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Mika ele
Ha`aha`a
USA
1493 Posts |
 Posted - 12/05/2007 : 1:31:18 PM
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I tried licking my wife's elbow. . . .
now I have to play with one eye
the other one is swollen shut . . .
PAFLers RULE.
10. When the pinkie is properly anchored you won't try to lick yer elbow -- dang guitar is in the way! |
E nana, e ho'olohe. E pa'a ka waha, e hana ka lima. |
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Kapila Kane
Ha`aha`a
USA
1051 Posts |
Posted - 12/17/2007 : 7:15:16 PM
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Generally, I like to use 8-9 fingers. But I cheat...I use both hands.
But PIMA on the right hand.
Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!
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wcerto
Ahonui
USA
5052 Posts |
Posted - 12/22/2007 : 02:19:14 AM
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| My popoki has 7 fingers on one hand and 8 or 9 or 10 on another (little finger nubsor varying sizes), depending on what the criteria for fingers for kitties are. She uses all her fingers to play....mouse, string, ribbon, Beanie Baby, etc. |
Me ke aloha
Malama pono,
Wanda |
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javeiro
Lokahi
USA
459 Posts |
Posted - 12/22/2007 : 06:11:13 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by wcerto
My popoki has 7 fingers on one hand and 8 or 9 or 10 on another (little finger nubsor varying sizes), depending on what the criteria for fingers for kitties are. She uses all her fingers to play....mouse, string, ribbon, Beanie Baby, etc.
Now if you could just teach her to play the ukulele she could really fly with all those fingers!
And it's great to see you back on the forum! |
Aloha,
John A. |
Edited by - javeiro on 12/22/2007 06:12:59 AM |
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DaKineViking
Aloha
USA
17 Posts |
Posted - 12/22/2007 : 07:23:56 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by wcerto
My popoki has 7 fingers on one hand and 8 or 9 or 10 on another (little finger nubsor varying sizes), depending on what the criteria for fingers for kitties are. She uses all her fingers to play....mouse, string, ribbon, Beanie Baby, etc.
dat make her one good dancing cat! |
Lona |
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cmdrpiffle
`Olu`olu
USA
553 Posts |
Posted - 12/28/2007 : 08:57:17 AM
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How many fingers?
All of them! All over the fretboard as well. I learned PIMA when I was about 9 in my classical guitar classes. When I got into electric guitar a short time later, I hated using a pick. Too restrictive. Still don't like them much.
In 1991, I got the tip of my right index finger cut off trying to strip a coax cable with a disposable razor. The plastic razor shattered and the tiny laminated blade came out and took off the tip of the finger. Got it sewn and pinned, but the tip has never had any feeling since. I got real good at compensating using my middle, ring, and pinkie.
I think it really comes down to what works naturally for you. Bob Brozman uses his thumb, index, and middle pretty much exclusively. Maybe you could say he compensates with faster speed in the three he uses.
Don't be surprised if you change your style of finger picking more than a few times through your life. |
my Poodle is smarter than your honor student |
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kaniala5
Akahai
USA
65 Posts |
Posted - 01/02/2008 : 10:28:06 PM
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Excellent question..........I play with all 5 or TI (with or without Alaska Picks) or I play with three or four fingers. I guess you could say, I experiment a lot but I favor using all five fingers without picks.
Two teachers I worked with favored the two finger technique - one insists on use of Alaska Pics. You can develop a real light touch with finger picks if you practice using them a lot (I do not). The other teacher wished he had learned with two fingers only but I did not learn why he wanted to. |
Look for reasons to be happy rather than excuses to be miserable. |
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Tetapu
Akahai
China
98 Posts |
Posted - 04/15/2008 : 04:03:48 AM
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i brought this thread back up because I have a question...
I dont know which fingerstyle I should use.
i one time saw a guy perform on O'ahu with the silver picks, one on each finger.. he seemed to have for or 5 picks, and played really good, i was very impressed by how long and fast he played with those picks.. it was completely flawless. not even scratched another string by accident with those things..
I can only find plastic finger picks in China, no metal ones yet.. and I've tried using them somewhat, but it really seems like its something I will have to really work hard at, and forget naked fingers all together, which doesn’t seem very practical when it comes to playing other peoples guitars just on a whim..
I play the Uke with just my thumb and index.. for the Ka'au stuff too.. anybody know how many troy fernadez uses?
