Taming The Terrible Thumb - PHH 014

Welcome to Practicing Harp Happiness, the Harp Mastery Podcast. My name is Ann Sullivan and I'm a harpist, teacher, and founder of Harp Mastery. I'm all about creating more harp happiness in the world by helping harp players like you play the music they want the way they want. But as a harpist who nearly flunked out of one of the most prestigious music schools in the world, the although later not only graduated, but I went on to teach there, I know from personal experience that learning the harp is way harder than it looks. Here, each week on the Practicing Harp Happiness Podcast, I show you how to solve the challenges of practicing and playing the harp. Whether it's about making your fingers behave or learning music faster, or getting your piece's performance ready, or just learning to enjoy your playing every day. So, sounds great, doesn't it? Let's get started.

Welcome to the show. Today's show is all about thumbs. Thumbs are funny, aren't they? They're not like our other digits. For one thing, there are lots of sayings about thumbs. You could give somebody a thumbs up or a thumbs down. If you're a gardener, you could have a green thumb. If you have systems, perhaps you have a rule of thumb for doing things. Or maybe you're bored and you just don't twiddle your thumbs. Or maybe if you remember your Shakespeare, you're suspicious and you've got a pricking in your thumbs. Or maybe, like me, sometimes you just feel like you're all thumbs. Hopefully we'll cure some of that all thumbs feeling, at least in regard to your heart. Playing today. So let's take a moment before we get started and think about the anatomy of your thumb for just a moment. Look at your thumb. Whatever you're doing right now, unless you're driving, look at your thumb. If you looked at your thumb over its entire length, you would see that it's just about as long, if not longer, than your other fingers, right? It's got that little tiny knuckle at the top, and then there's that middle joint where it sort of connects to the the webbing that goes to your second finger. Then there's that bottom joint that connects all the way down to your wrist so that your thumb is actually quite long.

It's interesting, too, if you consider the reach of your thumb. If you take your hand and you stretch it as far as you can and you put it on the harp strings, try seeing how far you can reach between your second and your fourth finger and then compare it to how far you can reach with Your thumb and your second finger. You'll find that your thumb accounts for literally half the reach that you can do on the harp strings. Pretty important digit, pretty important finger for us harpists. And everybody's thumb is different, of course, right? Your thumb might be double jointed, it might bend back, it might collapse at different knuckles.

It might be longer or shorter. So there are different physical ways to use your thumb well when you're playing the harp. And all of those ways have to achieve this double objective, the objective of physical agility, so that your thumb can play well and blend with your other fingers and musical expression, so that it's not always too loud or always too soft. I mean, let's face it, your right thumb is often the melody finger, correct. And so we want the melody to be expressive, not just loud. We need it balanced with the other fingers. And then, of course, sometimes your right thumb needs to blend with the other fingers in an arpeggio or a scale. Now, your left thumb is probably your most underappreciated finger. It doesn't have the prominent role of your right thumb, but it's so important in any left hand accompaniment pattern or again in scales and arpeggios. It can prove to be the weak link if it's not developed well. So a lot of times we think about developing the strength of our thumbs, and I think that there's a better way to look at it, and I'm going to share that with you today. So we're going to talk about how to make your thumbs physically agile and musically expressive. And hopefully I'll show you how to be happy with your thumbs. I'll also give you some extra resources to, to give you some other things to consider with your thumb and with all your fingers when we get to the end of the episode. But for right now, let's just get started talking thumbs. We harpists want our thumbs to be beautiful and strong. Our thumbs were built to be strong. You know, there are nine skeletal muscles that help the thumb work. Nine muscles for one little thumb, that's pretty impressive. And that gives us, or should give us, the ability to do everything we need to do with our thumbs, whether we're hitching a ride or just twiddling them or playing the harp. But those muscles need room to work. So like every other muscle in your body.

