I have moved on from chuggin 8th note punk bass-lines and am re-exploring my ska roots. Lots of fast triads and movement, requiring pinky and ring finger dexterity. After about 20 minutes of such pieces my fingers/forearm start to cramp. Should I strength them out and soldier on or call it a night when this happens?
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Always take a break when you feel discomfort. Your hands, fingers, arms, shoulder, back, whatever need time to recover from the strain of playing new and/or challenging techniques or lines.
As is the case following prolonged or heavy physical exercise, muscles get sore from playing. Resting from that exertion allows your body to bounce back stronger and increases your endurance.
Shorter sessions with rests in between will get you where you want to go.
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What might help is if you apply the Fartlek (speed play in Swedish) method, which is alternating between going fast and slowing down. So you would play the fast notes for a few bars, then hit the root note for a few bars, then fast, then slow, and so on. It’s really an efficient way to build muscle endurance.
It combines speed and endurance, and is an old running training technique. We made a lot of jokes about the term when in high school.
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Doing your practicing in 20 minute chunks is about right. It’s what I’ve always suggested to those I’ve given lessons to. Take one thing you want to work on and perfect as much as possible and after a brief warm up work solely on that.
If you’re experiencing discomfort take a break. Not doing it typically results in getting into bad habits in order to compensate. One thing I would suggest though is to determine what’s causing the cramping and fatigue.
If you’re having to grip the neck too tight is the action so high that it requires more light pressure to fret? Could lighter gauge round core strings help now while you’re still building finger strength and endurance? Just some things to consider.
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Well unless you are building up your fingers strength and stamina for a tour, I’d just stop 5 minutes after you feel sore. It gives enough of determination exercise to push through but not going to injure you.
Keep doing it and you’ll be able to play a 60 even 90 minute set in no time.
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My main problem with soreness has been for 2 years, and continues to be: 1) wrist tension; 2) finger tension—both caused by my relatively short stubby/fat fingers. I have attempted to account for these in a variety of ways:
- My p-bass has a jazz neck (All Parts), which I sanded to make it thinner
- I use very low string action.
- I utilize a very high neck angle to reduce curling of the wrist (sitting with my bass hanging between my knees)
- I microshift whenever possible.
The main problem is that many songs with fast triads or walking bass lines require ring/pinky utilization and independence and my finger span is not naturally wide enough for 1 finger per fret until I get up to the 9th fret. As a result, anytime I have to do a 2 to 5 or 6 jump on the low (nut) end of the bass, I have to use my thumb as a anchor point on the back to leverage a stretch.
Also, playing with a high neck angle works for certain genres, but not for fast rock/punk/ska because of the need for an up/down picking motion as opposed to an left/right sawing motion that results from a high neck angle. For such songs, I have to stand and rest the bass on my right hip with it pointed out at a 45 degree angle to avoid excessive wrist curling, but that makes it very difficult to fret notes accurately for me, as I now have a greater distance to cover with my fingers when playing on the E and A strings.
The most recent instance this cropped up is trying to learn “Special Brew” by Bad Manners, which is quite busy and all over frets 2 to 7 across all four strings.
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