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May 2004
Posts: 295
Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada | I've been slogging up and down the fingerboard for about 36 years now, and as I get older I find my joints getting creakier. However, I find a noticeable difference in my left-hand and right-hand fingers. My right hand is creaky like my knees, shoulders, and other assorted parts showing wear and tear - although I have to blame my wrecked right ring finger on one of my jiu-jitsu classes, when I broke it (I broke a toe in the same class - what can I say, it just wasn't my day!).
On the other hand (literally), my fretting fingers are a lot more supple and less prone to joint pain. Logic would suggest that my left hand would be worse, doing all that extra work. But that's not the case. I can only assume that all those years of guitar playing have helped to preserve one set of fingers.
Maybe if I'd been a finger-picker instead of almost exclusively a flat-picker, my right hand would be in better shape, too.
What are your experiences with "the age factor"? |
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April 2003
Posts: 2503
Location: Fayetteville, NC | age factor?? I Find that I am beginning to turn Gray. :D |
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April 2004
Posts: 265
Location: Warrenton, Virginia | I've been playing in the neighborhood of 45 years.....give or take...I'm 51 and began when I was about 6 or so. I am a finger picker....i play guitar right handed....and my right hand is pretty strong....because of the finger style. Left hand is pretty flexible....but I do get a little joint pain.
What's odd..for me is that i'm naturally left handed....and learned to play the guitar right handed because there were no lefties around when I was a kid to show me licks....so I figured it was easier to learn the right handed way.....Also right handed guitars were more plentiful. |
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Joined:
September 2003
Posts: 782
Location: Waurika OK | I have owned a guitar for about 48 years, been long periods of not playing much. I am now 61, I try to play everyday, 6 string, 12 string and semi-hollow electric. I do notice that an hour or two after a long session, the fingers on my left hand get a little stiff. However, I beleive that everyday playing is good for the hands and fingers as we age, inactivity is not good for old joints.
Because of shoulder pain at night, I take Ibuprofen ( a great anti-inflamitory )every night at bedtime and quite often in the morning. This helps with the fingers also.
Steve, don't worry about the gray hair, just be glad that you have something to get grey.
noel |
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April 2004
Posts: 265
Location: Warrenton, Virginia | Noel
roger that! on the hair comment. 51 and mine is leaving me. I retired from the AF in 96.......had a fairly thick head of the stuff....seems like in the last 6/7 years....it's getting thinner....oh well....I try to play guitar everyday. |
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April 2004
Posts: 71
Location: Charlotte NC | I'd rather have it all turn gray then for any of it to go away! :D
At 46, I've found in recent years that my fingers are sometimes a tiny bit stiff and puffy in the mornings depending on what I've done the previous day. Like a Saturday of yardwork for example. This only hampers me when I have to play an early church service on either bass or guitar. I've found that running my hands under water as hot as I can stand it while flexing my fingers and clentching/unclentching my fists for about 30 seconds shortly before playing really helps a lot to loosen everything up very nicely. |
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Joined:
January 2002
Posts: 14127
Location: 6 String Ranch | I find mine are swollen a bit in the AM too. I always thought it was diet, too much salt in the previous evenings meal or fat or whatever.
Here's another thing to look at. My left hand fingers are about 1/4" longer than the other hand. In a discussion with Adrian Legg one night he has a similar thing and attributes it to fingering the strings. How many of you have the fretting fingers a bit longer than the picking hand?
Of course Adrians middle and ring fretting fingers are slightly bent sideways from the first knuckle from doing so many bends over the years. |
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February 2004
Posts: 2487
| I am 42. I know I have right to bitch at this age yet? But I have worked heavy construction for most of the years between now and when I was 18. I have been doing cabinet work and model building for the last few years and this has helped my playing some but I am also a diabetic now and I am afraid if I do not learn the songs I always wanted to do I will loose the feeling in my fingers before to long. So for what it's worth Keep at it! I figure if I get real bad I can always try to play the Moog sub bass pedals! Randy |
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March 2003
Posts: 555
Location: Wooster, Ohio | scary thing fretting fingers are longer. Sounds like a carnival trick but it is true for me.
Steve |
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September 2003
Posts: 782
Location: Waurika OK | Hmmmm, longer fingers, I checked, me too!
Must check some non-players for control group.
noel |
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May 2004
Posts: 26
Location: Canton, Ohio | I'm 39 (40 next month)and started playing at 39 (last December). I'm making good progress and told a friend that I wish I had started this years ago instead of waiting until I was "40."
He said that it could be worse...I could have waited until I was 80.
