Plucking with middle two fingers?

[lfmn16]

Advice - get a good teacher. It’s way easier to start right than to fix bad habits.

 

[fhm555]

I took the too off the middle knuckle on my right hand middle finger once. I had to have it stitched up and couldn't use it. I broke out my bass and tried it with my index and ring finger and was surprised at how quickly i adapted. I worked out that way a few days after work and got through two nights that weekend.

 

[drumvsbass]

alternating is technically just as fast as raking.

 

[drumvsbass]

Using those two fingers is fine but, think those two fingers share a tendon.
Plucking with only those two you are firing that one tendon over and over again. Could lead to a repetitive stress injury, though seeing how my day is going here I'm sure some asshat will say that it's the only way to play bass and that my 40 years of playing knowledge is worthless but hey... welcome to Talkbass land of the disgruntled old men.

 

[2112]

I use whatever finger it takes to get the sound I want. Normally, this means my index finger. The callous is built up such that I get a pretty hard attack out of it too, especially in-tandem with my hard stroke. However, when I want to a softer or rounder attack, I use my middle finger. I also use my middle finger (the nail) when doing downstroke raking. When I flamenco a la Geddy Lee (which I do FAR faster than alternating), I typically flap my whole hand, and because my middle finger is longest, it is the one striking the strings.

I also use my ring finger when playing fast triplets or triplet shuffles.

So, I use my index finger most of the time, and my ring finger some of the time. But when a special occasion really requires it, I give it the middle finger.

Digitus impudicus, indeed.

 

[James Collins]

I'm always up for learning something new and never studied classical guitar. So I looked up "apoyando" and came up with this lesson. While there is some downward pressure on the sting, the stroke is still up toward the string above, which would probably benefit those who rake on a bass. I'm not sure that raking on classical would be as effective as it is on bass.

But as far as alternating technique goes, while not on bass, below find one of the most impressive demonstrations of it I've seen. The bass player ain't too shabby either.

There are really not any good videos on classical guitar apoyando technique. Yours is okay. I didn't mean to insinuate that you don't rest on the next string. I was trying to emphasize the downward portion of the stroke. It typically involves having the string roll across the curve of the nail instead of actually being plucked by the string. If you have a clicking nail sound and you focus on that sort of motion, it should make it go away. It did for me anyway.

Regarding raking, descending scales, and classical guitar: this is why I absolutely know raking is not faster than alternating. Raking I leave up to personal preference. In classical guitar raking is frowned upon. Everything is always alternated. And descending scales occur commonly in music pieces played apoyando.



Another helpful thing to know there is you practice alternating patterns over scales:
Index/middle, midle/index, middle/ring, ring/middle, index/ring, ring/index, and index/middle/ring/middle...so if you do play middle/ring only it is just fine. Practice on keeping your index and small fingers relaxed if you do, otherwise it is hard to get speed up.

 

[I-play-bass]

Hi all! I'm brand new to playing bass guitar...and I mean brand spanking new. Not counting a stint I had in a band in middle school (which is best forgotten), I'm figuring out basically everything from scratch: building up left hand finger strength to prevent fret buzz, how high the bass should be on me while I'm playing it, how to play a 34" scale bass with tiny hands...the list goes on. At any rate, I'm trying to devote at least an hour a day to practicing. My daily driver for the time being is a Squier Affinity PJ. (The Vantage VS-600B in my profile pic there is just eye candy for right now. I got it from a friend for free, but its pickups are fritzed.)

My question is about plucking technique. I'm having trouble using my index finger, because the nail grows so far up on the finger that, no matter how far I file that sucker down, it still hits the string and sounds like I'm playing with a pick. As a result, I've taken to plucking with my middle and ring finger. So far, it seems to be working out well. Does anybody else do the same, and have any advice?

Thanks in advance!

I saw a video a while back where the bass player played with those two fingers fingerstyle, and she'd hold a pick with her index and thumb and play pick passages where it fit the songs. She was really good, and I thought it was super neat.

If you're going the middle/ring route, I'd say you've got a cool opportunity to do something similar.

 

[James Collins]

Using those two fingers is fine but, think those two fingers share a tendon.
Plucking with only those two you are firing that one tendon over and over again. Could lead to a repetitive stress injury, though seeing how my day is going here I'm sure some asshat will say that it's the only way to play bass and that my 40 years of playing knowledge is worthless but hey... welcome to Talkbass land of the disgruntled old men.

