Since I'm more considering myself a better rhythm guitar player, than lead guitar player, I figured I should learn a bit more than 1 finger across the neck barring. My pinky finger isn't good for anything, as far as making chords goes, but I should be able to find enough 3-finger chords that use just the index, middle and ring fingers, right? Any suggestions as to books I might look for, so I can go through and pick out all the chords I'd be able to play? I do just fine with my current playing style, but I figure there's room for some improvement.

Matt

Fast Cars & Loud Guitars!

Matt,
Just as a general word of advice - unless there is some medical reason that you can't use your pinky on your left hand, find some way to work it out and put that thing to use. Not using your pinky to fret would be just like me saying I don't need a right foot to walk since I'd do just fine with my left foot and a stump.

You were born with five fingers on each hand for a reason...

~B~

SurfBandBill
- unless there is some medical reason that you can't use your pinky on your left hand, find some way to work it out and put that thing to use.

I have permanent nerve damage, in the bundle of nerves that run along the 5th metacarpal, from them having been severed 9 years ago. An off balance step in the kitchen, put my hands out to regain my balance, and my left hand ended up in a losing fight with a cabinet corner. The neurologist told me that the nerves would eventually grow back together - in 6 months to a year - but he didn't tell me about the possibility of developing a neuropathy at the injury site. In that, I consider myself lucky, as there are people out there with more severely disabling neuropathies than I have in my left hand.

Of course it didn't really slow me down, in that I'm actually able to make "some noise" come out of a guitar that folks actually enjoy, rather than scaring them away or them begging me to stop. The injury happened at a time that I was wanting to get more serious about learning to play guitar, but I went on anyway, developing my mostly one finger across the neck barre with which I've developed several original tunes, and managing to distill some various rock tunes into that playing style..."Foxy Lady," "Purple Haze," "Twist & Shout" a la lead/rhythm style playing, as well as "Walk, Don't Run" and "Tequila" rhythms. On bass, I do fairly good with tunes such as "Money," "My Sharona" and "Taxman," despite that I should use my pinky for those bass lines, and I can manage a 12-bar blues bass line just fine, for only fretting with three fingers. I can sometimes use my pinky when playing bass, but I have to be paying attention to where I'm trying to put it, and that don't always work, so I typically don't even bother.

I've just reached a point where I figure I still might be able to do better, and that's why I asked my question. Of course there are some 3-finger barre chords, but I'd like to have more to play with, for developing rhythm and lead/rhythm parts. Eventually, I'd run out of choices, with just 1-finger barres, and even 3-finger barres. Somewhere along the line, I may work on my lead playing, a bit, and I can manage some lighter stuff, like "Pipeline," Walk, Don't Run" and "Tequila," but with only three working fingers on my fretting hand, I'd be hard pressed to emulate the lead playing of our own Ivan P. Whatever I manage to develop, for original surf leads, will be unique (of course), given my slight limitation, and now anybody reading this will know the why of my limitation, and that I don't really let it slow me down...too terribly much.

Matt

Fast Cars & Loud Guitars!

How about open tunings?

Chris

"You can't tell where you're going if you don't know where you've been"

How about open tunings?

...
E B E G B E - Em
E B E G# B E - Emaj
E B E G# B D# - Emaj7

use a capo too, the frets are closer up the neck,

a good musical friend of mine lost his 1st finger on fretting hand, now he plays killer slide...although he was very depressed for awhile!!

...if you bar with your first finger an open tuning you can get the all the chord flavors without having too stretch too far with the other 2 fingers.
and because the chord is on one fret you can easily make triads and inversions

...also consider using a neck with smaller scale like a 3/4 so that you can reach further..

have fun
adam

yall need to check out django---seriously burned his hand in a fire and ruined his little and ring fingers. the docs had him play violin and guitar for therapy and he liked the guitar better. never got a fair shake over here in the states--bad tour managers and whatnot. he can burn on the guitar----i love DD but django can play circles around him he may be the best ever, hell, i don't know. he is fucking astounding. john jorgenson played him in some movie a couple of years back. django is a monster peace work on those chords, not sure but i thinnk they are called triads but i'm not a trained or educated player. check him out

ps: as far as "solo" or "lead" runs, you could base your technique on something like john entwistle (the who bassist): he mainly played on the fretboard with the first and third fingers in a sort-of "box" pattern style...he was amazingly fast and nimble with his "two-finger" style bass runs...check it out, it might be helpful...even in building a rhythm guitar oriented style.

john plays bassVI while his mum mends some clothes...

Django is awesome... regardless of your own style of playing, or primary tastes & interests in music, listening to the two-fingered jazz-gypsy is incredibly eye-opening & inspiring.

As for three-fingered chords, just learn triads in various positions across the neck, both vertically (i.e., 1rst to 6th strings) and horizontally (down the fretboard). The root, 3rd & 5th will get you through most major, minor, dim & aug chords you'll need, and it doesn't take much to suggest 7ths etc after that

to me, it's also the secret to playing surf lead guitar, but that's a whole other story...

http://www.facebook.com/?sk=lf#!/rockinrio.delrosa

http://www.facebook.com/?sk=lf#!/TheHighTides

http://www.facebook.com/?sk=lf#!/pages/The-Blue-Demons

hell, beethoven got deaf and continued.

I'd go with simple triads b/g/d string based on E and Em shapes, powerchords, and mini-barres,. throw in some rockabilly style one fret-slides, and you'll be turning your weakness into your strenght! it also will be far easier to navigate around chords once you find a bassplayer, or record basslines to play along with.

fwiw, I think leadguitar is a lot easier with a disfunctional pinky then rhythm, so keep diggin' into that too.

WR

Rules to live by #314:
"When in Italy, if the menu says something's grilled, don't assume it is."

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I seen a guy in San Francisco play guitar with NO hands...For real, he had a slide duct taped to his stump. He wasnt all that good but then again he was drunk.

This might be obvious but a lot of people play chords with the thumb fretting the root note on the low E ala Hendrix et al...Ususally this is done to free up the pinky for trills. Once you get used to it its really easy.