Quick question :)

[Pottish]

Sorry if i'm beating a dead horse again possibly but I have a quick question reguarding my left hand technique.

Suppose I'm holding a root (eg A) with my middle finger, a note with my index (C#M3) and the octave with my pinky or something similar, my ring finger locks. I mean seriously just tenses itself being still attached to my middle finger. Been playing consistantly for about a year now so I'm starting to get ok with my left hand but this problem wont go away.

Not worth a thread on it's own so i'll pop this in too. Any tips for counting sixteenths? I'm ok at counting 4th's and 8th notes or say something like 1....and2.....and3......and4 where the 16th would be easy to pull count instinct. But take a bar with a quarter note or 2 8th's and then a group of 16th's it throws my mental counting out the window lol. I'm aware it's good just to go by flow and not count but counting is helping me quite a lot at the moment I think.

Many thanks for reading

[DrVenkman]

An idea on the 16th notes, which may or may not help:

Quarter notes you count "one, two, three....", presumably, and eigth notes as "one and two and three and ....". Have you tried counting sixteenths as "one-two-three-four two-two-three-four three-two-three-four ...."?

That gets very hard to do at faster tempos, and frankly I don't do it. I've spent years playing trumpet in a brass band that played lots of Sousa marches so things like straight 16's are just ingrained. Maybe slow down, practice with counting until it gets to be more second nature?

[amosjones]

for the left hand part of your question. I would do some hand exercises focused on moving your fingers independently, not just on your bass. It may take a while but eventually you will be able to control all of your fingers individually.

[rpsands]

I count sixteenths as "TTTT" and don't count 1/2/3/ whatever. The syllable counting method is really cool but it takes a while to develop a sense of where 1 is - but it does come. The system I use is T for 16ths, TA for 8ths, Too for quarters, and stretching out for longer (e.g. too-oo). Got a book that is just full of rhythm figures I use for practice Really awesome.

I found counting 1-e-and-a- works but it's hard to say out loud when you get going fast.

[251]

Originally Posted by Pottish

Sorry if i'm beating a dead horse again possibly but I have a quick question reguarding my left hand technique.

Suppose I'm holding a root (eg A) with my middle finger, a note with my index (C#M3) and the octave with my pinky or something similar, my ring finger locks. I mean seriously just tenses itself being still attached to my middle finger. Been playing consistantly for about a year now so I'm starting to get ok with my left hand but this problem wont go away.

Not worth a thread on it's own so i'll pop this in too. Any tips for counting sixteenths? I'm ok at counting 4th's and 8th notes or say something like 1....and2.....and3......and4 where the 16th would be easy to pull count instinct. But take a bar with a quarter note or 2 8th's and then a group of 16th's it throws my mental counting out the window lol. I'm aware it's good just to go by flow and not count but counting is helping me quite a lot at the moment I think.

Many thanks for reading

Many people count 16ths as; 1 e & a, 2 e & a, 3 e & a, 4 e & a
where e is a long ee as in 'feed', a is short like 'again' & = and

For your ring finger, why not try what ERB players do & use both ring & pinky to fret that note?

Of course there's an old vaudeville joke that goes; Doctor it hurts when I do this. The Dr replies, Don't do that.

Hope that helps. 8-)

[DarkArwen]

I don't really have any help (except that I 2nd the 1 e & a thing) but my ring finger doesn't always do what I want it to do as fast as I want it to do it. I don't have that problem in the major configuration you just described. I have that problem in minor. So I can play the first, then the minor 3rd, but when I go to use my ring finger to play the 5th.. well....
It is for that reason that I still can't play I want you back...