Take this as not criticizing your playing advice. I am criticizing your anatomy.
Each of your fingers has 3 tendons that flex them and 3 tendons that extend them except the index and small that have 4 tendons a piece.
All of those tendons are separate for each of the fingers. Some of the tendons share a muscle belly in the forearm, but even then the muscle is innervated to allow independent movement of your fingers except for one of the extensors that extends your first knuckle and one of your flexors that flexes the last knuckle.

 

[Ric5]

Hi all! I'm brand new to playing bass guitar...and I mean brand spanking new. Not counting a stint I had in a band in middle school (which is best forgotten), I'm figuring out basically everything from scratch: building up left hand finger strength to prevent fret buzz, how high the bass should be on me while I'm playing it, how to play a 34" scale bass with tiny hands...the list goes on. At any rate, I'm trying to devote at least an hour a day to practicing. My daily driver for the time being is a Squier Affinity PJ. (The Vantage VS-600B in my profile pic there is just eye candy for right now. I got it from a friend for free, but its pickups are fritzed.)

My question is about plucking technique. I'm having trouble using my index finger, because the nail grows so far up on the finger that, no matter how far I file that sucker down, it still hits the string and sounds like I'm playing with a pick. As a result, I've taken to plucking with my middle and ring finger. So far, it seems to be working out well. Does anybody else do the same, and have any advice?

Thanks in advance!

I do that … but for a different reason … I play with a pick, and I employ several non pick playing styles … so sometimes I switch between picking and plucking in the same song so while my index finger and thumb are holding a pick the other fingers are free.

 

[drumvsbass]

Take this as not criticizing your playing advice. I am criticizing your anatomy.
Each of your fingers has 3 tendons that flex them and 3 tendons that extend them except the index and small that have 4 tendons a piece.
All of those tendons are separate for each of the fingers. Some of the tendons share a muscle belly in the forearm, but even then the muscle is innervated to allow independent movement of your fingers except for one of the extensors that extends your first knuckle and one of your flexors that flexes the last knuckle.

From Wiki

The tendons in your fingers are independent from one another apart from the ones in your middle and ring finger. These tendons are connected, so that when your middle finger is folded down you cannot move your ring finger

 

[drumvsbass]

I'm sure some asshat will say that it's the only way to play bass and that my 40 years of playing knowledge is worthless but hey... welcome to Talkbass land of the disgruntled old men.

Take this as not criticizing your playing advice. I am criticizing your anatomy.
Each of your fingers has 3 tendons that flex them and 3 tendons that extend them except the index and small that have 4 tendons a piece.
All of those tendons are separate for each of the fingers. Some of the tendons share a muscle belly in the forearm, but even then the muscle is innervated to allow independent movement of your fingers except for one of the extensors that extends your first knuckle and one of your flexors that flexes the last knuckle.

Not criticizing your reply but, case in point. Are you a physiologist? Have you ever have problems with your tendons in your hands? What science exactly did you base your reply on? This is stuff that I shaging know. Do you?

 

[TheReceder]

In my opinion, plucking should be pushing toward the body of the instrument. Not pulling toward the next string.
I second the recommendation to get a teacher.

Wouldn't work for me, I actually use all three fingers to pluck, and sometimes much like strumming with a pick, I use my fingers on an up and down stroke. I'm getting older and slower so anything I can do to get speed is necessary. How else am I going to hit the 64th notes.

 

[Wasnex]

In my opinion, plucking should be pushing toward the body of the instrument. Not pulling toward the next string.

I don't think most will share this opinion.

I do see players who use this technique to hammer the strings against the frets to get an aggressive sound. To be honest it drives me a bit nuts as I primarily focus on playing very cleanly. However, I do accept it as a valid technique...so I suppose it depends on the genre of music you play, but I have always used a pick when I needed a clanky tone.

This video describes demos techniques where the strings are slammed in the frets.

 

[James Collins]

Not criticizing your reply but, case in point. Are you a physiologist? Have you ever have problems with your tendons in your hands? What science exactly did you base your reply on? This is stuff that I shagging know. Do you?

The Paralysed Finger -
This is the first page that comes up when I Google what you are referencing.