Working the muscle is what's going to make it strong. And so much of the time I see harpists who are worried that their thumbs aren't strong enough not giving their muscles the chance to do the jobs that they were designed for. They're playing with their thumbs scrunched right up against their hand. There's no room for their thumb to move. And if their thumb can't move, they're not using the muscles that are there. Now let's compare this to what we already know and do with our fingers, right? We know that our fingers get the best sound when we move them fully and close them into our hand. We don't just play with the top knuckle or the middle knuckle, but we use all the joints of our finger and close from the back of our finger where it joins our hand so that we have the biggest finger motion, which allows us to be relaxed and therefore allows our sound to be rich and beautiful and relaxed as well. The motion itself helps to create the relaxation. And that's where our sound comes from. Basic physics when you think about the lever and all that kind of thing, right? It's the finger motion using your biggest lever to get your sound with the least effort. So why do we keep our thumbs scrunched up against our hand? Well, the simple answer is we shouldn't. Now, different methods of heart playing talk about this in different ways. The salzado tradition that I grew up in always talks about thumb up, meaning that your he salzido taught that your thumb should be vertical. And this created a space between your thumb and your second finger. But whatever heart method you use, or if you don't use any particular method at all, you still need space for your thumb to move. That's where it's going to get its best sound. For the least effort, it's going to make it relaxed. It's going to sound more like your other fingers when you want it to. It's going to be able to blend because it's producing the sound more or less the same way. So what does this space look like? What does it mean? Well, let me describe it to you. If you were to take one hand and put your fingers together, maybe, you know, pretend that you were taking an oath in court, right? And put your hands straight up with your fingers straight together. Then have your other hand in playing position. You could even put it on the harp for a second. But it's going to look like you were playing a four finger chord. You're going to take that and take your four fingers of your other hand. You're taking the oath hand, and you should be able to fit all four fingers between your thumb and, and the middle knuckle of your second finger, which is where your thumb should Close.

Now, depending on your own particular anatomy, you may not be able to fit all four fingers. You may only be able to fit three. You know, your thumb might be shorter, your fingers might be fat. You know.

Everybody'S a little bit different. So if the measurement doesn't come out exactly right, you know, that's okay. But it shouldn't be scrunched up. You shouldn't have one finger width. If your thumb is going to move and it's going to close over to that middle knuckle of your second finger, which is what we want, it needs room to do it. And if there's only one finger width there, your thumb doesn't have enough room to move two fingers, not really three fingers. Now, your thumb can move four fingers even a little bit better if your thumb is that long, but you want that much space to be able to move.

This will allow for the motion that will create relaxation in your thumb. You won't have to work so hard with your thumb to get a big sound. It's going to sound more like your other fingers when you want it to in a scale or an arpeggio. It's going to keep your hand balanced so that all your other fingers have room to work as well.

And it's just going to create more relaxation in your hand completely. And that's where your sound comes from. So the first ingredient in a beautiful thumb is give it room to move. Once you've given your thumb room to move, then it can start to relax. Now perhaps you're thinking, well, a relaxed thumb isn't what I want. I really want a strong thumb. I want a thumb that's going to be able to project the melody. I want a thumb that's going to be able to blend with my other fingers and not leave a hole in the middle of my scales. Yeah, I get it.

But this is where the paradox is.

The harder you try with your thumb, the tenser you're going to get. And the tenser you get, the less mobility your thumb will have and the less ability it will have to do anything that you want it to do, whether it's blend or project a melody. Neither of those things will work well if your thumb is tight and tense. So when your thumb has room to move, then it can be relaxed. And relaxation is the key to a beautiful sound and to control over that sound. And we'll talk a little bit more about how to produce the different sorts of sounds you want from your thumb. We'll talk about that in just a moment.

But relaxation is where all this starts. We're not really looking for a strong thumb. We're looking for a free thumb. A thumb that is free from tension, a thumb that is free to produce the sound that you want it to produce. So here's a little exercise to help you learn how to relax your thumb. You're going to put your hand on the harp strings. I'm going to use my right hand and I have a plain old C major chord here. You can put it on any combination of notes that you like, makes no difference. But I call this the flop over exercise because you're going to put your fingers lightly on the strings and then just flop your thumb forward. Now, when I say flop, I mean you're going to let it push the string, but without any tension. And you want it to go right over to that middle knuckle of your index finger, which is its little home base. That's its resting point. That's where, you know, that's where it needs to land for its follow through. Now, as you flop it over, it may hit other strings on the harp.

That's okay. It may not. But it may. And if it does, that's fine because you're flopping it. You're not trying. The idea is to keep the dynamic quite soft. I mean, certainly no larger than a, no louder than a mezzo piano. And you're going to just relax it. Now, if it doesn't hit other strings, that's fine. If it does, that's okay too. You going to flop it over to that knuckle. As you play it, start feeling the impetus for the motion of your thumb from that back knuckle, that bottom joint of your thumb where it joins to your wrist.

That's where your thumb motion is going to come.

When you do this, I would do it in both hands, not together. But do also do this with your left thumb. This is not just for your right thumb. When you do that little exercise, you're going to think, start thinking about your thumb over its entire length. And the nice thing about this is that if you're, if you're not creating the space for your thumb to move, you will not be able to feel this. This requires motion. So as you do this at that lovely soft dynamic where you're not really trying, be sure everything else is relaxed.

