First,just by chance, both Woody and I are lefties who play right-handed. I can't speak for Woody, who has a great left hand, but for me, my left hand is very average, and my right hand works really well for me. Your theory of opposite hand being better at "ands" is very interesting and I want to think about that one more, do a little research.....

I also think I could learn the strumming bits MUCH faster than the fretting bits if i tried to reverse.

Then of course there are 3 categories of guitar-playing lefties:
1. Players who reverse the entire guitar
2. Players who reverse the guitar, but not the strings.
3. Players like John Bushouse, Woody, and I who just lay righty.

Finally, it is really semantics and language habit which gives us these terms "playing righty or playing lefty"--we play with both hands. And considering how in American guitar culture,too much attention is given to scales (fretting) and not enough to rhythm (strumming/picking, I think the terms are backwards.

He speculated that we most often use our dominant hand to strum & pick (Woody and Bob being notable exceptions) because that's the harder & more important part.

I know for me personally I've spent decades fretting (pun intended) over the inadequacies of both hands (& my brain of course) but I've recently come to the conclusion that my biggest challenges are rythmic & dynamic. I'm pretty sure my left hand will find enough of the frets to get the point across, but I'm much less sure my right (dominant) hand will make it all sound musical.

Dan

No, you won't find that whole "Strat pack"/everything you need in a box deal for lefties, but here's a little secret: those "Strat packs" are LOUSY deals for the money. They put the crappiest amp, strap, tuner, you name it in those "packs" and market them at beginners. It's a very predatory strategy. If you want a Squier Strat, get a Squier Strat by itself. Then go shopping for a good budget amp. You'll have fun shopping, and you'll get more amp for your money.

Last question: no, you can't just switch the strings around. First, the slots in the nut are different sizes and your fat low E string will NOT fit in the narrow slot on the other side of the nut. Second, your bridge will be backwards and your intonation (the ability for notes and chords up the neck to be in tune when the open strings are in tune) will be messed up. You gotta get a lefty guitar. try southpawguitars.com

The medical point:"lefty" brains are wired in a variety of ways as compared to the right-handed brain. Hence, lefties that play left probably have their motor programming in the left brain while lefties that play right more likely have some degree of motor programming in both hemispheres thereby allowing them do do it "backwards". This is called neural asymmetry.

Thus, handedness is probably not a one-dimensional trait or behavior, and is better defined using multiple measures that assess different aspects of hand preference and performance.

I would suggest that those of use who are left and play right are able to do so due to motor programming on both sides of the brain and the a right dominated culture that probably lets us develop our right hands.

I play lefty -- completely, not just flip a righty guitar. (I'm not really sure which hand is dominant with me -- I write with my right hand, but I grew up in a place and time where schools forced everyone to. Curiously, I've always been able to switch hit in baseball).

I sometimes regret playing lefty -- one of the nice things about the guitar is how many there are of them, and lefties can't play 99% of them. And as we've discussed, if a lefty wants a tricone, he has to rob Fort Knox and get it made custom.

When I started playing guitar, the music I wanted to play (flatpicked rock/country) didn't place nearly as much demand on the picking hand as the music I now prefer (acoustic country blues). As such, I would say the music you want to play is something to consider when decding whether to pick with your dominant hand (with the understanding that this may change over time).

I would also agree with those who've said that guitar playing is not a completely 'one-sided' function: it's more like batting than throwing, and it's a lot easier to learn to switch hit than to 'switch throw'.

And yes, not a week goes by that I get to tell someone who asks to play one of my guitars, "Sure dude -- you can play a left-handed one, can't you?"

Anyway, that was a long way of saying that lefties should look for symmetrically braced tops when buying a righty guitar.

Here's a little trick for those of you who don't want to go to the trouble of making an entirely new nut. Fill the slots with baking soda and dribble a tiny amount of cyano glue (e.g. Hot Stuff) on the filled slot. Cyano bonds so well with baking soda that it makes it as hard as the bone it is replacing. Be careful though. Cyano bonds to just about any part of your body instantly. The glue sets up immediately and you can file new slots right away.

In activities where one foot is forward (surfing, snowboarding, skateboarding, slalom waterskiing), most people prefer their left leg forward (regular) and a minority favor their right foot forward (goofy).