All of your fingers share that same muscle. It is called the extensor digitorum comunis. It splits into 4 tendons that go to your index, middle, ring, and small fingers and is the only tendon that extends the metacarpal phalangeal joint of the middle and ring fingers. The index and small fingers have an extra tendon to extend this joint (extensor indicis propria and extensor digitorum minimus respectively).

You cannot flex your middle finger at the MCP joint and extend the ring finger fully simultaneously, but that is not for the reason you think. If you put your hand flat on a hard surface, you can hyperextend your ring finger while the middle finger is flat on the surface. That is independent movement. They each have their own tendon. And those tendons are connected to a muscle with innervation that allows firing certain fibers preferentially so that even though it is one muscle, it sort of acts like 4 muscles. Independent movement is limited somewhat because of the juncturae tendonae on the back of the hand. The index and small fingers share this muscle also and have the same juncturae tendinae, but they have an extra muscle.

Even so, extension of the proximal and distal interphalangeal joints is completely independent. This is controlled by your palmar and dorsal interossei muscles and lumbricals.

The lumbricals are an interesting muscle because they originate on one of the flexor tendons (FDP) and insert into the extensor hood. So they act like a flexor at the MCP and an extensor at the IP joints. The lumbricals are of course the primary flexor of the MCP joints.

The other flexors are the flexor digitorum profundus and flexor digitorum superficialis. Each is one muscle with 4 tendons, one for each finger. The FDS is only able to flex the proximal interphalangeal joint because it inserts on the middle phalanx. Even though it is one muscle, it is innervated so each tendon can pull separately and there are no juncturae tendinae on this side of the hand.

The FDP by contrast is not independent. It is the only flexor of the distal interphalangeal joint. Similar to your trick with the EDC, when you hyperextend one finger (except sometimes the index finger) you cannot flex the DIP joints of the other fingers. All of the flexion comes from only the FDS, so you only bend the PIP joint. This is referred to as the Quadriga Effect after the Roman chariot of the same name for obvious reasons.

The reason I am criticizing your anatomy is because it is wrong or oversimplified to the point of being wrong. There are literally four EDC tendons. One per finger, not one for the index, one for the middle and ring fingers, and one for the small finger.

If I flex my index finger into my palm on a hard surface, I also cannot lift my middle finger. Same as the way my middle and ring work. I'm not sure why one is okay to alternate, and the other is not. For that matter, I fret with all four of my fingers, run scales while holding barres, etc with my left hand.

And unless for some reason you are extending your fingers all the way back with one finger clenched in your palm while you play, this doesn't matter as much as you make it sound. The muscles we use to play bass are independent enough through the ranges of motion required that they are essentially independent. I am not saying they are Independent. Certain things are impossible. A lot of finger independence requires practice though.

This is all just knowledge in my head. No source required. That gets you through everything but the hypothenar muscles and muscles for the thumb.

 

[James Collins]

I don't think most will share this opinion.

I do see players who use this technique to hammer the strings against the frets to get an aggressive sound. To be honest it drives me a bit nuts as I primarily focus on playing very cleanly. However, I do accept it as a valid technique...so I suppose it depends on the genre of music you play, but I have always used a pick when I needed a clanky tone.

This video describes demos techniques where the strings are slammed in the frets.

Yeah...it's really not what I meant. I think I should have said it differently. If you think about plucking the string going across, your fingertip starts off below the string and ends below the string. So even if you pluck across with a pick the string gets pushed down a little. If not you would never get to the next string. So it will vibrate up and down and side to side. This is going to happen with every reasonable pluck I can think of.

So the goal of what I'm trying to describe is set the motion of the fingers in a way that emphasizes the up and down motion more than the side to side. Most people with good tone seem to do it, and none of them mention it because people don't seem to think of it in this way.

It was a guitar teacher that made me think this. I had really bad tone. I could play all the notes, but it just sounded bad. It wasn't as bad on bass because the strings are spaced further apart so my finger would get between them easier, but if I had any nail it would click or sound funny. Modifying the pluck fixed it.

The best I could describe the pluck is to angle my hand so my nails would be about 10 or 15 degrees from parallel to the strings. When plucking, the string goes across my fingertip more side to side than front to back. The string is pushed down more than it is to the side. My fingertip ends closer to the body than where it started.

The latter is why I prefer alternating. The end position is different than the start position, so the raking is going to sound different everytime. I saw it in the Scott Devine video above. Which is fine. He's a better bass player than me.

