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Double Bass Left Hand Finger Knuckle Stiffness and Pain?

P

Paps

Dec 29, 2015
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#1
Well, I'm now practicing 1-2 hours a day; a lot more than I've been used to recently.
I've been working on Bille and Sevcik exercises, so I am playing a lot of notes.
For this past week, every morning I wake up, the middle joints of my left fingers, especially the 2nd finger are stiff and slightly sore.
This improves after a few hours, but I've never experienced this before.
It's identical to my experience when working on building sites in New York as a 20 yo student. Did anyone else have this experience? What should I do?
 
#2
It would probably help to know your age, but from the information you've provided this sounds like it's a result of increased playing. Maybe you're overdoing, and should slowly work up to the increased practice time? Might also be doing it improperly? Just guessing, not much else to go on.

I've had similar nasties happening with my fingers but I'm in my late 60s; it's associated with familial RA and has been building up for a number of years.

Unfortunately I can't blame it on my double bass playing. Fortunately so far it primarily affects gross finger movement and doesn't keep me from playing musical instruments. It seems to be spreading through all the fingers and tends to get better over time with persistent exercise.

I highly recommend washing dishes by hand 2 to 3 times a day. The hot and cold water combined with random hand movements are excellent hydrotherapy.

Good luck with this!
 
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#3
Kurt Muroki talks often about keeping your supporting weight in front of the playing plane of the bass with both hands - as in ensure the arc of your arms passes in front of the fingerboard so that you are using weight on the strings rather than strength. I get the achiness and tender knuckles you're describing whenever I am stretching myself technically and lose that supported arc over the string in my left hand. I have to ensure I'm not letting my middle knuckles flatten out to the point of being too weak to transfer my arm weight.

I have no idea if this is even remotely your difficulty and what's causing you knuckle pain, but it sounds so much like what I experience I figured I'd share.
 
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#5
Another one that has crept up on my left hand is mild to moderate carpal tunnel diagnos ed after 50something years of orchestral playing. My second finger started to "pop" as I bent it from straight to curved and back. Pop is my own description of a break like a soundless click in the smooth movement. Pain developed in the sheath of the larger joint (Not the knuckle) through which the "closing" ligament passes. This ligament had developed a small bump that was catching in the sheath. Initially I went to a hand specialist ( a surgeon) who had scans of my LH and fingers done before proclaiming the carpal tunnel diagnosis. He wanted to operate on the spot by making incisions in the second finger sheath and in the palm of my hand. No, thank you !!

I found and spent time with a physiotherapist who specialises in problems from the fingertips to the neck. He gave me a group of exercises that, together with rest and 5 minute soaks in warm water, helped me through. The second finger has stiffened and cannot straighten fully but this does not impede on bass playing because I shape fingers in arches and "flap" from the big knuckles. Generally my LH palm has stiffened a little and can be uncomfortable, even hurting at times, but I am doing OK in my 60th year of bass playing.

I think and hope that a combination of rest, warm water bath, Voltaren and lightening the self-imposed lode should help a lot. There are plenty of other less stressful things to help break up your practice. Also check out your LH technique. I advocate using a pianistic approach by arching the fingers and raising/lowering them from the big knuckles, not curling/uncurling them.
 
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#6
Thanks for that.
What I tried last night was to run my left hand under a cold tap a few times for 5 minutes.
The ice bath athletes use gave me this idea. My fingers were less stiff and sore this morning.
 
#8
+1 for carpal tunnel. Randy Kertz's book for bassists has some great info and exercises for it. Another suggestion is to slow down your exercises and play as relaxed and correctly as you can concentrating on correct technique and where and when you start to feel any tightness or discomfort.
 
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