Hello JG Community.
I am having troubles preventing the last joints in my third and fourth fingers from locking-out while making the “Big G” shape. Really any open G chord shape. It seems that I cannot reach across the neck the cleanly play the low E and A strings when I keep my smaller fingers bent. Does anyone have any advice on how to correct this issue or how important it is to keep all the fingers bent? Thank in advance.
Hello Jon a photo or 2 so we can see would help
Welcome Jon! And thank you for posting your problem. I’m having the same issue so I’ll be watching to see if you find a solution. Actually I don’t find any of the Stuck 3&4 Chords easy.
Hi Michael, like you, I find it more effective to improve my command over chords in the context of a song. I don’t know if it’s sensible, but it certainly feels more rewarding!
Hi Jon,
welcome to the community, nice to see you here. Would you mind introducing yourself briefly?
I had a problem with the stuck 3&4 chords with my very short pinky and my fat fingertips too. I found a solution that works for me: keeping fingers 3 and 4 almost straight at the last joint and wrapping my hand further around the neck. Try out different hand positions until you find the one that suits your anatomy.
Hi Ron. Glad that I’m not the only one experiencing this. I have found that if I move my thumb down and closer to the middle of the neck, my fingers naturally bend. I’m land the chord shape slower than when I use straight fingers though. I’m getting good advice in this thread. Good luck.
Hello witkatz. Thank you for the welcome and the advice. I’m a 48 year old beginner from Kentucky, USA. I’m playing a Mexican strat that I bought in 1995, playing for a couple weeks and put it on a shelf for the next 31 years. Happy to pick it up again.
I’ve tried changing the position of my arm and wrist and I do indeed find better positions. Good suggestion.
That’s great and even better if it sounds good but before you get used to that hand position, you could post a photo of it here to make sure you don’t end up doing something harmful in the long run.
2 posts were split to a new topic: Please advise on strumming patterns needed to move on from Module 8
I just can’t play the Stuck 3 4 Chords well. It seems that when I anchor my 3 and 4 fingers, my 1 and 2 fingers are just not long enough to reach the Low E and A strings. If I reach far enough to fret the Low E and A strings, my 1 and 2 fingers have to move upward so far that my finger nails touch the fret board and I am no longer pressing hard enough on the High E and B strings. Yes, I cut my finger nails as short as possible.
It’s surprising how the fingers do adapt over time. You would think how on earth can fingers stretch any further but they can. It just takes time and trusting the learning process. You will get there.
Thanks Chris. I’m sure you’re right. Doesn’t seem possible though. I’ll keep at it. But the Emin 7 chord is absolutely impossible. Thank you for your reply!
Here’s a little exercise just for your own confidence. Make a video, nothing special, just strum a few chords, then make the same video 2 weeks later. Then you can see the progress. It’s hard to feel like you are making progress when things happen so slowly from one day to the next.
Getting your palm closer to the underside of the neck might help. There seems to be quite a gap there.
This same thought occurred to me. In conjunction with this, you could experiment with placing your thumb higher behind the neck. (I know this violates Justin’s idea of beginners keeping the thumb behind the neck. ) This will bring your palm closer and will straighten out your stuck 3&4 fingers to get them off the nail.
Maybe. You have to experiment with a variety of small movements of your hand/fingers when you have this sort of situation.
Thanks Els and John. I really appreciate the help. Seems like I’ve tried everything but I can’t say that I’ve specifically tried moving my palm closer. I definitely tried moving my thumb higher but maybe I’ll concentrate on both at the same time. Thank you!
Thanks again, Chris. The video idea would probably be helpful and mentioning how fingers can learn to stretch is true. But there’s something about these shapes that is really throwing me. I’ve been “playing” for a while but I’m terrible so I decided to give Justin a try. So I remember how at first I thought I’d never be able to do the open C chord, and the easy F chord was a bear too. But eventually I was able to do them. But these anchor 3 4 chords are killers. But I’ll try your video idea so that in a week or two I can see that maybe I’m progressing. Thanks.
Guys how long did it take you to master the G chord? I don’t remember if I actually mastered it when doing this course in the past. I know a very easy song that just uses A, E, D and G (and G/A but that’s not the problem) and the G chord is messing things. So, is it just a matter of time or am I doing something wrong? Do I need a higher score on One Minute Changes?
If transitioning to/from G proves to be difficult, I would advise you to do 2 things:
Do you mean the Perfect Fast Changes Exercise? I’m not doing it but I think I’ll have.
Counting by changes or metronome? I mean, both pretty much do the same thing and I think Justin was saying the number of changes since it’s a mix of the two exercises.
