Hi Lee,
Recently purchased your Pentatonic Scale Fluency book. I’m really enjoying your approach which emphasizes playing around the root notes and not focusing on the boxes. One thing you didn’t mention in the book is preferred fingering. Specifically, I’m wondering about when you get to the 1st and 2nd strings in Box 2 and Box 5. Should I be fingering with my 1st and 3rd fingers or 2nd and 4th fingers? I’m seeing different opinions on the web. Some say use your 1st & 3rd fingers because there are more versatile for sliding and bending. Others say use your 2nd & 4th fingers so you can strengthen them and because it requires less shifting/movement of your fingers. I’d be very keen to get your opinion.
Hi Chris.
Before thinking about the question I just picked up the guitar and played both positions to see what I do naturally. Box 5 I played..
Ascending: 2,4 – 2, 4 – 1,4 – 1,4, 1,3 – 1,3
Descending: 2,4 – 2,4 – 1,4 – 1,4 – 1,4 – 1,4
Box 2
Ascending: 2,4 – 1,4 – 1,4 – 1,3 – 1,3 – 1,3
Descending: Same fingering.
As you can see I’m neither consistent, nor efficient. I didn’t even know I did that – that’s why I picked up the guitar before answering.
But now a different answer. First off, the “best” fingering would be whichever one is the most efficient, i.e., whichever one requires the least finger and hand movement. Generally speaking that would be one finger per fret.
The thing is that doesn’t always work the same. It might if purely for playing and practising scales in isolation, but in real world guitar playing it will depend on what you play before and after, this can change the fingering. Let’s say for instance Box 5. From the thin string, descending .. efficient would be fingers 4,2 – 4,2 – 4,1 and so on. But what if you were to get to the 3rd string, play the note and then follow with a bend? In this case you’ll more likely want to land on that note with the 3rd finger. Or maybe I’m in position 1 but want to slide down to position 5 .. my first finger is already in place so I’ll slide down with that finger. In this case I’ll play fingers 1 and 3 on the first string – if I then descend to the 2nd string I would probably keep the same fingering at this point otherwise it can get clumsy.
The bottom line is fingering will not be consistent in real world playing unless you design all your licks and phrases around the fingering. With this in mind, you should practise variation and do both. Don’t be afraid to do what comes naturally but still practise with different fingering just to build strength and diversity. I know some incredibly good guitarists that never use their fourth finger. We’re all different. Maybe for very fast stuff the argument can change but you’ll still see various guitarists doing the same thing differently, even at fast speeds – they still spend a lot of time practising what works for them – and the fingering they use on one phrase may not be the same for another.
So my opinion is to practise variation, do (and work out) what’s best for you and listen to other peoples opinions but don’t take any of it as “the only way”. There’s really no right or wrong other than you play cleanly and you aren’t causing yourself physical damage – if you can do that then everything else is irrelevant.
