Neck Width and Finger Envy....

[Leviathon]

Ok, I'm not really depressed, but I will say that after watching some vids in the Show & Tell Threads with JimmyJ and Ricky Garcia and Eriv V and all you guys I have to say that I have a full blown case of FE, Finger Envy. My god, what do you guys do, hang from bars by your fingertips for 5 hours everyday?

I know that finger length should not matter. But I have to tell you guys from watching others play that there has to be an advantage with stick like appendages we call fingers.... I see guys reach around the neck and touch their index to there thumb at lower sections of the neck, I can't do that. Everyone's pinky fingers look to be as long as my middle finder.

Has anyone switched to a thinner neck guitar and saw improvements?

[Zatz]

I have small hands and I play thin neck acoustic just for this reason. Much easier to play for me.

Hard training may do wonders to your playing abilities no matter the fingers length but for sure nature sometimes gives initial advantage to some people. Of course, the size matters :D

BTW, I suggest that there should be "Middle finger length" edit box in a user's profile :D

Warm regards,
Zatz.

[Gunnan]

Its not all advantage, I have some very lanky hands ( big finger tips ) and I have problems with fretting certain chords on alot of guitars. Also my big lanky hands have horrible blood circulation so if I am jamming with a friend outside on a brisk day my hands will stay cold and ill have problems playing.

[Shaman_Santana]

I'm not sure if its such a big problem. Obviously it is gonna make a difference in some areas, but generally i dont think hand size matters too much. I have quite small fingers, but i play an Ibanez RG470, which has pretty big 'Jumbo 2' frets. I can still maganage stretches like 12-17-19. Its more a case of working on it i think.

To build up my reach i do stuff like simply stretching out my fingers, which you can do at any time i,e while watching tv, at school/work etc. When i come across some stretches i find difficult i tend to spend time just trilliing from one note of that stretch to the next. For example, with 12-17-19, id fret the 12 and then trill on 17. After that, keeping the finger that is fretting 17 there, i try to move on and trill on 19. I've found thats a good way to build up reach and strength.

Hope some of that might help :)

[Bizarro]

I wouldn't worry about it!

My hand are way bigger than Nuno's but he can still make bigger stretches than me! It has a lot to do with training and stretching and practice :D

Watch your hands in the mirror sometime. They probably look longer than you realize just because it's a different angle. :p

[ReinierK]

:) They actually do...

Well, large hands can be handy, but my fingertips are huge, this ALWAYS makes me hit more then 1 string at a time, no matter how I position them...

I think small hands are nice for the precise work... Large hands for the stretches and looking cool ;)

:( "I wish i was a little bit smaller" ;)

[forgottenking2]

I've got square hands (SpongeEdward SquareHands? :p ) And when I used to watch Paul Gilbert I used to think that handsize was a factor, I don't anymore, ever since I started practicing seriously I have seen improvement (of course I am not able to play like PG <although yesterday I could almost swear that I had gotten this pentatonic pattern at a speed that PG would play it :D > ) so yeah... at least on guitar we know for sure: Size does not matter :D

[Koala]

I have big hands, and theyre good for some stuff, but for playing mandolin, jaranas, and cuatros y really have a hard time.
Plus, I have huge thumbs, so my left hand position requires me to keep my thumb over neck most of the time.

Still, keep in mind what women say, its not size that matters, its how you use.... them.

[TheJeffinator]

I have to be honest and say I have pretty abnormally large hands (over 4.5 inch fingers and great flexibility), and they're skinny enough to not crowd each other on any voicings - but I still have to warm up and stretch out before making the big stretches. I usually wash my hands in hot water, to loosen them up, and whenever I'm not around my guitar I'm stretching out my fingers by basically sticking something large between any two of them - I'll have them in a 'V' around the thicker part of my arm, or have them pressed up against my thigh, or something like that, for about a minute at a time, while tensing and relaxing the fingers about twice a second, which supposedly helps the ligaments loosen up and stretch a bit. Trilling with large gaps also helps develop the ability to stretch.
I can comfortably trill between the 1 and 6 frets on all strings, between 6 and 13, and at around the 14th or 15th fret I can reach just about anything above. Did that come from having large hands? Perhaps in a small part. Did it come from stretching the hell out of them at any given opportunity? More than likely - when I first started I could barely go from 1-4. Should you at least try? It will probably only help - unless you go too far and try to wedge small children between your ring and pinky.

Rock On,
The Jeffinator

[Vai=god]

i used to be really jealous of guys with bigger hands, some of my biggest heroes have huge hands (e.g. steve vai, paul gilbert), but i have come to agree that its not how big they are, but how you train them that matters. besides, michael romeo has small hands and he's awesome.

[Santuzzo]

Ok, guys, that's pretty cool so far ...

But how about your feet ?
Well, I know they smell, but I mean the size ... :D

What's your footsize ? And does it help or hinder your playing ? :D ;)

Peace
Lars

[UltimaRage]

Footsize has nothing to do with playing.

With fingers 2 and 3, I can do stretches from the 2nd to 4th frets, which is kinda hard with those two fingers right now. I'm training my fingers to do completely insane stretches, one step at a time. There is this song in my band called seizures, which requires a stretch from 3-6-8, holding it as a chord. My index frets the 3rd fret on the E string, my ring finger frets the 6th fret on the D string, and my pinky frets the 8th fret on the A string. Pretty insane... When I hold it for more than a minute it starts to hurt. I just need to build new muscle to endure the stretch. :D

[forgottenking2]

Do you want a really crazy stretchy one? This is almost unpractical (but I've used it a few times) check it out:

e-10---
b-5----
g-5----
D-9----
A-7----
E-5----