I started playing slack key by just buying a guitar and learning with my friend who was learning slack key at Kauai community college, and i spent some many hours alone figuring out some things on slack key, just by myself and it seemed to make sense to me that 1 finger on each string would be the best style in the long run, so i kind of just created my own picking pattern similar to Ozzies first "Kani Kiho'alu" song in his book...
then I went out and bought the red book, the same book my friends were learning, and just started following the book. I started that book with all three fingers (index, middle, and ring) too..
then I didn’t play for a long time..
now Im picking it back up with Ozzies book, and most of the time I use the 3 fingers on 3 strings plus the thumb combo, but the song "Mauna Loa" I just learned with 2 fingers and the thumb, no ring finger... in fact, most of the song is just my index finger and thumb. and I play it quite flawlessly, but when i tried to go back to 3 fingers + thumb it seemed like learning the whole song from scratch, i really had no idea which fingers or strings i was supposed to be using..
and if I go back and play the earlier songs with just thumb and index finger, i also have to re-learn everything...
I was thinking that the thumb and index finger feels alot more like im jamming my uke, and maybe I should just stick with that style..
im kinda stuck on this decision.. it seems an important decision i need to make..
1. throw out the one finger for each string method I originally thought of, and that Ozzie favors, and just use whatever fingers i feel like using, maybe just index, maybe sometimes middle, sometimes all index, middle and ring..
2. stick to the stricter discipline of keeping the three strings labeled as "index finger's string", "middle finger's string", and "ring finger's string"
Ozzie says that most don’t use 3 fingers.. maybe its only Ozzie that uses 3 fingers + thumb, and other people who also play other styles of guitar..
Im not really interested in flamenco... but i kind of use 3 fingers because maybe it would be fun to learn that style too someday.. but i really am not so interested.
Mark Hanson says that the older players in his book all are very stubborn about not using the 3 finger on 3 strings method..
so I think if I only play Hawaiian Slack-Key guitar then maybe its just more like uke jamming time? kind of do what i feel?
in truth, when I play the style with 2 fingers it seems more fun.. but I worry that one day that I wont be able to do everything just using that style.. but it seems more like the Hawaiian way to Kani Ka Pila.. but also seems a little wrong for some reason.. i cant quite figure out why... so i dont really know what I should do..
with all three fingers in use I cant even touch the guitar body really, its quite disciplined and strict form, which i kind of like, and it seems good for using the finger picks too later on.. but it seems like its alot longer and harder to learn too, because you have to practice until you are pretty much picking the strings out of the air, but I kind of like the that feeling too, never anchoring..
any suggestions, or advice would be helpful
thanks alot..
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Na Ke Akua E Malama Kakou |
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Mainkaukau
Lokahi
USA
245 Posts |
Posted - 04/15/2008 : 05:49:27 AM
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| Sometimes 1, sometimes 2, sometimes 3, employ, the appetite is the key when playing slack-key or eating poi. |
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Russell Letson
`Olu`olu
USA
504 Posts |
Posted - 04/15/2008 : 06:01:29 AM
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Right-hand/what-fingers advice is all over the place, and not just in slack key--blues, Piedmont, and Travis traditions have the same kinds of issues. Many (maybe most) traditional players in all these styles seem to start with thumb-index (Uncle Ray, Led, Libba Cotten, Rev. Gary Davis), with a few, like Ozzie (or Mississippi John Hurt), reinventing some variation on three- or four-finger or classical technique. Or, like Keola, transferring their formal classical training to slack key.
There are good reasons for the T-I approach (or P-I if you favor the Spanish terminology), especially if you're learning by watching and imitating--and I suspect that it might be easier to get phrasing and accents right if you use the same right-hand approach as the original player. (In mainland styles, for example, it's very hard to reproduce Rev. Gary Davis's tunes with T-I-M.) But then there are the players who would tell me that they just use "whichever finger gets there first." I do some of that myself, depending on the difficulty of the passage and the state of my nails. But I generally default to T-I-M and accept the fact that it will affect some phrases and keep me from exactly reproducing the master (as if there were much danger of that anyway). Anchoring is something that most of my teachers have discouraged, since it limits RH mobility, and I've heard lots of testimony from players who have gotten away from the planted pinky that the payoff is worth the effort. As with two- and three-finger picking, I find myself switching back and forth, usually without thinking about it. (But after 50 years of playing, my technique is a mishmash and not what you'd call well-disciplined.)
Advice about fingerpicks is just as variable, though I see them a lot less among slack key players than, say, blues and Piedmont pickers, who are often looking for volume and a sharp attack. I do, however, often see slack key players using thumbpicks--I have a mental picture of Uncle Ray using one--to get loud, clean bass notes. Again, there are parallels with Piedmont/Travis styles here, since it's hard to deploy the thumbnail when you're striking from the side of the thumb rather than straight down as in RH classical position.