You can demonstrate this by pushing somebody from behind and seeing which foot they put forward to arrest their fall or by sliding across the floor in your stocking feet and seeing which foot forward "feels right".

This phenomenon does not appear to correlate directly to right or left handedness.

I ride "regular" on a snowboard and also favor my left thumb on top, but am right handed.

"Everybody fold your hands together, you know interlocking your fingers. Which thumb is on top?
My psychology professor got everyone to do this yesterday saying those with the left thumb on top are more musically inclined.

Whew! My left thumb wins every time! (I can hardly figure out how to interlock my fingers the other way around!).

Craig continued:

"Seeing we're all guitar players here it would be cool to see how this theory holds up."

Because the theory works in my "favor", as it were, My vote goes to the "all-thumbs theory" as holding up nicely! :-)

On to the lefty/righty thing...

For the record, I'm a "righty", playing with a conventional configuration.

Except for the fairly rare historical reference to someone deciding that they required a different instrument/string configuration (considering all stringed instruments, not just guitars), it really seems a relatively recent concept of dubious physical/mental pedigree.

Why is there no need for a "lefty" keyboard instrument? Perhaps the answer to that one offers us something to ponder when considering the lefty/righty issue of other instruments...

With a keyboard, each hand is expected to perform similar technical feats with equal dexterity. I don't know anyone who has re-strung (re-designed) a keyboard instrument so that the bass is to starboard, and the treble to port...just because someone signs their name with their left hand.

I grew up surrounded by other string players...all of us, regardless of lefty/righty status, played our instruments in the "conventional" manner (left hand deals with fingerboard, and right hand bows and plucks). The issue of left or right handedness *never* came up, because it had nothing to do with which hand might be more dexterous in some areas...because both hands were required to develop technical mastery and sensitivity in their respective duties. The left/right hand requirements for any stringed instrument may be more dissimilar than for the hands on a keyboard, but one is not more challenging or "important" than the other.

In an orchestral setting, the occasional "lefty" player would really disrupt section-wide bowing conformity, with unhappy collisions becoming a greater threat (as well as being visibly distracting).

Finally, with the bass bar/sound post arrangement in the violin family of instruments, if the strings were to be reversed, so would the interior configuration of the instrument need to be changed. The bass bar runs, interior, the length of the instrument top, along the line where the "bass" side bridge foot resides...distributing vibrations along the top, and the sound post...from the bridge foot on the "treble" side transfering vibration to the back of the instrument).

No violinmaker I know of has made instruments with a "lefty" configuration (perhaps there have been some done for special order, but this has never been, and is not now, a "normal" thing to do).

I really do feel that this lefty/righty issue - all other things being equal - has very little basis in "reality" in terms of being able to train one or the other hand to be technically proficient in its assigned task.

The only situations where I feel a "reversed" instrument configuration really makes sense is either in the case of truly physical barriers (something like a missing finger on one hand might perhaps make it very reasonable to consider alternate instrument/string arrangements), or if someone just "likes to do it this way".

Steve Morse is a lefty playing righty by the way. He has incredible picking chops so perhaps not all lefty's that are affected equally. He also holds his pick in a pretty non-standard way using his thumb, first and middle finger to hold the pick.

If I didn't have 25 years of playing under my belt I'd think about switching but trying to fret with my right hand seems infinitely harder than trying to pick.

If someone had a proven method for helping people with weak picking hands improve they could make a lot of money. One of these days maybe I'll stumble onto something really useful. Until then I keep searching and enjoying the instrument despite this small handicap.

____________________________________________________________________

CRAIG .........
phewwwww - my left thumb came out on top too ...........
I knew I was musical I just knew it !!!

I eat left hand - but do everything else right handed
always wondered why I did that !!!

I was recently think about finding a lefty strat and converting it to see if Hendrix was onto something.

It can get to complex with themedical opinions of why this is...... blah .......... blah..... books on why people are lefty or righty. Your brain is blah ...blah....

It is always best to simplify things and just play.

First of all, it's fun being lefthanded. Especially around righthanded players! They think for some reason that what I do on the fretboard more difficult to achieve because the strings are strung backwards. I used to buy into that myth years ago, because it validated and supported my low self esteem as a player at the time. Most right handed players trying to read my chord hand would admit they had great difficulty following unrecognizeble chord shapes... that was amusing to me. I would offer dramamine, but to now avail.

