Crazy Hand Stretches (part 2)

OK, hopefully you’ve read the last post, and there’s been an (almost annoying) amount of finger tapping going on. Remember, the motion comes from the fingers, not the arm! That’s not to say your arm is totally still, because it is connected. In order for this next section to make sense, you might want to familiarize yourself with the concept of “Economy of Effort” and make sure your posture is correct, as these are the techniques we will be building on in this article.

So what have we gone over so far? The “Mr. Spock” sign works the muscles that stretch your fingers out, but the same effect is achieved by stretching your whole hand out; tapping a table with different combinations of fingers helps to work on the correct technique for guitar, but you have to remember that the main action is from your fingers- not your arm, and using the two exercises together is the same motion as playing wide interval stretches on guitar. If you’re happy with that so far (and if you’re not, there’s a comment section below), then you can pick up your guitar.

Sending More Power

The amount of Star Trek jokes I could make in this article is beyond funny, to the point where it’s not funny anymore- so I’m trying not to, for the sake of all our sanity! Pick up your guitar and place your fretting hand on the fretboard as if you were going to play. Your fingers should be roughly parallel to the frets and your thumb somewhere at the back of the neck. We’re going to play this exercise, but before we do that, imagine the fretboard is a table-top.

No, I haven’t lost my mind. Imagine the fretboard is a table-top (only vertical instead of horizontal) and tap your fingers as if you were table-tapping. Remember, the motion comes from the fingers (I’ve said that so many times now that it must be important!). It’s also very important that you don’t try and “send more power” to your fingers by using your arm muscles. This isn’t going to give you more power, it’s just going to move the wrong muscles. Try not to think of it as “sending more power” to your fingers. Your muscles already have the power themselves to send to the fingers and you are just telling them to use it. If you try and “send more power” to the fingers, what will happen is muscles around the ones you want will start tensing up too- and you’re using the wrong muscles again (compromising your technique).

Focused Energy

In conclusion, crazy hand stretches allow you to focus on building up the right muscles (because without them, some stretches are just impossible), but there are other ways of doing so. I hope this clears a few things up from my previous explanations, and if it doesn’t please leave your question in a comment below.

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January 12, 2010 at 4:00 pm | Guitar Technique and Exercises | No comments