Richard Jernigan -> RE: How long can you hold a barre chord? (Apr. 22 2020 8:52:36)
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Here's something you might try. Move your left hand up, so that the first point of contact of 1 is at the inside of the big knuckle joint. That means that a lot of the tip of 1 will stick up above the top side of the fingerboard. Make sure that 1 is energized only by its flexor muscles, not the side-to-side muscles--to the extent possible. This brings the palm pretty much parallel to the plane of the fretboard. 2 will need to bend a little more, but you ought to be able to make it work. 4 won't have to reach nearly as far. Watch yourself in the mirror and put some curve into 4. Since the strongest flexor tendon connects between the big and little knuckle joints, effectively shortening 4 by putting some curvature into it significantly reduces the muscle force required to operate the pinky as a lever. Holding the guitar to make the neck stick up higher will relieve some of the twist on your left wrist. Experiment with left hand position to reduce tension. Seems like there's quite a bit of tension. This is just the way I try to make it work for myself. Each person's hand has its own mechanism to some extent, but the anatomy is pretty much the same for everyone. When I was your age I just blasted away without much thought to left hand technique. When I started back trying to play almost ten years ago, 3 and 4 were so numb they wouldn't even go to the right string. Probably pinched nerves from a bone spur that developed over the years from an old motorcycle wreck. Somehow the bone spur resolved on its own 12 or 14 years ago, because I stopped having shooting pains in the neck, but the fingers were still numb. To my surprise, the fingers started to work better when I started trying to play again. But I had to analyze pretty carefully what I was doing, because they were weak. I'd say 3 and 4 are back to about 95%, maybe a little more. I doubt that I will ever be as fast as I was when I was your age, but i can play now, and I've learned something in the process. One of the main things is to work toward hand positions that are inherently stable, and which don't require continual strong effort to maintain. RNJ
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