TE-001 • The Finger Gym

[justinguitar]

Questions...

[abernethyfj]

Hey Justin,
Just a quick question about my technique doing the finger gym. I didnt feel much on some of the hammer-on / off parts of the excercise so i changed it a bit till i felt something. It seemed i was getting tired in the forearm, but not really my fingers. Is this where I am aiming to strengthen or is my arm just tired because I'm tensing it up too much?
Regards, Frank Abernethy

[ToastedSoul]

Hi Justin

I've been doing the (complete) finger-gym now for about five months now on a more or less daily basis. About a week ago, I stopped doing the complete routine and started doing the 1-2-3-4 / 4-3-2-1 (and some variations) up and down the neck (positions 1 - 10).

On the top position (near the guitar head), my flick-offs produce a clean sound and I can keep up the volume of the picked string without any problems (all without muting). But when I move down the neck (index at fret 6-10), I'm having trouble getting the same results: my fingers always hit adjacent stings or I loose too much volume. It gets better when I use my index to mute the lower strings (those closer to the floor). Is this practice technique alright (even required) or am I learning something completely wrong? The sequence 1-4-3-2 is my killer-sequence so far, even at very slow speed! I find it quite hard to position my hand comfortably from around fret 8 and moving toward the bridge.

[bananajoe]

Hello Justin,
also having a question on the flick-offs. Don't know what is the best way to do them. What I'm doing so far
is I'm using the very tip of my finger, pulling the string down a bit and then flicking it off by pressing it a bit harder
against the fretboard and releasing the finger in a downward (to the floor) motion. The finger gets stopped then
by the following string. Is this the correct way or am I missing something?
And also when you have your hand in the "bending position" with the thumb over, do you flick-off by turning your
wrist a bit or how do you do it? Thanks very much!

[DaSilvaRenegade]

the only issue i am having with pull offs is that i tend to flick the string im on as well as the string underneath it so i ring two notes. how can i eliminate the extra note.

Duo

[Guitarhead]

Hiya Justin, well, i'm not a very experienced guitarist and only recently started out with hammering and pulling-off... the pulling off is really getting a bit frustrating, i'm not sure if i'm doing it correctly(P.S: Doing it exactly the same way as 'bananajoe' and sometimes having the occasional double string flicking problem as 'DaSilvaRenegade'... can u make a kind of 1 minute video, showing the exact way of pulling-off while focussing entirely on the fretboard? Thnx a lot...

[ToastedSoul]

I asked my neighbor the question about how to correctly do a pull-off a few days ago (he plays since about 10 years, started on acoustic guitar and now plays electric guitar too). here's what he said:

Just let the finger that does the pull-off fall down onto the next lower string (= pull it towards the ground and mute the next string when releasing the string). You should put more strength into the finger that stays on the string that you pull off from, making sure that you keep the string nailed down in that position.

well, that's what he said. I haven't had much time to try it myself that way yet. What worked for me up until now was muting the adjacent string with my first finger. I still hope Justin can show us a close-up video in the near future to make it more clear.

[routerbooter]

Questions...

Hi

This may sound a bit strange, but on portions of the finger gym where the little finger is used extensively, my first finger has a tendency to develop a mind of its own and point upwards whilst the rest of my fingers are doing the work, and I find it quite hard to get the first finger under control and remain bent like the rest of the fingers. This doesn't necessarily affect my ability to perform the exercise, but just looks very strange and I notice that my role model in these exercises, justin, doesn't have this problem.  Has anyone had this problem, and if so was it managed to be overcome?

Thanks

MJC

[Rezn8r]

Play it really slowly, concentrating on keeping all your finger tips as close to the strings as possible, until it's easy, then increase the speed again.  My 2c.

[Blade]

Hello,

Just started playing again after 18 years. And only knew the basics back then, stoped playing for other reasons.

Have to say the Finger gym is an awsome practice tect for someone who hasn't played in years, and would recomend to anyone learnging for the first time. Helps to get the fingers limber and get them built back up again. After only 5 to 10 mins of doing this I can feel it working. I love this practice tect 

[NathanB]

I was just wondering when I should be doing this exercise. Usually I do it after I'm getting to being done practicing and playing all my stuff or when its late. i go through all the orders pull offs and hammer ons. and my hand gets really tired afterwords. I also feel like I'm not doing the exercise as good i could if i would of done it right away. I usually play for 2+ hours a day. when do you think i should do the exercise?

[stymye]

I figure once you are able to hammer and flickoff ...( hopefully after  every day for 5 months!)
you should be doing it with scales. I mean don't just pull and flick the finger gym.

 mabey practice some of the hundreds of scales and modes with hammer/flick so you are learning ...scales and modes.
you can always go back and do the finger gym  at any time , or mabey as a warm up each session

I hope people aren't just doing the finger gym every day than quit practicing hammer/pulls the rest of the time
I practice everything I do with full alternate picking AND Hammer/flicks.. so I don't really need to go back to the finger gym everyday.
 once you can do it , try incorperating hammer and flick into your entire practice routine.

 mabey Justin can clarify that, but thats how I always thought of it

[Tomps]

That's a good idea stymye!

I have a problem with flick offs. Well I don't know if it's a problem yet. I can't do flick off with these combinatons: 2-3, 3-4, 2-4 or atleast it's very hard. These things keep happening: My "upper" finger (near top nut) keeps slipping off when I flick the string with "lower" finger, when I flick the string I accidently hit the thinner strings and thay start ringing and some times I can't even flick the strings cause, they simply don't work. They just raise a little bit and... well the string tone changes to where it's supposed, but the way is wrong. I watched some videos from youtube to see that my tachnique is right. I have done this finger gym only a 4 days so maybe this is not a problem yet. Will my hand improve when I keep doing this every day?

-Tomps

[Pusur]

I seem to have some trouble with this one. It really doesn't feel like a workout, my hand doesn't get tired or anything like that. I was wondering if this may be caused by my fingers being too angled? Justin tells you to keep your fingers as square on as possible, but I don't seem to be able to keep them aligned with the strings at all. Or anything even close!

[Sawdustboi]

Ummm....  Yeah...  im havin a little troubles with my pull-offs.  when i do them, most of the time i get a bend in the note, is there anythin i can do to fix this?