The Chetboard

I just broke my right hand ring finger nail yet again and I'm going to try this method. I'll let you all know how it turns out and if it holds up to pickin'. Even though I try to disfavor my ring finger nail when playing, even going so far as using the little finger nail it, still plays the better half of the melody notes.

Rich Irvine

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6iUeSq1fJtE

How did you break it? Nails are in constant peril from everything from car doors to can openers. Drives me crazy sometime. Just the slightest wrong move. And "D'oh!"

I usually break my nails at a food pantry that I work at two days a week. I've got to remember to wear gloves there from now on. As far as fixing my broken nail, my Crazy Glue had dried up and I keep forgetting to buy more of it. In the meantime the ring finger nail broke even worse and also my index finger nail.

Rich Irvine

Ahhhhhhhhhhh! I hear 'ya! It's the bugbear of my life! It's the simplest thing that usually gets me. It's usually unexpected and comes out of the blue when I'm least expecting it. D'oh!

It could be as innocuous a thing as pressing down the knob on the toaster. Actually, any simple, seemingly safe action where I use my right hand can become a platform for launching two weeks of misery for me. Even opening up my guitar case. Oh, the irony!

I've taken to shaking people's hands with my left hand so as not to strike a ring or other jewelry,. Some people even get offended, believe it or not! They get HUFFY! But they are not inside the head of a guitar player. Can't really expect them to be.

I have seriously thought about the glove. But I haven't figured which would be a proper style of glove.

Didn't Chet take to wearing a protective glove? Maybe someone can set me straight on that. Seems I remember a photo of him actually sitting at a piano (believe it or not), and he had a glove on his right hand.

But perhaps my memory is playing tricks on me?

At the Food Pantry ministry that I work at, I broke my middle finger nail badly when I forgot to put on my gloves when moving stuff around. Afterwords, I bought some super glue and hopefully fixed the nail. Since I'm not worried about looks it indeed doesn't look very aesthetic. I probably won't try the nail out until tomorrow. It seems solid for now but will await putting it under the stress of playing (nylon strings) before reporting back to you folks. In my case the nail had a missing triangular section.

Rich Irvine

Brings to mind for me something Chet once said. He said that he had SOFT nails, and he took more to playing nylion stringed guitars because the steel strings chewed up his nails.

But maybe that was earlier in his career. I'm not exactly sure.

After the super glue dried I added a coat of M Nail Magic over the top. I tried out playing this morning. So far it holds up. It looks kinda bad but I don't really care, as long as it works. Time will tell if it holds up until my nail grows out again.

The other thing is to pay attention to how much nail you actually need to play

Lennny (for example) kept his longer than most folk. The shorter you "need" them to be the easier it is to avoid breakage

I try to reach a happy medium between too long and too short. I absolutely can not understand how Liona Boyd plays with her nails that long. At least the last I knew of. But play she does!

Dolly Parton is another one. Not a "CGP", but she can do some pickin'. But her nails are like talons! How does she pull that off? Imagine going through life trying NOT to break those things??

I found that the fix only lasted a day, but my technique for doing this is flawed. since the fingernail is on my right hand, my left hand has to do everything and it is not very nimble. I think it will take me some time and practice to get fixing a nail right. One thing I found on one of my attempts today to fix it, I clumsily ended up gluing the tea bag paper to the end of my left index paper and it is like a tough callous which I really can't develop anymore. Hope it doesn't damage the skin underneath but I will see how it affects my playing.

Rich