How/What to Practice with Hand Limitations

[gerryjazzman]

Hi all,

I'll spare everyone with TOO many details, but this has been a heck of a year for me healthwise. I had a long (4 hour) throat surgery in June 2024 that resulted in ulnar nerve neuropathy in my left arm because of pressure on my ulnar nerve while I was on the operating table (poor arm positioning). I was left with the typical cubital tunnel syndrome symptoms of ring and pinky finger numbness and overall hand weakness. I underwent an ulnar nerve transposition surgery in October and am getting some improvement. Needless to say it has hindered my playing both on bass and piano although I have been slowly improving. I have some intrinsic hand muscle atrophy that may or may not ever return to normal and still have some tingling / desensitivity in the pinky, but I'm at least hoping for at least a partial recovery.

In any case I want to practice exercises that would help my playing and recovery. I'm slowly working on my old Hanon book (for example) for the piano for now (recommended by my therapist who also plays piano). For bass I thought to do some scales, arpeggios, some simple etude type of things. However, I know from fooling around a bit, certain types of fingerings will just not work since some of my fingers simply don't want to move in certain ways because of the muscle atrophy. Would these type of exercises be a good approach to recovery/improvement with altering finger use as necessary to work around my limitations, maybe skipping those which are too demanding? Just looking for some suggestions. I know a number of folks here have suffered various hand injuries over the years as well and wondered how / if they were able to compensate or workaround their issues? Thanks.

 

[pingvuiini]

Unsure if my story will help you as far as exercises. I started having pain in my fretting pinky and ring fingers several years ago and it started affecting my playing. With 34" scale basses I could probably play 20 minutes before pain. I started playing 32" scale basses and I could play those for 30-45 minutes. Around 2017 I got a Gold Tone Microbass solid body uke bass just to try out and I found I could play it forever with it's 23" scale and low tension rubber strings. And it's a total blast too. This started me on my journey playing solid body uke basses exclusively. Initially I had to have a custom bass made because nobody was manufacturing left handed fretless 5 string uke basses at the time. In the 7 or so years since then my collection has grown and, more importantly, manufacturers are just starting to really come out with production solid body uke basses and steel core strings like the Kala. And they're still a total blast to play! Again, not sure if this will help your particular sitch, but I hope you can overcome your hand issues. Good luck!

 

[gerryjazzman]

Thanks pingvuiini. Those are some cool looking basses! Yeah, I want to give it a bit more time to see how much recovery I experience before I look into alternative basses. I’m a 5 and 6 string player these days. Don’t do much with 4 string anymore (I do see your fretless 5 there which is very nice). Even before this all happened, I got an Ibanez SR1346 6-string and recently an SR1805, so I’m embracing the 16.5mm spacing. I still have a Yamaha TRBJP which is a 19mm 6-string. Needless to say that’s going to be on the block soon. I’ve been contemplating a GVB36 which has the 14mm spacing but still has the same nut width as the 1346 so it’s helpful as you play up the neck but not as much in say first position. Short or medium scale with very narrow spacing (like less than 16.5mm) is a possibility but I’m sure that would be a large custom investment and a long wait.

All that would help but still the finger movement issue is still an issue.

 

[jallenbass]

Sorry to hear that gerryjazzman. I think you're on the right track with finding alternate fingerings for all of your bass playing since this may be permanent. Django did okay with just a couple of fingers. Good luck.

 

[gerryjazzman]

Sorry to hear that gerryjazzman. I think you're on the right track with finding alternate fingerings for all of your bass playing since this may be permanent. Django did okay with just a couple of fingers. Good luck.

Thank you. Yes, I knew about Django. I also recently read about a number of famous guitarists who had to overcome bad injuries that threatened their careers including Jerry Garcia, Dave Mustaine (interestingly the same issue as me), Yngwie Malmsteen, Pat Martino, among others. These gave me hope and confidence that I can keep moving forward to overcome, at least to some extent, my limitations and still have a good time making music.

 

[dmt]

I’d keep it therapeutic rather than trying to power through an injury. "No pain, no gain" works for working out a healthy body, but with injuries, slow and steady, gradually working to progress but not pushing things too far too fast, is more the way to go.