You can go even softer, right?

Think about keeping all the tension out of your hand. You don't need any tension to play this. You just need to push from the bottom of your thumb. I guarantee that if you haven't done this this will be an entirely new feeling for you to think about that thumb motion and to feel the thumb motion coming from the bottom of your thumb instead of the top. But the sound will be very different. Now, you might find at first that you can't control it, that you hit a lot of extra strings, that the sound isn't very consistent. That's okay. This means you haven't developed that musculature that I was talking about a little bit ago. And this is new. Anything new is going to be a little bit awkward. So think about it. Feel the bottom of the thumb and allow your thumb to relax, knowing that it will play better. And actually, because your thumb is relaxed, it's going to take a lot of the tension out of that portion of your hand, which will allow your fingers to. To move more freely, too.

So you might even want to expand your idea of relaxation here. And as you play that little drill, feel the relaxation in all your other fingers, not just your thumb. Push from the very bottom of your thumb again.

Feel that relaxation. Spread up your arm. Release the tension in your shoulders, your neck, your jaw, the rest of your body. Be sure you're sitting, stretching, straight, breathing.

But push from the bottom of your thumb.

You will be amazed at the difference in the way your hand feels, the way you feel, and the sound you make. Now it's time to talk about the sound. Now that your thumb is loose and relaxed and feeling free.

I'd like to free the sound that your thumb makes as well. And I'd like to help you create more of a tonal repertoire. A color palette for your thumb. We don't only want your thumb to have one sound. And while this applies to all your fingers and both thumbs, it applies to your right thumb even more, doesn't it? Because your right thumb is your melody finger. And so often we have pieces that require.

A beautiful, ringing right thumb. So that's an essential point, that color palette. But I'd like to offer you this word first. Think about your thumb sound as a releasing of the sound from the string. You're not going to pluck it or pull it or push it. You're going to release it. And it's a whole different way to think about it. The sound is already inherent in the string all your fingers are doing. Or your thumb. At this point, all your thumb is doing is releasing it. Right, There you go. Better string.

It's just releasing the sound.

And it can be loud, soft, it can be accented, it can be very gentle. It can be long and lush.

It can blend with your other fingers. So that word release.

Has for me at any rate made a big difference about how I think about the way my thumb plays. If I'm just releasing the sound, I don't need to drag it out of the string. I don't need to hit the string really hard. I don't need to try so hard like any other releasing. I just need to open the door. I need to create the possibility for it. And we've already taken a lot of the work of your thumb away from it. We've given it room to move so that it can use those nine muscles, right? We've created the relaxation so you don't have the tension that you're always fighting to create the sound.

So all the possibilities are there. All that's left for you to do is to release the sound from the string. Some people think about pressing it out. Another thing to do. Pressing is a nice thing for a particularly.

Lengthy sort of attack, a thoughtful kind of a sound.

You can press the sound out of the string.

But isn't it interesting to think about the words that you can use for your thumb sound? Because they're different. I just gave you a few a moment ago. And they sort of do fall into three different categories. I think there are an infinite number of variations on these themes, on these little categories. But first of all, there's the. The sound that blends, right? The sound that sounds no different from the other fingers. When you're doing a scale, oops, it could be too loud or too soft. There we go.

But one that fits in and sounds seamless. If you're interested in thinking about making your cross unders and crossovers sound sound more seamless, try playing a scale that's just two and one.

Or just three, two, one.

Or play a scale without any thumbs at all and see if it sounds different to you.

So there are ways that you can sort of experiment and see how your thumb blends. But blending is crucial. But now that your thumb is working the same way your fingers are working, it has room to move. And it's playing from that bottom joint, right? The entire length of your thumb. You stand and it's relaxed. You stand a much better chance of having it blend. If you tense up your thumb, it's never going to blend. It's. And you won't be able to necessarily control exactly when it plays. That's another one of those paradoxical things, right? The harder you work to control something like this, the less it is really in your control. When your thumb is relaxed you have the ability to have it play exactly when it's supposed to and not fire a little too early or a little too late or get stuck on the string because you're pushing too hard. In relaxing and setting it free to do its job, we find a lot of. A lot of good things come out of that. So blending is one thing. And then sometimes we just want an accent from our thumb.

Right? A nice strong kind of a thumb. I also have kind of a large callus on my thumb that I need to file down. And it's. It's sort of clicking today, but there we go, a little bit better.

