Sore wrist

[Fergie Fulton]

Originally Posted by Rune Bivrin

I guess we'll just have to disagree. A strong and tense tendon flexing over a bent wrist is far more likely to cause issues down the road than a relaxed weak tendon going straight over the wrist.

But there's absolutely nothing wrong with physical excercise, as long as you pay attention to technique. Particularly neck, shoulders and back are areas that can take a hit from the weight of a 6kg piece of wood hanging there for hours on end.

I don't disagree with you, but you have posted two different senarios here. Is it a strong tense tendon or a strong rexaxed tendon, or a week relaxed tendon or a weak tense tendon?

To me this is either a mis-understanding or a mis-representation of the points. The flex of the joint does not have as much relevence in these senarios.
Why not a strong relaxed tendon in both senarios?

[INTP]

You guys have flushed this out. I don't pair strength with being tense. To the contrary, I find that as strength builds, playing becomes more relaxed. It's an important distinction, so it's good that it is being discussed.

[Rune Bivrin]

Originally Posted by Fergie Fulton

I don't disagree with you, but you have posted two different senarios here. Is it a strong tense tendon or a strong rexaxed tendon, or a week relaxed tendon or a weak tense tendon?

To me this is either a mis-understanding or a mis-representation of the points. The flex of the joint does not have as much relevence in these senarios.
Why not a strong relaxed tendon in both senarios?

It's just the issue of whether the wrist is bent or not since that will determine if the tendon will be bent or not. It's really the bent tendon that's a recipe for disaster, and that's where good technique comes in.

[Fergie Fulton]

Originally Posted by Rune Bivrin

It's just the issue of whether the wrist is bent or not since that will determine if the tendon will be bent or not. It's really the bent tendon that's a recipe for disaster, and that's where good technique comes in.

That does not come into it, a tendon is designed to flex, so it doing what it is designed to do. Tendons connect muscles to bone all over the body so why not restrict this movement in these places to prevent injury. Well that could be that they are not the focus of a players attention, when something becomes a focus then it is viewed differently rather than factually or rationally.

In CTS for example, the flex of a tendon is not the problem. It is presure on the Median nerve in the Carpal tunnel area of the hand. Usually it is the Carpal tunnel side that collapses in and allows pressure to be put on it. This is an over-use issue not a mis-use issue, correct technique or not this can develop. It can develop for many reasons so even playing with correct technique can be to much.
The wrist can flex, everyone has flexion in a healthy wrist. Over-flexion is a different position, and than can be injured, but we all have different levels before we reach our own over-flexion limits. This limit will change with age or health problems so listen to your body. You can have safe flexion in you technique not over-flexion.

[unclejane]

Fergie and I have actually discussed issues like this in another thread and of course he's posting some of the things we talked about here since the subject matter is similar.

The basic conclusion we came to is that we don't really have a truly objective set of techniques we can point to (yet) that we know will avoid injury for all of us. We have our suspicions that some things can be more harmful than others, but we can't yet offer this or that technique as universally the "right" one for playing our best and avoiding injury.

So I'm going to follow suit here and offer only my particular case, what I've found and what I'm trying to do to fix it. The caveat being that this is only my experience and it may or may not work in your (or anyone else's) situation.

My latest discovery is that I've been using what amounts to the 1-finger-per-fret system everywhere on the fingerboard. After about 20 years of this, I've begun developing recurring injury in the left wrist - in my case it's on the back near the wrist and into the middle part of the hand. The really bad injury has been a repeated swelling-like pain in the connective tissue in the wrist itself.

In my case, I've lately been able to connect these injuries to using a bent-wrist technique in my left hand. And in particular, having recently discovered the culprit being the 1-finger-per-fret method when playing down in half position. Now that I'm older and have injured my wrist enough times, I pretty much can't do that anymore and get away with it. I don't know yet if my professional career is over, time will have to tell.

But, the step I've taken just in the last few weeks is to abandon that technique and instead move to the Simandl technique down in the lower positions (essentially using 1-2-4 and not the ring finger unless it's needed for a particular passage). This allows me to keep my wrist straighter when playing down there and so far seems to aggravate those injuries in the wrist less.

So, again speaking only for me, a bent-wrist technique on the left hand seems to lead to eventual injury in my wrist. If the Simandl technique successfully treats this I might be a lot closer to _knowing_ that bent wrists are tearing my left arm up.

But the jury is still out since I've only just now started changing this technique. It already feels a lot more comfortable and doesn't seem to aggravate pain. So I'll have to see.

Finally, there're all the other health issues to pay attention to, such as other things besides playing bass that I'm doing with my hands, my general overall health and so on. Mainly keyboard use, which is another possible culprit. I'm working on that one as well.

anyway, that might be something to look into in your case.

LS

[Byzcat]

Just looking at the pics you posted, I'd have to say
1)Try shortening your strap, your bass looks a little on the low-slung side
2)Shift if off to the left. I've found that having the neck farther out from my body leads to less need for bending my wrist, especially when playing above the eighth fret or so.

Also, if you play sitting a lot (I noticed what appeared to be the back of a chair in the first two pics), you should try to have the bass in the same position as it is when you're standing. I actually can't play sitting on a chair, I have to have a stool to properly position my bass, or I have to kink my wrist into very uncomfortable positions in order to play.

[unclejane]

Originally Posted by Vendele197

Extending my thumb does not hurt. I just picked up my bass, played some stuff slowly, and watched my left wrist. When I play low notes, i.e frets 1-4 on the E string, and 1-4 on the A string to a lesser extent, my wrist was bent. Keeping my wrist straight feels better, but E-G# is terribly difficult to play. Also, by keeping my wrist straight, my arm shoots an imaginary line right through the back of my fingerboard and my thumb more or less rests on top of the neck.

I've never received formal instruction on BG, but I have on DB and was always told to keep my thumb behind the neck, opposite my middle finger. Is this something I shouldn't try to do on BG? I feel like I can't do so, at least in the lower positions, without bending my wrist.

I'm uploading three photos, one with my wrist bent, one not, and one showing the height of my bass while playing. Let me know where I'm going wrong.

For me, bending the wrist the way your are in the top photo just kind of makes my fretting hand/wrist break all by itself just looking at it .

But.... keep in mind it's purely an individual thing and it may not actually be the wrist bending that's hurting you. I.e. watch John Myung, one of the most terrifying bass players of all time, crank his wrist around even more, even more painful for me to watch but he's still amazing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAVf-...eature=related

In my case, I'm already getting results by going to a 1-2-4 method when down in half position, playing 5ths and octaves with 1-4 and more or less avoiding using the 3rd finger unless a passage really requires it (I drift back to 1-finger-per-fret as I move up the neck tho). I'm almost pain-free now after about a week of using this, tho I'm also mostly convalescing and not playing a whole lot.

E-G# I'm practicing as 1-2-4 shift and 1-2-shift-4. I think I like the former better but i'll just depend on where I'm going.

So I'd say give that a try and see what results you get.

I remember Carol Kaye also issues an exhortation to not use the ring finger down in the lower positions (and of course she's the master of playing for days on end without injury). She also recommends keeping the thumb more underneath the first finger and pointed a bit towards the headstock. I've been using that method for quite a while now and it really does help me.

I've been able to play only barely at all with the thumb up and over the edge of the neck (i.e. Billy Sheehan, Louis Johnson, etc.) so I avoid that technique. But the wrist bend is limited for me by using the 1-2-4 method and keeping the thumb still on the back of the neck.

LS