The thing about learning "proper" techique is that it gives options--though sometimes doing things "wrong" from a classical or even an ergonomic point of view is the only way to get the real traditional sound: to play "la pompe" in gypsy jazz tradition, you have to hold the guitar in a way that would get a scolding from a classical teacher (feet flat on the floor, guitar on wrong leg, neck not elevated), but that's the posture that the old guys use, and apparently they don't wind up at the physical therapist's with shoulder and wrist problems. (Or maybe they just can't afford the office call.)
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RJS
Ha`aha`a
1635 Posts |
Posted - 04/15/2008 : 2:01:22 PM
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| My take on your latest posting is that trying to figure out how to play "Hawaiian" is getting in your way on this issue. As you can tell from the above postings, there's no ONE slack key way or Hawaiian way to play your right hand. Whichever way you choose will have some strengths and probably some weaknesses. Just part of being human. But whichever way you choose, you will still have to spend a lot of time at it for your fingers to develop "muscle memory." If you get confused switching between right hand fingering -- play just one style for now. Typically once you have that really down, it should be easier to switch. I use thumb and 3 fingers because it gives me the most versatility, although I've been know to pick a few notes with my pinkie when the other ones were too occupied. I love the sound you can make by "rolling" the chord, and that takes more than thumb and 1 finger. (I think you will, in the long run, have more freedom by using 3 fingers and thumb, and I don't think you sacrifice a lot for it.) Whichever you choose, practice till you don't need to think about it anymore. Good luck. |
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Tetapu
Akahai
China
98 Posts |
Posted - 04/15/2008 : 8:46:47 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Mainkaukau
Sometimes 1, sometimes 2, sometimes 3, employ, the appetite is the key when playing slack-key or eating poi.
thats good advice.. I only like eat one finger poi, so maybe i should just use one finger and thumb..
or maybe for health reasons I could just use my thumb and middle finger for slack, and save my index finger just for poi... |
Na Ke Akua E Malama Kakou |
Edited by - Tetapu on 04/15/2008 8:49:58 PM |
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Tetapu
Akahai
China
98 Posts |
Posted - 04/15/2008 : 9:09:22 PM
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Mahalo Ray, Russell, and Braddah Duke..
your posts contained some good info..
I dont really think I cant go too wrong with 3 fingers + thumb... and that was my main worry
so I have another set of questions:
1. Can you play all the Ka'apana, Kane, Kwan, and Chillingsworth songs with the 3 finger style? to the same levelas those guys?
2. Can you play all the other compositions with the Thumb + Index style?
3. is one of them more healthier for your hands??
i feel the 3-finger style really takes alot longer to learn to play... when i first started slack key i recall thinking that the thumb/index/middle/ was a good in between option because the 3 fingers + thumb really seemed quite impossible..
and if I think about it.. i dont think I could pick ukulele half as fast if I used 2 fingers and thumb instead of thumb+index..
do u think the 3 finger= thumb method is a little overkill fr only playing slack key? maybe 3 are never really needed?
is the thre fingers pluck a traditional method or is it something Ozzie made up or imported from another style?
ya so.. even after all that im still unsure of which way to proceed..
auwe
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Na Ke Akua E Malama Kakou |
Edited by - Tetapu on 04/15/2008 9:13:07 PM |
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chip
Aloha
Canada
38 Posts |
Posted - 04/16/2008 : 7:07:27 PM
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| I`am with Bob, arm rest and all, not trying to be smart here, how do you play with your hand anchored to the top, thats for blues players,& dobro, play a high open e string & then put your finger on the top & see what happens to your tone!!! Free your hand up so you can play all over the place, its worth a try. Chip |
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Tetapu
Akahai
China
98 Posts |
Posted - 04/16/2008 : 11:34:52 PM
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Deya you go, brah. That's actually how I eat my kau kau too. Thumb and middle for da poke, index for poi, thumb and middle for da opihi, index for poi --- until time fo go moe moe. Ha--waiian!!
hey, I think I know that song.. Kani ke kaukau is it? nice alternating finger pattern.. I could really get into that rythm..
i thought I might do 5th and 2nd string with thumb and middle finger, then 6th and 1st string with the thumb and ring finger, then a fast "huki" style pattern with the index finger to the 3rd Poi bowl, while my arm rest on na wahine... and repeat that basic pattern til I pass out.. |
Na Ke Akua E Malama Kakou |
Edited by - Tetapu on 04/16/2008 11:35:44 PM |
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