistence are surely an inspiration to all!!!!!
Cheers, Carol
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<div>Hi, that’s a bummer but I agree with Carol; you can easily find alternative fingerings for most chords on YouTube. Lauren Bateman is a superb teacher and she has addressed this issue in her video
<yt-formatted-string force-default-style=””>BEGINNERS Instantly Play ALL Major & Minor Guitar Chords with 2 Finger. </yt-formatted-string><yt-formatted-string force-default-style=””>
</yt-formatted-string></div><yt-formatted-string force-default-style=””>I disagree with Moose; I am left handed but persevered for 6 months playing right-handed and it totally destroyed my enjoyment of the instrument, I simply could not fret with my dominant hand. It sounds counter-intuitive but that was my experience. </yt-formatted-string>
<yt-formatted-string force-default-style=””>I strongly urge you to live with your limitation but simply work around it. For instance the “F-word”…….for the life of me I can’t play a barred F-chord but there are a few easy alternatives that sound pretty much identical and that suits me fine – I’m not aiming for perfection, ‘sounds ok’ is fine by me.</yt-formatted-string>
<div><yt-formatted-string force-default-style=””></yt-formatted-string></div>
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I’m going to elaborate a little on my play left-handed comment. Sorry if I go a little too deep into neuroplasticity and the brain.
It should not matter which hand you learn to fret with. It is a new skill that your brain has never encountered. The brain learns new skills through focused activity and repetition. When these two things occur it actually changes the neural pathways in your brain and creates routines in your subconscious. Many people refer to this as “muscle memory”. You could learn to play with your feet for that matter, it doesn’t matter to the brain. The key is to have focused regular practice for the skill you want to learn.
You could learn to modify chord shapes to accommodate your injury, the challenge is that you will be somewhat on your own trying to figure out those modifications, as most lessons make assumptions about chord shapes. As you learn music theory and the fretboard modifications will be come much easier, but it is probably 6-9 months into your guitar journey and it’s going to be frustrating getting there.
Justin of JustinGuitar, has played his guitar right-handed for 30+ years, but to validate his beginner course he went through the lessons playing left-handed (they are documented on YouTube under Nitsuj, Justin spelled backwards). He had the same struggles as any beginner but eventually developed the “muscle memory” in order to play proficiently left-handed. So it’s not impossible, it’s just what you practice.
There is a great book on how the brain learns and talks about learning stringed instruments, “The Laws of Brainjo” by Turknett. Highly recommended for understanding the process of learning a new skill like the guitar.
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thanks Moose for the followup. Super interesting and thought provoking too. Now to find the Brainjo book : )
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That’s awesome. Thanks for the replies! I replied to Moose408 that his comment made me burst out laughing. I can barely open a beer with my left hand……lol.
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