As a drummer early on, my left hand was (for the lack of a better term) my lead off or dominating hand. As a result, I have always been focused on lefthand technique as a drummer, bassplayer & guitarplayer. With that being said, my approach to the guitar has been heavy on rhythm.

Albert King, the reveared catagory 2 player, exploited the upside down and backward thing to the fullest degree. Playing his deep bending licks are easy & effortless for me. It was hardly an accomplishment to grab a B string or high E string or both with 3 or 4 fingers and wank it down across the fretboard. Unlike the righthanded player who has to push a high string, I will always have the honor of pulling a string. A righthander that can soulfully pull off Albert's licks skillfully will always get my respect.

Also too, having the small strings at the top gives you a slightly different strumming signature too. My downstroke sounds like your upstroke... not better just different. A distinct disadvantage being strung upside down is the fact I can't use a thumbpick to drive the A & low E string (standard tuning referenced) on them delta and Piedmont style tunes. Got to do it a la Miss Cotten. Also, if I'm not careful, I can slide on more strings than I intended because I have to cross a fretboard full of strings to get to the last one. Sooooo.... it makes you play differently.... but that's a good thing.

"just because I ain't playin' it right... don't mean I ain't playin' it wrong!"

Although it did seem a little wierd to me at the time, I immediatly changed my positioning of the instrument to "normal" righty style, and has been playing that way ever since. I have no idea whether or not this is good or bad, but as a total beginner, it didn't matter much to me at the time. Lefty or righty? i consider myself 50/50.

Oh, yes, and that first guitar was a German-made Oscar Teller student model, nylon strings.
I still play it when I visit my mother's house.

For my birthday, I had wanted a toy red plastic Stratocaster copy that a large toystore had displayed in their catalogue. It was sold out - imagine my disappointment. I mean, no whammy bar,no buttons? Actually, the Teller was a really good guitar.

David.

You want to really stretch ot some brain cells? ... pick up one of them babies and play one for 10 minutes. You'll be ready for margarita!

Cole
www.colestevens.net

1. I am right-handed. Also my left thumb is on top, as per the test. So there.

2. I'd like to say that there are two aspects of this topic that haven't been discussed yet.

3. The first one is the chronological progression of development of guitar-playing skills.

When I started (age 12, a long time ago - I think I still walked around on tiptoes, because the earth hadn't cooled down yet!), I had to leard a bunch of chords to begin with. Now, I contend that learning chords was more of a visual phenomenon; in fact, some people call chords "positions" in Spanish. In other words, we worked at learning the shape of the chords. I don't remember if what the strumming hand did was considered relevant - in fact, you could just run your right thumb down the strings at regular intervals.

A few years later, I remember how impressed I was with the finger picking style of the so-called folk music players - particularly Paul Simon. At that point, I realized that I could get by if I just perfected a few chords, but I really had to develop my right-hand skills.

Now I agree that guitar-playing is a two-hand deal. There are songs where your left hand is more critical; in others, it may be the right hand. Sometimes they have to do independent things with each hand at the same time; sometimes you can only produce a particular effect if the two hands work together, in sinchronicity.

4. The second aspect is the particular demands of various genres. I have said before that my personal stomping ground is Latin American folk music, and in this field, the right hand is very critical. This will be evident for those of you who may have listened to a Venezuelan cuatro player, to an Argentinian chacarera or to one of those masters of the andean charango music. In many of those instances, the left hand demands are kind of minimal, but the right hand skills can be very demanding.

It is an interesting phenomenon that ultimately probably has a very simple answer.

Hmmm... Do lefty vs righty people tend to orient themselves differently to magnetic fields?

Well the final answer for me at 4:59 a.m. and several days late is that it doesn't make a difference. There is only a percieved difference due to 'the system' of western capitalism- they don't really care about making anything 'left handed' only about marketing and selling the most products for the most profit and cost cutting requires that they cut out left handed people, thus, they choose to make and market right handed stuff.

Is there such a relationship in nature: right handed and left handed monkeys for example? Are there left handed and right handed bananas or are they neutral?

If it is only a matter of balance in nature then the capitalist system is what creates the imbalance and brings our attention to it. I think it is the system, and therein lies the root of the problem. Did someone mention the Devil?