Articulating the 3-4 hammer on

Playing Technique
#1

Hi all,
I’m practicing some mixed picked/slurred phrases, and find it quite hard to give definition to the hammer-on from the ring to the pinky finger (interestingly the 2-4, or mid to pinky, feels instead very strong). Should I simply keep hammering (ha!) at it until it gets better?

Or is there some fundamental limitation to how well this can be done, due to the non-independence of these two fingers? I noticed that some great legato players (e.g. Tom Quayle) often replace 1-3-4 fingerings with 1-2-3, so maybe this is something I should also start doing? (Not a big fan as I prefer the one-finger-per-fret approach when possible).

Cheers,
Tommo

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Efficient Digital Cycles
#2

You can practice to get more strenght and independance, but finger length also plays a part.

A good exercise from J.Petrucci:

Place all your fingers on the B string, 2nd ro 5th fret, now hammer-on and pull-off with your index dinger on the G string from 2nd postion to open string and keep the other fingers fixed at their position on the B string.
Now you do the same with the middle finger (from 3rd fret to open G string) keeping all the other fingers fixed at theire position on the B string.
And so you go on with the other fingers.

This exercise helped me a lot to gain strenth and independence.

Good luck!

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#3

Like you my brain is wired to one-finger-per-fret.

But Shawn Lane is another who avoids 1-3-4.

I think Guthrie as well (infact you often see people commenting on clips that “he should use his little finger more” which…I dunno, seems a bit like telling Lewis Hamilton he should brake a little earlier to conserve fuel).

I would say drill it, AND drill avoiding it, that way both are available to you in the moment.

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#4

From about 1:13:35 another great exercise from J. Petrucci.
Pfffffff!!!

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#5

@andjoy Yeah I love Rock discipline.

That circular lick reminded me of an interesting thing! I can articulate something like 3-4-3-1 pretty well using legato (which contains the annoying 3-4 passage buried in it), but when I only do 3-4, I can’t do it as well! Maybe it’s something to do with how I visualise it in my head.

@Prlgmnr glad (or not glad? :thinking:) to know even Shawn Lane avoided that! There must be something to it then, maybe no matter the effort one puts in, 3-4 will always be a weak combination for anatomical reasons. And I also love when people give lessons to the greats via youtube comments :rofl:

#6

Guthrie suggested trilling between the third and fourth fingers in order to strengthen them and gain independence. Its very difficult to do though.

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#7

like anything else, I guess its just a matter of “what we learn TO do, we learn BY doing”

in other words working the heck out of the 3-4 combo lol.

Im the opposite of the OP. it has always felt weird as heck for me to “reach up” and use 1-2-3 fingering for, say, 10,12,13 fret etc.

I think a ton of guys probably use 1-2-3 fingering because they probably played their first first years not using pinky at all

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#8

To an extent this may alleviate the issue, but the question is “by how much”? We may be fighting against too strong anatomical limitations (two fingers sharing a tendon or similar). I don’t want to work too hard for a mild improvement.

Actually I also prefer 1-3-4 for comfort, but i just don’t get enough volume/note definition with that last 3-4 hammer on. The pulloff feels a little easier to me.

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#9

u talking a specific phrase or just in general?

arent there a zillion players who use 1-3-4 just fine? (playing devils advocate, not being a know it all)

side note. you could always just use 1-2 for minor thirds lol
image

#10

from other current thread.

opening phrase

of course im asking myself why id ever post a vid now lol

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#11

Not sure if it will help ya or not but
If i depend fully on the hand n finger it sounds a bit weak. With the pinky I use a bit or wrist to fling the pinky into place.

Edit now that I look closer maybe Im using forearm instead of wrist
Still the point is im not holding my hand stationary

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#12

This is very well played :+1:

… but it is a 1-4-1-3 kind of sequence, it does not contain the 3-4 hammer on I’m talking about.

The specific phrase I’m working on is a simple circular pattern of the type

----------------10-12-13-12p10--
-13-12-10-12h13-----------------

past a certain speed, the “h13” bit tends to become barely audible when I use fingers 3 and 4.

This one instead I can rip trough no problem (fingers 1-2-4):

----------------10-11-13-11p10--
-13-11-10-11h13-----------------
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Efficient Digital Cycles
#13

its gonna sound stupid and maybe it is…just brainstorming. what if you just play and improvise for about 15-20 minutes per day using JUST fingers 3 and 4?

#14

Have you ever tried playing with a really heavy noise compressor to try and get those notes sounding even?

#15

@JonJon hehe interesting suggestion but I don’t think I am masochistic enough to play only 3-4 for 15 mins :joy:

@aliendough you are right, heavy compression might alleviate the issue and I may eventually use it if I find no better way. But ideally I’d like to develop techniques that work with more or less any guitar tone (within reasonable parameters of course!) - but of course I may be asking too much of the instrument :sweat_smile:

another weird thing I noticed yesterday is that I can do the 3-4 hammer louder if I am doing a 3-4 stretch (2 frets = 1 tone). Somehow the problem seems to happen when 3 and 4 are closer together, and in fact it gets worse in the higher frets.

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#16

WARNING - My understanding is the 3-4 fingers, do not love being separated so to avoid injury you have to be careful practicing separation and trills between them. I’m not saying don’t do it, just be aware that this is exactly the kind of thing where someone might say “man my 3-4 movements are not strong at all, I’m going to spend two weeks straight drilling them!” and then have to take 6 months off of playing.

ONLY giving a warning when working on this movement to try to be as relaxed as possible, listen to warning signs of any strain, stop when you’re tired, take breaks, mix up the practice.

Mindful of the endurance component too - my understanding is it’s much better to do 15 on/15 off (or 15 other activity) 4x a day than to do 1 hr straight of 3-4 practice.

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#17

thats sort of the equivalent of saying “gee im a bit out of shape, I think ill go straight into a 6 day/week fitness routine”. Next thing u know dude has shin splints, elbow issues etc.

Slow and steady is a good way to go for this stuff. There is only so much improvement that will take place in a period of time…cant rush mother nature

Stimulate. Rest. Grow

#18

Tommo, sorry - I meant to say use a really heavy noise gate to practice legato. It will help you strengthen weak fingers as to try to get the notes to sound.

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#19

and the alternative is? lol

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#20

The alternative is for me to admit that the 3-4 combination will always sound so-so, and for anatomical reasons, practice can only bring it to “ok-ish”. If that is the case I should train myself to use 1-2-3 instead :slight_smile: I admit that makes the whole discussion I started a bit useless :sweat_smile::sweat_smile::sweat_smile:

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