I was just trying to share my personal anecdote with plucking style because it helped me. I mean there's only roughly 60 years of bass history, so who's to say any technique is correct. It's not like violin or other instruments that have time tested traditions. Bass is a hodgepodge of techniques for a 34" scale length mostly 4 stringed instrument worn horizontally taken from a double bass (a 25lb fretless behemoth played upright with a 44" scale) and/or a guitar (a 6 string toy with a 25" scale).

 

[Wasnex]

Yeah...it's really not what I meant. I think I should have said it differently. If you think about plucking the string going across, your fingertip starts off below the string and ends below the string. So even if you pluck across with a pick the string gets pushed down a little. If not you would never get to the next string. So it will vibrate up and down and side to side. This is going to happen with every reasonable pluck I can think of.

So the goal of what I'm trying to describe is set the motion of the fingers in a way that emphasizes the up and down motion more than the side to side. Most people with good tone seem to do it, and none of them mention it because people don't seem to think of it in this way.

It was a guitar teacher that made me think this. I had really bad tone. I could play all the notes, but it just sounded bad. It wasn't as bad on bass because the strings are spaced further apart so my finger would get between them easier, but if I had any nail it would click or sound funny. Modifying the pluck fixed it.

The best I could describe the pluck is to angle my hand so my nails would be about 10 or 15 degrees from parallel to the strings. When plucking, the string goes across my fingertip more side to side than front to back. The string is pushed down more than it is to the side. My fingertip ends closer to the body than where it started.

The latter is why I prefer alternating. The end position is different than the start position, so the raking is going to sound different everytime. I saw it in the Scott Devine video above. Which is fine. He's a better bass player than me.

I was just trying to share my personal anecdote with plucking style because it helped me. I mean there's only roughly 60 years of bass history, so who's to say any technique is correct. It's not like violin or other instruments that have time tested traditions. Bass is a hodgepodge of techniques for a 34" scale length mostly 4 stringed instrument worn horizontally taken from a double bass (a 25lb fretless behemoth played upright with a 44" scale) and/or a guitar (a 6 string toy with a 25" scale).

I started on string bass and you generally pluck string bass with straight fingers. When I began to play bass guitar, I adapted the straight finger plucking technique I used on string bass. Relatively close to the end of my playing career, my band hired a hot shot young player who used bent fingers. He had incredible tone and also the ability to vary his tone expressively much more than I did. At that point I started transitioning to a bent finger technique and that is my primary technique now.

Predominantly my goal is to cause the strings to vibrate more parallel to the body of the bass than vertical. But the bent finger technique allows one the change the angle of attack, which is why I believe it is more expressive.

When you are playing super fast, the notes go by so fast that it is much harder to hear differences. Also, differences are not necessarily a bad thing when you are playing a syncopated or melodic line.

For the most part I alternate index and middle, but there are some times when I rake purposely. There are also probably times when rake without thinking about it. I also have been working to integrate my ring finger some...also some double thumb with index, middle, and ring finger. My ring finger has significantly less independence and endurance than index and middle.

 

[factory presets]

From Wiki

The tendons in your fingers are independent from one another apart from the ones in your middle and ring finger. These tendons are connected, so that when your middle finger is folded down you cannot move your ring finger

I'm not a doctor. Or a physio. Not even a nurse. But it took less than 2 seconds to fold down my middle finger and fold and straighten my ring finger.

 

[factory presets]

So far, it seems to be working out well. Does anybody else do the same, and have any advice?

Thanks in advance!

I don't. But I've been thinking about doing it for the reason others mention. IE to play fingerstyle lines or verses in songs that I mainly play with a pick. Tried it after reading your post. First thing I learnt was i probably need to do floating pick damping. Second is I should take it slowly and watch out for injury. That ring finger is weak as a kitten.

This could take a while.

 

[drumvsbass]

So I guess a whole team of physiologists in Canada just made this up as a way to have me do physio excersizes 15 years ago. But you guys know all right Next time I have trouble in my hands I'll make sure to call you I guess. Those doctors don't know anything right? You googled it right? Dr. talkbass to the rescue huh? ACTUAL knowledge is apparently worthless here.
I love arguing when I know I'm right.
It reveals others idiocy.
So please, do keep me entertained.
I apparently have nothing but time to educate.

 

[factory presets]

Else that or I'm just deformed. Have you tried it?