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Broken finger from a long time


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This is my first post, so hello to everyone!

 

A long time ago, when I was 16, I had an injury on my left hand ring finger: A flying football egg crushed my ring finger, breaking the proximal phalange by spliting it a little to the side. It looks that it's called "Transverse Type 1" [1]

 

I'm 27 now and I'm retaking the guitar on a more serious approach since last year. However, I cannot solve a problem that I hope is not related to my injury. The first of all it that, when playing slow, I can control the height of the pinky finger when the ring... slow, lets say around 8ths notes @ 100 bps. Everything beyond that, even after a few bps over that, I start with trouble. First, I'm unable to flex my ring finger without twisting my pinky and, if I concentrate to keep it down, it starts clicking like a trigger with only a couple of positions. Beyond that, My pinky and hurting badly. It doesn't matter if I've been playing 10 minutes or 3 hours in a row.

 

This is lack of training (I realy hope it is...) or my finger is screwed and I'll never be able to play fast? If not, any recomendation you could give me to keep improving? I'm playing almost 2 hours a day for the last two months just focusing on both ring and pinky fingers height from the fretboard and I cannot feel any progress at all. :(

 

Maybe I'm just making the wrong excercises, maybe 2 hours of work is too little effort, maybe 2 months isn't enought time to actually see any progress. I'm kinda loner, so I don't have access to experience from other guitar players.

 

From Chile, Have a nice weekend!

 

-Bob

 

PS: I attached a picture from the site [1] that shows my exact injury, in case there is a doctor/guitarrist among us in here.

 

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It's pretty hard to diagnose over the internet if it's just something you need to work on with your technique or something related to your old injury. Having a lack of independence in those two fingers isn't uncommon though, there are plenty of professional guitarists who have unused fingers sticking up at all sorts of odd angles while playing. You could try something like the Speed Mechanics book by Troy Stetina to work on keeping your fingers close to the strings even when not using them; that's about the only advice I've got.

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I agree it is hard to diagnose, but I'd start slow and work on accuracy. Not saying that's a problem, but you will benefit from it. A long time ago, I put my left hand through a window and cut my pinky real bad. Had it isolated for what seemed an eternity. Worked my ass off to get it into shape. I can now bend strings with it. But the process was slow and tedious. When I'm not using it, it still has a tendency to ride a little higher than the other fingers. A little anticipatory when playing, but not as bad as that might sound. Gradually build up your speed even if its slower than you'd like. Play/rest, repeat.

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I agree it is hard to diagnose, but I'd start slow and work on accuracy. Not saying that's a problem, but you will benefit from it. A long time ago, I put my left hand through a window and cut my pinky real bad. Had it isolated for what seemed an eternity. Worked my ass off to get it into shape. I can now bend strings with it. But the process was slow and tedious. When I'm not using it, it still has a tendency to ride a little higher than the other fingers. A little anticipatory when playing, but not as bad as that might sound. Gradually build up your speed even if its slower than you'd like. Play/rest, repeat.

 

This ^^^^ is my take on developing chops. You can't just insert the code for what you want to play. You may wish to play with the efficiency of a CNC machine but your body must learn the calibrations by careful repetitions and to complicate matters, has to physically grow into playing condition. You will often have to deal with difficult moves therapeutically even without the hindrance of debilitating injuries. Thankfully slow and steady usually works.

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