Playing from the back of your thumb allows you to accent and still stay relaxed. It gives you a way to push. And since you've done that exercise that we talked about a moment ago, you felt how it feels to push from the bottom of your thumb. Remember that you need room to move for this to work. If you don't have that space created for your thumb to close over.

It won't work nearly as well. You really need that space space. So both of those things still come into play. But the accent is that sudden push, right. And all that strength that this more strength than you could ever need for your thumb accent is found in pushing from the bottom, not trying to get it from the top of your thumb, the tip, Right? Okay, but what about those times when we were want a beautiful ringing melody and our thumb is the only melody note.

It'S the only finger that's going to be responsible for the melody. We want the melody to ring, we want it to sound, yet we want the ability to shape the melody. Because not all notes are created the same in the context of a melody. There's an arch, there's a phrase. So. So once again, the control of having a relaxed thumb is going to be really important here so that you can choose the dynamic at which you play any particular note.

But.

The richness of the sound is going to come from playing over the entire length of your thumb. That's where your thumb sound comes from. I know I've told you that a hundred times already today. But if you're just trying to play from the tip, if you do the wrong thing here and hold your. Your hand really close to your thumb, really scrunched up, and just try to play with the top of your thumb. There's only so much range of volume and tone that you can get. If you open up your hand to create that space for your thumb to move again, you have a lot more variety and a Good exercise. To just give yourself a taste of the range of dynamic and tone that's open to your thumb is to just play a thumb scale, making sure that your thumb has plenty of room to move. Don't pull your hand away from the strings. Close your thumb to play each note.

Try a scale with all your notes sounding equal.

In volume. That is, that wasn't quite equal.

And then try it with a continual crescendo up to the top. Start from pianissimo.

Get gradually louder each string. Be sure you have the space to play. Oh, that could have been a little bit louder. There we go. And all the way up to the top. And then try a decrescendo all the way down. Just playing your thumb, keeping it relaxed, remembering to give it room to move and to let it move and to experiment with the sound that way. But your beautiful thumb melody will come from having that. That motion that keeps your thumb supple. It will come from. It will have richness because you'll be using your whole finger and it will have control because your thumb will be relaxed.

So those are my three most important things I need to tell you about your thumb. You, it needs room to move, it needs to be relaxed, and then you need to be able to release the sound. All three of those things put together will give you that beautiful ringing, accented, blending, variety of tones, dynamics and colors that you want from this most important finger. And remember, don't just concentrate on your right thumb, your left thumb and needs this too. You're going to strengthen all of those nine muscles leading into your thumb that help you do all those wonderful things the easy way, just by giving your thumb room to move. I'm sure you're anxious to get to your harp and try out these techniques for taming your terrible thumbs and turning them into terrific thumbs, which, of course, is what we all want. But before I let you go and start working at that, just a couple of quick resources for you. In the links in the show notes for this episode, you will find a link to a blog post that I wrote about thumbs, which will give you a slightly different and expanded viewpoint from what we talked about today. And also if you're interested in working not just on your thumbs, but on your other fingers, remember, we have a course called Four Weeks to Finger Freedom. And you'll find that in those four weeks, we devote one week to each of the four fingers that we use to play the harp. Your little pinkies accepted here. And you might find some similarly valuable tips and plenty of exercises and good ways to look at how your fingers move in that course. So if you're interested in taking a look at that, I'll link to that in the show notes as well. On next week's show, we're going to be talking about the practice gap. That practice gap that happens when you're practicing your piece and practicing your piece and somehow finishing it is still across this divide and you're having trouble getting from nearly done to done. So we're going to show you how to not fall into the practice gap, but finish your music a little bit faster. And whether or not you feel that you're suffering from the practice gap, I know you're going to find these tips really valuable. We'll be doing that on next week's show. Also, for the entire month of September, the podcast is going to be a series on goals, on types of goals, setting goals, making sure that you're setting the right kind of goals for you, how to plan, how to okay, you've got this great goal. Well, how do you plan for it properly? How do you set out a plan for that? How do you actually achieve it? How do you know when you've gotten there? What different types of goals, all things goal related to and harp related we're going to be talking about on the podcast in September. And I've got some special things lined up for that so you won't want to miss that. You'll be able to kick off a new season of harp playing in the best, most powerful way for you. So that's coming up in September. Next week we'll be talking about the practice gap. And now I will leave you to get back to working on your terrific thumbs. I look forward to seeing you and talking with you next week. Thanks for tuning into another episode of the Practicing Harp Happiness podcast. I release a new episode every Monday morning so you can hit your practice week running. Until then, remember to practice your harp happiness every day. See you next time.