how often does everyone really use their ring finger?

i play the nashville style hybrid-picking and i hear a lot about the ring finger. but unless im hitting double or triple stops, i rarely use it. and i can play pretty fast too. does any one else use it much?

Plenty. For stops, chords, pickin' and arrpegios. Maybe I use it too much. Hmmmmm.....

i use all my picking fingers every time i pick up one of my bender teles....i use thumb pick and no finger picks, just fingernails...for myself, can't see any way to get an effective pedal steel sound without all the fingers being used, but that's just my opinion....

I'm a hybrid picker too. I use it all the time not just double stops but single note runs too. I don't really think about it but I'll unconsciously pull my middle finger in and kind of favor my ring finger. I guess what ever blows your skirt up.

Not that much for most of my standard electric playing. My middle finger pretty much covers all the ground I need to fast enough.

EDIT: Should add that I use it a lot for double stops of course. Just not for single note lines.

For acoustic finger picking, it's of course a different story.

Shawn

Plenty. For stops, chords, pickin' and arrpegios. Maybe I use it too much. Hmmmmm.....

+1. I use it a lot for chord melodies and B3 stuff too.

I learned hybrid-picking after playing mostly fingerstyle for years. Thus, it seemed natural to continue using my ring finger quite a bit. And also, I now use my pinky occasionally to play full chords while hybrid-picking.

I haven't got into hybrid picking as much as I should perhaps. I can't get the attack to be equal. I either flat pick or finger pick using all my fingernails.
But I have become very good at palming the pick into the back of my second finger to fingerpick (with thumb, forefinger and ringfinger) and getting it back out to flatpick. It's become so fast and automatic I can switch without any break at all...even in the middle of a fast run.

But maybe I'll work some more on that hybrid stuff. It would make the country and rockabilly licks alot easier.

my styles prety basic but i still find i use it in a lot of licks, especialy those in blues scales.

I use my ring finger all the time for chords, sweeping arpegios and when I(occasionally) break out the classical tremolo

I'll second a bunch of the above, I use the ring finger all the time for banjo rolls, chords, double stops, etc. Not so much for single-note runs, but it definitely comes into play for many country fills and some chicken-pickin' stuff. Hope it helps, CS :-)

I use it all the time, either when doing hybrid picking (with plec & fingers) or when doing Travis picking (for picking the occasional triad).

Yep, I use it all the time. It's 20% of my firepower...

my ring finger is directly responsible for me playing guitar today. 21 years ago, i was playing in a softball game for my company team...usually i play first base, but the regular pitcher couldn't make it. i volunteered. late in the game a wicked line drive comes right back at me. i knock it down and throw to first to record the out. back in the dugout, i take off the glove and the ring finger is expanding and changing to various colors. x-rays the next morning show the joint closest to the nail is shattered and there is a crack running the length of the bone from that joint to the middle one. the doctor says i'll probably always have a bit of trouble with that finger and it'll never be 100%. i ask about therapy. he recommends activities like squeezing a rubber ball, etc. i say "what about guitar, always wanted to learn". he says "perfect". so all these years later, the ring finger is about 75-80%, as good as it could be, considering....but playing guitar became one of the great joys of my life.

ps- i think it's about to rain, 'cause that finger is aching a little.

I guess it depends on what type of music you are playing
I went through the chickin pickin phase. Now I'm playing jazz and that style doesn't cut it, although I do do a chicken lick for laughs.
I use all four fingers on my left hand now. I find it so much easier to play. I don't need to go all over the neck. I like to watch people like Clapton. He gets in a position and doesn't move up or down the neck very much. All the notes are right there...bends, chicken.....etc.
Besides you may play a certain style now, but you probably won't forever.

i wish i could learn to use it more. i simply can't get confortable with it. I find that it is easy to integrate the middle finger but my ring finger always seems to be at the wrong angle for picking. I really need to find someone who knows how to do this well and observe how they do it.

Huge issue for me.. i just can't get the angles right..

i have never seen a video that showed you how to hybrid pick well.

I rarely use my ring finger on my picking (right) hand and I am actually having a deli ma.
I can pick much faster and more accurately with a flat pick but I dont get enough attack or presence with my middle and ring finger while doing hybrid picking.
If I use a thumb pick, I absolutely LOVE the attack from using my index and middle finger. I use my index the most, and then add the middle with it when needed. When I use hybrid, I use the middle most (obviously) and then add the ring finger when needed.
I can do hybrid picking with no problems, I just dont get the attack with middle & ring. Also, I dont use my fingernails, I am just picking with my finger tips.
Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Don

I have been playing three-finger style on my 12-string which is basically taking banjo technique and applying it to guitar. I do that with a thumbpick and fingerpicks on my first and second fingers. Your ring finger is not used.

Though without fingerpicks, I use my ring-finger a lot, especially in hybrid picking. I tried the banjo style technique using a flatpick and the finger picks on my middle and ring fingers but that just did not work for me.. YMMV!

It's amazing I can play my guitar without any of my right-hand fingers even touching the strings!

It's amazing I can play my guitar without any of my right-hand fingers even touching the strings!

yeah, you chickenpickers have my total admiration. i'm a flatpicker struggling to work some fingers into my right-hand technique, but it's sloooooow. and somewhat depressing!

..................yeah?..........Whose calling?:lol:

http://i58.photobucket.com/albums/g276/fingers23/spiderguitar.gif

It's getting to be that I'm using my ring finger more & more. The majority of my music is done on pedal steel, dobro, or lap steel; where I'm using a thumbpick & index & middle fingers. And for years any 6 string work that I did was stricly flatpick. When I retired about 3 years ago I fought with myself trying to get hybrid-picking done in a proper manner & that ring finger was just like a club hanging on my right hand. Finally, the fighting has ended and everything seems to be coming around as I think it should. Yeah, you can teach an old dog new tricks...but old habits die hard. Anymore, on lap steel I'm just as likely to use a flatpick with raw fingers as I am the traditional thumbpick & metal fingerpicks (and in doing that is really where all of my battles were won in using the ring finger).

I´ve become a "hybrid" picker over the years....so I use ring and index fingers a lot in my playing.

Yep, I mostly stick to just using my middle finger. I can keep up with it. But I do use my ring finger a good bit too.

I use my ring finger quite a lot, but not necessarily for fast stuff. More for banjo rolls, chords, string skipping, and double/triple stops.

/ Tony

I also use the ring finger a lot. No pinky, though.