I guess I'll look at the glass as half full and enjoy the years that I do have to play instead of those I missed. |
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Joined:
December 2003
Posts: 13997
Location: Upper Left USA | So I'm thinking that Bill is laughing his buttocks blind as 2500 members and an uncountable number of voyeurs are lining their fingers up. Then I gather my control group!
Gomer was right - shazaaam!
Will one of the Pauls please explain why this is so? I am freaked out over here!
The other myth is male hair loss. We do not lose hair. It just relocates to our nostrils, ears and backs. It is not lost. |
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May 2002
Posts: 3005
Location: Las Cruces, NM | curse you CWK2
I checked mine and they ARE longer, and I'm only 68 and have been playing since I was 14, I don't know how long that is as I lost my subtractor in a Colorado bean field, it sank in a mud bog on the great divider.
My left hand is considerably healthier than my right, the nails grow faster, the joints are better even though I broke my ring finger in a tangled leash when my big dog took off after a cat. Even there I just cut off my wedding ring and let it heal and it healed with the upper joint restricted but didn't affect my playing hardly at all. When my doctor was checking out my injuries from my auto accident, I asked him about it as he is a bone specialist, he looked at it and said "looks fine to me", but it still hurts now and then.
I think playing is a great exercise and has some properties of preservation that haven't been explored by the medical profession.
Bailey (My left hand broken ring finger measures 12" cwk2) :D |
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October 2003
Posts: 148
Location: Munich | lol, you can compare the age of a guitarist with wine. the older they get, the better they play ;)
in fact they stop playing all that silly fill-ins and they put all their soul in every single tone.
look at the last albums of J.L. Hooker or B.B. King.
just a silly thought of a 26 year old guy :D |
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July 2002
Posts: 1900
| yep, fret-hand fingers are longer, fret-hand palm is thicker, and the fret-hand wrist stays sore...
steve |
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January 2004
Posts: 627
Location: Cherry Hill, NJ | I'm 52 yo, and play more each day. My guitar playing is better than it's ever been. Probably cause the guitars, and my attention to adjusting the neck and action to perfection, with the guitars today, Ovation, Hammer, and others, have made the action so much better. I wonder if Clapton needs a guitar tech on his road trip?
Could be future employment.
Tommy |
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September 2003
Posts: 782
Location: Waurika OK | One other observation about players hands.
Have you noticed how well developed that muscle in your palm and under your thumb is? From all those years of hanging onto the neck? Even on the other hand, from holding the pick.
noel |
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January 2004
Posts: 627
Location: Cherry Hill, NJ | That's what I'm talkin about Noel.
Tommy |
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January 2002
Posts: 14127
Location: 6 String Ranch | Are any of you left handed? Just wondered how many of these fretting hands were the left hand. I think that it is true that the fretting hand winds up with the longer fingers but sure as hell don't know why.
I do agree that the fretting hand gets stronger muscles in the palm and thumb, especially those who play alot of bar chords |
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Joined:
August 2003
Posts: 4619
Location: SoCal | maybe it is the non-fret hand that has stunted growth from all of that action, maybe even more hair?
or do I have that mixed up with another activity... |
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Joined:
December 2003
Posts: 13997
Location: Upper Left USA | The stronger muscles are easy to figure out.
The additional length in the fingers would be a counteraction of he body to an applied stress.
Bones add density when pushed against. In the case of weight bearingbones it would equal out. Since the digits are only under stress for a short duration the "repair" will build up length.
If Bill is just pulling our legs they should actually get shorter then, right? |
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January 2002
Posts: 14127
Location: 6 String Ranch | this one is serious |
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Joined:
December 2003
Posts: 13997
Location: Upper Left USA | Bill,
I succomb to your superior knowledge and experience. You have never lied to me.
You have driven me to experience massive levels of G-A-S and frenzied idolization of stringed instruments, but you have never lied.
We just watched the movie "Mooseport". Have you ever thought of becoming President? It could improve your Golf game! |
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Joined:
March 2002
Posts: 1380
Location: Central Oregon | You should get some kind of award for watching Moosecrap all the way through Mike. We didn't make it through half of it. I should have known better than to rent it when I saw that guy that has to tell you everybody loves him on the box.
/\/\/ |
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Joined:
March 2004
Posts: 201
Location: Vernon, CT | As long as you use your talented hands and fingers for playing the guitar and don't have hairy palms that is good! Age is not a factor!! : )
John L.
Std. Balladeer
Legend LX
Celebrity C026
Tornado
Martin D16GT
Takamine 12 String
Fender P-Bass |
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The Age Factor
