A little Vox Pathfinder 10. I have neighbours so anything bigger would be pointless. I get this, certainly. It's just the hulking great body feels restricting. It also starts to hurt my armpit after a while, where it sits on the edge. I think the problem is I find it impossible not to adopt bad posture when using it, as I'm always straining over its bulk to see what I'm doing.
I've heard good things about those amps. I have played some of Vox's other small amps and been quite impressed. Classic brand for sure.
I know I keep banging on about this and I sincerely hope I'm not beginning to push anyone's patience, but can someone put my mind at rest and tell me this is normal when first starting out. What this guy is playing is irrelevant, as it's finger positions I want to talk about. You can see in the first image I've indicated the position of the guitar's neck in relation to his fingers (primarily his first and fourth). The second image indicates the direction of my fourth finger when trying to form this chord. I try to do this and begin to seriously wonder if there's something wrong with my joints. Other than a severe dislocation, how will I ever train my little finger to point in the direction it does for this guy, or any half-decent guitarist for that matter?
I think the first thing to check is the position of your thumb. That guy has long fingers and is therefore able to wrap his thumb around the top of the neck; my fingers are pretty short, so in order to play that shape I have to bring my thumb all the way to the back of the neck, like in the below photograph, or even further down towards the bottom edge of the neck. Another thing to consider, in order to make this as easy as possible, is neck thickness. Les Pauls in general have pretty meaty necks, so assess which of your guitars have the thinnest neck and maybe practice on that one. But I doubt you're a special case. If you were able to type that post then there's probably nothing wrong with your joints. The pinkie is the weakest finger and is probably the hardest to train. I would advise you to keep on learning your basic open chord shapes that don't require use of the pinkie. Make sure you're able to use your other fingers before singling out your pinkie for scorn.
@Friedrich Kugelschreiber as with most new hobbies I'm trying to run before I can walk, I admit that. When holding the guitar in a normal position, moving my thumb down the back of the neck made things feel even more awkward (and painful) but I did find that if I sit the back of the guitar's body on my thigh (instead of in the recess of the bottom) and lift the neck so that it's up near my face (the whole guitar is now almost vertical) I can get a little closer. But I know that's not the answer as it's a ridiculous way to hold it (although even though the photo's taken from a weird angle, this does appear to be how this guy is holding it too)
Oh, I'm not blaming you at all. Just don't get discouraged because of your pinkie. Whatever works. The guy in the photo is playing classical and uses a footstool to achieve just the effect you describe.
Well, thanks to everyone for all the help over the last few weeks. It has been very helpful and encouraging. But I'm going to try my hardest to avoid this thread now as I can already see it going the same way my writing did when I first joined. I spent all my time asking stupid questions just for reassurance, instead of putting the work in and reaping the rewards in a more practical way. I'm sorry if that sounds ungrateful, it's not meant to. Also, please feel free to keep posting anything guitar-related, as I'll always be interested in reading such matter.
Looks like a standard D chord with his pinky hitting the B note to turn it quickly into an F# Major triad. Sorry... couldn't resist. The dude in the image looks like he's got his thumb ready to fret the F# on the low E string to add a base note to that D chord (F# is the major third of D). I've always liked using my thumb to hit quick base notes without wasting my index finger. The problem with your fingers @OurJud is that they're not guitar fingers yet. They haven't "learned" how to stretch. That will come with time and practice. The pinky especially kind of wants to shrivel up and disappear when the other three are engaged. I would recommend getting your pinky involved in the early stages of your development so it learns how to behave. Though several great guitar players don't use their pinky much at all. I believe Slash falls into that group. A quick search here brought up a thread with all sort of names.
When I started playing the B7 was the hardest If you feel cramped the classic guitars have a wider spacing. I actually changed my 12 string to a classic by changing the nut and lacing 6 strings. I’m always looking for the easy way, so I changed to a bass guitar. Now I’m always counting, looking for the bridge or the turnaround. I think I’ll go back to playing the blues on my guitar. Something from Jimmy Reed.
Agreed. That's the first "exotic" open chord you see on in the beginner's handbook. But it's usually the first cool moveable chord you learn, and the shape has a lot of nifty variations. Like 9th and Hendrix chords, which I think is a 7#5 or something kooky. 7th: x 7 6 7 x 7 9th: x 7 6 7 7 7 11th: x 7 7 7 8 7 Hendrix: x 7 6 7 8 x You can make almost any chord sound good from the little off set shape. I always called them "back bar" chords because instead of barring the fret with a single finger and adding notes in from of it--like with standard chords--you kind of bar the fret with multiple fingers and slip in notes behind it. Add in the muted chucks and a few quick blues fills and you have a Stevie Ray Vaughn song!
If I’d known at the time my fingertips wouldn’t fit between the strings I may have considered this aspect.
Believe it or not, I never forced myself to get comfortable with the traditional fingering for the F chord. To this day I just barre it.
Found a video of the way I was originally taught to play the F chord, which is what I'm calling "traditional." Watch the guy's index finger at around the 40 second mark — it's fretting two strings at once. That's what always gave me trouble.
I seem to recall Fmj vexed me too, when I first started. Also, the sound of the chord was unsatisfying; using the four top strings meant it didn't rank well in sonority against other first position chords.
I like to play the F with my thumb wrapped around the neck and the A and high E muted. Like this: 1 x 3 2 1 x It's slide-able anywhere on the neck. The D chord is cool with the F# on the low E fretted with the thumb too. Like this: 2 x 0 2 3 2. Also a slide-able shape. And sometimes using your thumb for bass notes keeps your bend fingers free to hit little licks and fills. Anybody else play with their thumb? I learned it from reading Hendrix tabs that would denote the notes he thumbed... make it much easier to play. My hands are super small so I have to cheat anywhere I can to cover the real estate.
Sometimes, although my hands are too small for it to be very comfortable. I'm more of a lead guy, and I usually don't voice my chords so low in the bass. Sometimes, though, when I'm in an ambient state of mind. I kind of like this thumbed voicing of an F (since we're on the subject of F) with the 11th in the bass: 6 x x 5 6 5 You can throw the pinkie onto the 6th fret of the high e to make it a sus4 chord. Actually, moving from this inverted f chord: 5 x x 5 6 5 to this suspended voicing: 6 x x 5 6 6 is a very nice sound. It's basically "Free Fallin'" I guess. Throw some sevenths in there and you've got a jazz version
Will someone please explain, in layman’s terms, what’s being expressed with all this ‘6 x x 5 6 6’ and ‘2 x 0 3 2’ etc? They look like hieroglyphics to me. Thank you.
Each number is the fret you play on each string. Left to right, low to high. So when we list six numbers, each of those is a guitar string. A G chord written 3 2 0 0 3 3 means you fret the 3rd fret on the lowest string (E string), the second fret on the next lowest (A string), and so on. An 0 indicates an open string (no frets), an X indicates a muted string. And so on.
I've tried that but I'm not comfortable using my thumb, and I was hit or miss with muting the A string. So I don't bother with it.
In the context of chord playing you would usually mute by damping the string with a fretting hand finger, so that it is both fretting the desired note and damping the undesired string. Alternatively, if you're fingerpicking, you could just refrain from plucking the undesired strings. That's often the best way if you can manage it. Actually, one thing that I use the thumb all the time for is muting the low E, especially for open D and A. I think Homer mentioned it already, but that's a great way to do it.
I mute strings all the time, unintentionally, when trying to shape a chord and it sounds absolutely horrible. How do you mute and it sound good?
