Today, I want to bust a common myth a lot of guitarists have about hand strength. (There's a video link to a lesson below!)
You might have seen guitar instructors online, urging players to ”squeeze harder” to get those thunking strings to ring clearer. The truth is, while you do need pressure directly onto the string, squeezing harder is not a surefire cure and it often causes more problems than it fixes. In fact, more muscle strength isn’t even what makes it work! The reason the squeeze works is not because of muscle strength, it’s because when you squeeze harder, you tend to
roll up onto your fingertips.
That’s why one of the most effective things you can do for your tone – and your aching hand – is to stop trying to do everything with muscles and get hip to how much your bones are doing. And how do you do that?
Play as lightly as possible.
When you roll up onto your fingertips, you put the end of your bone onto the string and all of the pressure ends up at that tip. It’s like when you lean on a crutch, all of your weight focuses pressure into that one small spot on the ground.
Most adult men can squeeze around 75 pounds of pressure with their left hand. Most women's grip is around 45 pounds. Do you know how many pounds of pressure is needed to fret the heaviest guitar string?
2 pounds.
Yep.
What can 75 pounds lift?
A bookcase.
Two pounds is a water bottle.
So the trick is not muscle strength, it's getting your bones in the right position. Here's a few tips on how to lighten your load:
Get your correct angle with the Skeleton Key
Start with the pick poke to feel the tip of the bones
Notice when you are squeezing too hard while playing
Break the cycle by loosening when you you feel the strain
Experiment with your grip
Play as loosely as possible to see just how lightly you can play
Take pics of your hand (from your eyes POV) to compare light and crushing grips.
The ironic good news is that it’s the most natural way to use your hand for guitar. It just feels weird because we rarely use our hand like this. The Skeleton Key is designed to help you get used to this position so you can discover, recognize and develop your own personal, intuitive relationship to your guitar.
The reason so few players attain this open secret is because it's not based on merely memorizing information. It's a feel. This can be difficult to find without help. Here’s a video I made in a course from years ago where I discuss this (and it has another stunning fact)
Bryan
P.S. If you’ve already gotten your start with “Play Guitar By Feel”, you might be asking yourself a question…
“What’s next?”
The truth is finding your perfect finger position is only the first step. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a big step, but we can’t always play with the perfect position, can we? Sometimes our fingers need to be flat, like playing a bar chord, or used in a different way as in bending a string.
It may seem like I’m asking you to do everything with one position. But don’t worry. We start here so you can get very clear on how the bones in your hand are always doing the work. Once you get the feel, you’ll know how to keep the bones on the job when you’re using different techniques in other positions.
So if you’re wondering how you can take things up a notch, to really work this into your playing, in just 15-30 minutes a week, keep your eyes on your inbox… because I’ll be announcing something special soon.