Best wishes for your success. I’ve had various issue, too, so I can appreciate your situation. Keep on rockin

Oh yeah, while I still play 34", I’ve moved a lot of my playing over to 30" short scale, which has helped at points

 

[gerryjazzman]

I’d keep it therapeutic rather than trying to power through an injury. "No pain, no gain" works for working out a healthy body, but with injuries, slow and steady, gradually working to progress but not pushing things too far too fast, is more the way to go.

Best wishes for your success. I’ve had various issue, too, so I can appreciate your situation. Keep on rockin

Oh yeah, while I still play 34", I’ve moved a lot of my playing over to 30" short scale, which has helped at points

Thank you. Yes, powering through makes no sense to me, if something doesn’t move then no amount of trying to force anything will have any effect except frustration. I’ll keep trying to work on exercises that I CAN do even if only slowly to retrain myself to the extent possible and thank the Lord for what I am able to do. I have been subbing on our worship team at church one or twice a month. The bass lines are not demanding so it’s doable for me and I enjoy it very much.

I’ve become a big fanboy of Ibanez SR basses recently because of their slim necks and close (16.5mm) string spacing. I bought an SR1346B (not long before my injury), SR1805, and my most recent one GVB36 (14mm spacing), all used. I traded my TRBJP (a comparative beast by comparison that I just could not play anymore) with funds leftover for the GVB36. A 30in 6-string (with narrow spacing)sounds really interesting but from what I’ve read it seems like it would have to be an expensive custom build that I can’t justify.

 

[TFunkadelic]

Hi all,

I'll spare everyone with TOO many details, but this has been a heck of a year for me healthwise. I had a long (4 hour) throat surgery in June 2024 that resulted in ulnar nerve neuropathy in my left arm because of pressure on my ulnar nerve while I was on the operating table (poor arm positioning). I was left with the typical cubital tunnel syndrome symptoms of ring and pinky finger numbness and overall hand weakness. I underwent an ulnar nerve transposition surgery in October and am getting some improvement. Needless to say it has hindered my playing both on bass and piano although I have been slowly improving. I have some intrinsic hand muscle atrophy that may or may not ever return to normal and still have some tingling / desensitivity in the pinky, but I'm at least hoping for at least a partial recovery.

In any case I want to practice exercises that would help my playing and recovery. I'm slowly working on my old Hanon book (for example) for the piano for now (recommended by my therapist who also plays piano). For bass I thought to do some scales, arpeggios, some simple etude type of things. However, I know from fooling around a bit, certain types of fingerings will just not work since some of my fingers simply don't want to move in certain ways because of the muscle atrophy. Would these type of exercises be a good approach to recovery/improvement with altering finger use as necessary to work around my limitations, maybe skipping those which are too demanding? Just looking for some suggestions. I know a number of folks here have suffered various hand injuries over the years as well and wondered how / if they were able to compensate or workaround their issues? Thanks.

I've had some hand issues in the past and what has helped my hands the most is improving my overall health. Having a healthy cardiovascular system and getting regular exercise does wonders to heal inflammation and movement/circulation gets nutrients and fresh blood to your limbs and hands where it is needed to help joints, ligaments, tendons, nerves etc recover.

 

[matthewbrown]

I assume that you are warming up your hands before your practice and playing sessions. It's easy to forget! This physiotherapy warmup video might be helpful -- it includes some resistance exercises, too. Good luck!

 

[FenderP]

When I was having issues a few years back after an injury, I went to a occupational therapist/hand specialist whose specialty is musicians. She was amazing. In the eval session, she had me bring in an instrument to see how I played (also see what was bothering me, of course) and then came up with how to do treatment. Here is an article on the person I went to:

In Perfect Harmony: OT Helps Musician Patients Prevent, Treat Injuries

 

[mambo4]

There is a classical guitar left hand finger independence exercise that might make good PT for a bass

find a span of frets that can comfortably be played 1 finger per fret

put your index finger (1) on the E string, and pluck a note, adjust for cleanness
keeping(1) on the E string, fret (2) , pluck a note cleanly
keeping(1) and (2) down, fret (3) & pluck
keeping (1,2,3) down, fret(4) & pluck

then, keeping (2,3,4) down on E
move (1) to the A string & pluck cleanly
keeping (3,4) down on E, and (1) down an A, move (2) to A string and pluck cleanly
keeping(4) down on E and (1,2) on A, move (3) to A sting & pluck cleanly

and so forth across the strings

not musical but definitely good finger training

you could also move the exercise to the lower frets
letting yourself move/pivot your left hand to reach each note-of-the-moment