I would like to discuss something that I can see has two sides of opinions and also in professional playing we can see both options.
I am learning 2 years and on my journey I found fingerstyle is my way to go - mainly influenced by Paul Davids and now when I am reaching a little bit more “complicated things” where I need to palm mute on guitar and I am used to anchor my pinky finger… I am starting to feel I am not that free and that relaxed. I can play the piece, but I am finding pinky limiting me in some way of playing.
I am using pinky all the time and I got some accuracy in that. But I saw Paul is not using anchor finger and he just “move up and down” while he goes for strings. To me it feels much more free, I can feel it could be faster for fingerpick for me, but wont it affect my accuracy? Is it just question about training?
I try to make short video where I am showing this and I would like to hear from you what you recommend, even when I know there will be groups of both camps. Please forgive me mistakes. These are first tries without pinky anchor and palm mute on my smaller Pioneer is harder than on bigger guitar.
When I try to not anchor my pinky tends to be in weird position like going off fingers “like dog is peeing” and sometimes it is “curly” next to ring finger. Does it have proper position too? Looks like Paul has pinky “closed” next to ring finger.
I am opening this because I feel like some limitations comes to this point… maybe playing both versions is OK for different patterns and styles?
I am trying do decide if I should focus more on sessions without anchoring, because it can be profit in long term.
I think Mr. Alexeyd recommended to me not to anchor… if he dont visit this topic I am gonna tag him later.
I dont talk here about theory that anchoring pinky is making guitar sound bad, because you are putting pressure to TOP and mutting the vibration… thats another topic. In my experience it is not noticeable at all if you anchor relaxed and dont put extra pressure to spot.
Video goes: anchor no palm - no anchor no palm - no anchor palm - anchor palm
Pauls technique, his hand is moving whole up and down to rhythm:
I’ve only done a little fingerstyle so far, but my instructor RARELY plays with a pick anymore and has tried teaching me quite a few techniques. At least as far as what he has taught me, what technique to use just depends.
I’ll be honest, I couldn’t tell a difference in the sound of the various hand positions/anchors that you used. They all sounded nice to me, though my ear is far from the most refined WRT tone.
One technique my instructor taught, which you didn’t mention, and I saw in the 2nd video you posted (Paul’s technique), was using your fingers over the strings as a sort of anchor. One technique my instructor spent a bit of time on me with was keeping the index, middle, and ring fingers positioned over the first 3 strings and the thumb moving between the lowest 3 strings. No doubt there are songs out there where you can’t do exactly this, but it’s another way.
I think when Paul is using that “floating hand” thing, it does free him up to move fluidly between fingerpicking and throwing in the occasional strum as he does later on in the video. My suspicion is that he has played so much and trained himself to know where that hand position is that he no longer needs the kind of reference point an anchor provides.
I sortof see parallels with that as I do with other skills that require precise muscle memory. There are quite a few things I can do with my mountain bike that are heavily dependent on “knowing” a precise position and putting a body part (or the whole body) there just by feel and by muscle memory. When I’m coaching beginners, they have a lot of trouble with that and I have to give them reference point guidelines. I don’t need those anymore. Even if I switch to a different bicycle that handles differently, I can find those spots just by feel.
I feel more comfortable with my pinky lightly resting on the soundboard (not “anchored” actually), but it has a drawback: it restricts the freedom of my ring finger a bit. So, for songs where my ringer finger has a lot to do, I anchor with my hand on the bridge and let my pinky float. Almost everything I play has palm muting on the bass strings, so resting the hand on the bridge is good for that.
I noticed in your video that your pinky is really planted in one spot, i.e. anchored. I would recommend trying to just barely touch the guitar with your pinky and let it move around as necessary. You can even play with that bouncy up-down movement like Paul Davids with your pinky keeping contact with the soundboard.
One last thing: whether to rely on your pinky or not is purely a personal choice. I don’t believe one way is better than the other – just choose the one you like better.
All down to personal choice. Tried both but an anchor does not work for me. Either in Folk Style or Finger Style Blues. I am in the floating camp but it doesn’t hold me back.
Whatever works, works. No right or wrong. Simples,
There’s your answer right there. If it works for you do it.
Personally it doesn’t work for me but I usually palm mute, seem rather silly to me to do both.
you’ll never know until you try. Doesn’t matter what other people do it’s what works for you.
You posted the other day about using the percussive hit. you can’t anchor with that style
Hi Michal, my suggestion is to watch closely what your fingerstyle favourite players do and try to make sense of it: do they anchor all the time during a piece of Music? Are there any passages when they don’t anchor? Or if they’re not anchoring mainly, are there passages where they do? Maybe different styles can be identified depending on anchoring or not? I don’t know actually, just wondering. Watching the pros is always very useful to me.
There is nothing wrong with either way as long as it works for you. I find an anchor finger restrictive, personally. I also not that classical players do not normally use an anchor finger, and they are kind of the epitome of fingerstyle.
Thank you all very much for your time writing any opinion and ideas. I am gonna focus what suit better to me, but I think in the end there will be parts where I use anchor and when not - try to aim for not using. I am doing lot of blues stuff and palm mute is part of that, good way to anchor too.
I was “messing” with that the time after I made this topic and it looks its not that hard for me “not to anchor” at all. It just need a little bit more time.
I am really happy for having you all.
Only thing I Need to figure is not having pinky like dog is peeing.
I would avoid anchoring. Even the lightest “anchor” adds tension to the hand and restricts movement, in my experience. One can play just as well without anchoring (like everything, it takes practice), so I don’t see a good reason to add tension or restrict movement.
Ha ha I made a lamp for my wife with my labrador peeing on it, now that is funny and I keep thinking about my lamp now, and guess what my wife loves it cheers Hec
If you watch Tommy Emmanuel, Mike Dawes, Joe Robinson etc they move freely and easily between a little finger ‘anchor’ and no anchor. It just depends on what else they are doing with their picking hand at the time.
@Richard_close2u I am working now on another blues fingerstyle and I “have to” to use palm mute here, so that is my new anchor now, but in the end there is ending phrase where I feel more comfortable to not palm and pinky anchor, so I can see I will go hybrid in some cases, but I will try to focus more on free move. Somehow it adds to my mind different feelings and vibe… even the tune sounds same in the end.
