Short fingers / Long fingers

[vindibona1]

Short or long fingers.... the secret is flexibility. As a young man, I could take my index and pinky of my left hand and open them up so they were perpendicular to my hand an parallel with each other point opposite directions. Now as I am into my senior years I get a bit over 60°, largely due to some arthritis. Playing difficult chords, even just a few years ago was doable, but age took its toll on flexibility and flexibility took its toll on playing.

The good news is that if you don't have any physical/medical issues you can build flexibility. Way more than you might think you can. It takes time, but if you stay with it it will happen.

 

[chris_b]

The secret is actually moving your hand around to place your fingers over the note you want to play. Never anchor your thumb and stretch!!

Try this. Play a scale, or even chromatic runs, across all the strings you have, but only fret with your index finger. You have to move your hand a lot, right? That's how much you should be prepared to move your hand when playing with all fingers.

 

[chris_b]

The secret is actually moving your hand around to place your fingers over the note you want to play. Never anchor your thumb and stretch!!

Try this. . . . play a scale, or even chromatic runs, across all the strings you have, but only fret with your index finger. You have to move your hand a lot, right? That's how much you should be prepared to move your hand when fretting with all fingers.

 

[Kyle_S]

My hands are on the small side, and the only thing I've felt disadvantaged by is my short pinky finger. It's seriously about half as long as my ring finger. Notes on the low E high up the neck are legitimately difficult to reach with my pinky, so I developed my own fingering system where past the 7th fret I use my ring finger on the E and A strings instead of my pinky.

Only things I've run into that I straight-up can't play because of my stupid short pinky is hyper-technical arpeggio-type things way up the neck, and very few people besides me want to hear that stuff played on bass anyway.

 

[bassGtar]

The secret is actually moving your hand around to place your fingers over the note you want to play. Never anchor your thumb and stretch!!

Try this. Play a scale, or even chromatic runs, across all the strings you have, but only fret with your index finger. You have to move your hand a lot, right? That's how much you should be prepared to move your hand when playing with all fingers.

Chris, I’ve tried it. . Not that I imagine playing this way, but it is a fresh perspective and will probably improve my accuracy moving up and down the neck with more practice. Thx

 

[HelpImaRock]

I'm a short guy with small hands. Position shifting and developing flexibility go even further on 30" scale basses. Works for me.