steven seagull

Zaphod is a firm believer in tough love, I was just trying to prevent undue worrying.

Buy a guitar with a wider neck if you feel you must but I honestly believe the issue is nothing more than a sever case of noobitis. You suck becasuse, well, you DO suck - same as everyone sucks when they start playing the guitar. If i were to go into detail about things I'd say that the issue comes from not knowing how hard to press and not being very good at controlling the fingers to regulate the amount of pressure being used. Press too hard and the fingertip squashes down, spreads out and starts impacting the other strings, but as i said earlier if you've got potentially more suface area at your disposal that's a powerful tool when it comes to muting - i all boils down to control and that comes with experience.

It's similiar to when people get their first touchscreen phone and thing their fingers are "too fat" to hit the right keys - they invariably aren't, they're just not used to having to worry so much about the exact location of their fingertips.

If anything those fingers could even be an advantage in the long run, tougher fingertips are less likely to hurt.

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Zaphod_Beeblebr

It is love none the less though

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Mephaphil

Yea TS, they don't look that big lol. Sorry

Unless that's vinyl...

Edit: I just tried it. It looked exactly the same. I don't know what that means but I don't have any problems.

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AshersUK

TS... Ignore the posts who claim to know your hand size\medical conditions better than you do, that just the kind of unhelpful posts you get I'm fraid.

What is true is that guitar playing is tough to begin with, but if you have large hands and a medical condition, well you'd know. Those who tell you to 'man up' are idiots, frankly.

When I changed my guitar to something that felt better, it did get easier. After all, if it made no difference, all guitars would have the same neck and everyone would use the same one. Which is clearly bollocks as everyone buys the guitar that feels best to them.

best advice, go to a guitar shop and try a few. I didn't want to do it (emabarrassed at being a noob) but it really helped as I tried a guitar I'd never heard of (mustang) and it immediately felt great , so glad I did. So don't give up, go have a look. But yeah, you will need to practice a lot, cos it's not easy :O)

W4RP1G

Apparently you didn't see the picture of his hand...

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Mephaphil

Well to be fair we don't know, but the picture does look pretty normal.

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AshersUK

<decided to edit my post to something less grumpy>

Of course I looked.

Put it this way, his hands are MUCH bigger than mine.

Zaphod_Beeblebr

His hands are significantly smaller than mine.

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halfj06

What I wouldn't give to have bigger hands... having little sausage link fingers blows lol

Zaphod_Beeblebr

Look at the size of Shawn Lane's hands. The size of the hands of one of the greatest shredders of all time.

LOOK AT THEM.

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StrykVladzimsky

How about we all post pics of our hands with CD's?

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Mephaphil

I did take a picture but my girlfriend said it would be mean to post, but I really just wanted to compare.

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Doogy-Style

Dear TS:

As it's been said, my hand look about the same size as yours, possibly I'd have longer and a little slimer fingers, but nothing significant.

Anyways, guitar is not really about your finger length or thinckness, and if anything, i think many shredders have very long/big hands.

The other day I was at guitar center in hollywood, and I compared my hands with prints of some famous guitar heroes... Angus Young has one phalanx less than I do, and Malmsteem pretty much has one extra.

Bottom line, you should buy the guitar that feels the most confortable to you, but you do not need anything custom built or too crazy, just practice.

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StrykVladzimsky

I thought the same thing. Sorry that we're cruel bastards, TS.

EDIT: I'll upload mine tomorrow morning.

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halfj06

The only place I feel held back is on some chords.. I really struggle with big stretches and bar chords

Zaphod_Beeblebr

Better technique and more practice is the order of the day. If you look around at some of Shawn's other music and his lesson material there's some stuff he does that sounds like it should be tapping... but it isn't.

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Mephaphil

Everyone I know has that problem. My friends all say Barre chords are impossible, I said the same. They all conquered it, and so did I.

How long have you been playing?

And TS, how long have you been playing?

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halfj06

On and off for a few years. I know pratice and I'm guessing a poper set up would help. Just seems a couple strings always end up in the inside knuckle joints and I don't get enough pressure on those strings to let it ring out.. i just mute them