Clawhammer Question & Answer

My opinion page addressing inquiries concerning clawhammer technique.

I read that some players use Scotch Tape over their fingernail to prevent it from wearing out. Do you use anything other than your natural nail when playing?

I've tried this before but found that I'd quickly wear through the tape to the adhesive and end up with a sticky mess on my strings.

I used to have a fake nail ("nails" in my case) put on at a salon. This worked great for a number of years until the salons started to use a more flexible nail formula. The new nails weren't as hard and would quickly start to scratch against the strings.

I'm now back to using my natural nails for shows and metal fingerpicks, shaped and reversed, for jams. I use the dunlop .018 gauge picks which are easily shaped to the curve of my nail. Once again I only use the picks in situations where I need a lot of volume.

Mike's Portrait

Thanks... Mike

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