3rd finger vs 4th finger and speed

JasonB5232

JasonB5232

Inspired
I've been playing for 30 years and always just had average speed in my playing. It's something I'm looking at again and wanted to get opinions on how other people have improved. I've looked at my picking over the years to try and understand my mechanics (pick slant/all that) and what works best, but have never looked at my left hand fingering.

My first guitar teacher was adamant about using the pinky from the very start and I have pinky strength. It works well, but when I'm 12th fret and higher on the neck, I'm wondering if it's just getting in the way for speed. I have ridiculously small hands so not using the pinky at say the 5 fret just doesn't work though. I've always keep using because the same fingering on the same patterns would be beneficial for muscle memory.

Questioning if I've been thinking about this all wrong.
 
Ultimately you just have to do what works best for you. Everyone's hands are a bit different. If it hurts, you're probably doing something wrong, otherwise it's mostly just trial and error to find what works best.

This guy could play better with just two fingers on a badly injured fretting hand than I'll ever be able to play.
 
JasonB5232 said:
My first guitar teacher was adamant about using the pinky from the very start and I have pinky strength. It works well, but when I'm 12th fret and higher on the neck, I'm wondering if it's just getting in the way for speed.
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Congrats on finding a good guitar teacher! Not using your pinky would be more likely to hinder your speed. But up high on the neck it can get cramped, so using 1st 3 fingers up there feels more natural to me unless what I'm playing requires 4 notes per string.

But way up there (beyond fret 17) no matter how small your hands are, it is slower for me to play 4 note chromatic spans (4 frets) with my pinky involved. So up high for 4 note chromatic spans I slide my ring finger up/down one fret and leave the pinky out. For more than 4 fret spans up there my pinky is back in the picture and faster for me than sliding my ring finger a couple frets.
 
I use my little finger when playing scales and some licks, but I'll also switch to three fingers when playing "in the style of" players who used three because it just seems to work better to replicate their style, maybe it helps me channel them.

I used to watch Jimmie Vaughn play and thought it looked like he was flailing away but I now think it helps him sound like he wants, like an old blues player, not polished but a bit rough.
 
Budda said:
Troy grady “cracking the code”
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I see your Troy Grady and raise you a Rick Graham - LOL. Seriously there are so many great people teaching technique on YT (and Troy Grady is certainly one of them). But as long as they cover proper picking hand and fretting hand techniques it's half dozen of one and six of another.

With that said, some resources are better at one thing, some another. So find one (or many) that resonates with the style(s) you want to play. Rick Graham's legato lessons are pretty great. Someone else's picking technique lessons (maybe Troy's) might be better than Rick's.

The best advice I got studying jazz at music conservatory is that there is no one size fits all approach. Most great guitar players have adopted techniques and styles of many other great guitar players. In the end they assimilate the ones that work for them.





A list of his free legato vids on YT:
https://www.youtube.com/@RickGraham/search?query=legato
 
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I think what determines whether you use your pinky or not, no matter where you are on the neck, is the riff, and how much shorter your pinky is compared to your ring finger.

You have to decide which works best by trying the riff different ways. And even after I've decided on a fingering, sometimes I've switched it as I get closer to the desired tempo.

So for that part, it really depends.

As far as getting the most use from the pinky, practice this riff through measure 78, to break the connection between the ring finger and pinky:1698712160737.png

It's from YJM I'll See The Light Tonight, and do spider exercises to help keep that pinky close to the board. (Google if you don't know what that is.)
 
Thanks for the comments. It's one of those, I've been playing this way for so long, do I try and change something so fundamental. Can I teach an old dog a new trick. 🤣
 
JasonB5232 said:
Thanks for the comments. It's one of those, I've been playing this way for so long, do I try and change something so fundamental. Can I teach an old dog a new trick. 🤣
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I've been following Paul Gilbert's basic lessons on hammer-ons and pull-offs, and they have been really effective for me in developing the strength in my third and fourth fingers.

 
Another thing you can do to help your weaker fingers, is any time you switch to a lower string (in the context of a legato riff or exercise) with one of your outer fingers, don't pick the string. Some people call it a 'hammer-on from nowhere.'

I regularly practice the legato part of the solo in Dream Theater's In The Name of God, and I do those hammer-ons from nowhere, and only pick the notes that start on a string with the first finger. It's a great workout. And it's harmonic minor, so there's some good 1-4-5 & 1-2-5 stretches in there that force you to work that pinky for the hammer-ons & pull-offs.

Plus it's very musical and helps me to learn the harmonic minor patterns too.
 
I just work on playing whatever I want to play and try not to worry if technique is what's ultimately the most "correct". My goal is often to find a way to play something with the least risk of screwing something up.

If you look at two of my absolutely favourite players - Gary Moore and Billy Gibbons, they both seem to almost go out of their way not to use their pinky.



 
This really wasn't something I thought about until I got a 24 fret guitar and realized how much I didn't play above the 15th fret. I've got all this neck I'm not using. Then started to realize my speed higher on the neck was slower as I'm just not as accustomed to the smaller fret distance, hence do I just need to ditch the pinky.
 
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