Hi guys, I started a month ago playing guitar and I'm doing everyday for many hours the right and left exercises of Mr PB's daily routine.
Of course, after sometime playing but fingers and hand are in pain due to my lack of experience.

Do you think something like this would be good? http://www.amazon.com/Gripmaster-Exercis...r/dp/B0006GCBL4

Will it add any value or should I just continue with the daily routine? I have a day work so I could be doing some exercises with the hand at work, but I don't want to over use it and get my hand and fingers too strong if is not beneficial...I'm afraid of loosing speed.

thanks!

They are a decent alternative when you are away from the guitar, be careful though.. if you finger them with proper technique (fingers completley curved) you can easily hurt your joints because of the pressure they exert back on your fingers.. (happened to my pinky, had to stop using is for 3 weeks) Of course im the only idiot who used them for arornd 4 hours a day... (every second i was away from the guitar actually)

I am a big fan of the pinky exercises that Pebber put up on youtube, you can get some real strength doing those. Other things you can do: clench your fist as hard as you can and release it, your fingers should basically burst. If that is too easy then put your hands above your head, this will make the blood drain from your arms and you will have to work harder on the exercises. Try a pinch grip: Index finger and thumb squeezing as hard as you can, then do it with middle finger and thumb, third finger and thumb and finally your pinky and thumb.

I prefer stress balls to hand squeezers, they are more versatile and can be used in a number of different ways. Just make sure that these things do not replace actual guitar practice, the quickest way for you to increase your hand strength is to play the guitar. You will find in time that your hands (particularly your fretting hand) will be very strong, probably stronger than anyone you know.

You can also spin a pencil between your fingers to increase dexterity. This may not increase your strength but it will make your fingers more flexible. I recently took up the drums and found this cool exercise:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQ8DSFbLcu4

If you do not have a drumstick handy then do it with a pen or pencil. I do it watching movies, tv, sitting on buses and trains etc. It will take some time to do it between your 3rd and 4th fingers but after a couple weeks I got it down. Make sure you practice it with both hands, I like to concentrate more on my left because I am right handed.

Hope these help.

thank you guys.

I've bought the Planet Waves Varigrip. I thought is might exercise different muscles than the grippers and it seemed to have better reviews than the Gripmaster. Don't the grippers use muscles to close your palm and not really close your fingers to your palm?

THEE TRIL!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7P07L7BY...8WhU8nar25M-xdB

The main effect probably, that these hand grippers produce is that they confuse finger/brain connection and fool it into pseudo feeling of gained facility, by using a greater amount of energy to accomplish particular tasks, and at the same time developing completely different muscles than those needed for desired effect. I remember using nunchaku spinning did the trick for me back in a day, and playing high action acoustic, but if it outplays the practice on actual guitar one uses the most, in the short run it seems to help, but in the long run it can delay one's playing development big time.

Imagine the bodybuilder who can't normally join his hands along with the body, or can't bend his arm to touch his shoulder with his fingers, for example, since his overdeveloped muscles doesn't allow him to be flexible enough, and than picture the gymnast who is highly flexible, but also very developed in those muscle areas particularly needed for his tasks. Push ups won't teach anybody to run faster, to jump higher or to do the salto.

Another thing that these hand grippers train incognito, and most hand gripper fans aren't even aware of this, is the fact that these damn machines train their hand to hang the thumb around the neck since most of these hand grippers sits right into the palm base.

That could probably be satisfying solution for grippers specialized just for bending strings, and there is a one particular product on the market for accomplishing this very well, just like it's specialized for accomplishing other tasks, like hammer ons and pull offs, and proper fretting in general. That particular product is called a GUITAR.

Ladders, spiders and thrills(nice video, Frakh) will serve the purpose just fine, while on the other hand one can attach one of these hand grippers on clogged water pipes and blow into the pipe pretending to play a trumpet. At least it could be handy in that type of situations.

One thing I wanted to ask about trills is would it be a good idea to do this on acoustic guitar with a higher action than a electric guitar ?

For the past 2 weeks Ive been doing the trills on acoustic.

My acoustic has gauge 10's on it and my electric (Ibanez s series) I have 9's on it with a really low action.

I feel like Im struggling a little mainly with the 3 - 4 permutations. I understand it will take time for me to really build up strengh but at the same time I dont want to damage any muscles in my hand.

Pebber,

Totally agree!

Steve