Finger Independence Exercises Starting on Your Fourth Finger
This is the last of the series focusing on finger independence exercises for beginning guitarists. I've saved the hardest for the end!
The reason exercises focused on your fourth finger are the hardest is because the pinky is the weakest finger. Some guitarist never incorporate their pinky–I call them 1–3 players–and this severely limits the possibilities of what they can do. Don't handicap yourself, run through these drills, and come back to them in your later practicing regimens.
Fourth Finger Independence Patterns for Guitar
Like the other posts in the series, we are sticking to alternate, or up–down, picking throughout the examples. The following exercises are depicted at the ninth through 12th frets, but can be played anywhere on the guitar with the finger patterns that are included.
Examples 1 and 2 illustrate finger orders I like to call the “Outside-Inside" patterns. These begin with a combination of your pinky and pointer fingers (Outside) and ends with some order of your middle and ring (Inside) fingers. Example 1 has a finger pattern of 4–1–2–3 and a fret order of 12–9–10–11. Example 2 changes these slightly to a fret order of 12–9–11–10 in the finger pattern of 4–1–3–2.
The next two examples depict the “Even–Odd" patterns that are available when you begin with your fourth finger. You begin Example 3 on the 12th fret with your pinky finger, move to the 10th fret with your middle finger, to the 9th fret with your pointer finger, and finally to the 11th fret with your ring finger.
Like Example 2, Example 4 make slight changes to the previous exercise. As the other "Odd–Even" example, it has a finger order of 4–2-3–1 and a fret pattern of 12–10–11–9.
Example 5 begins by going from your pinky, on fret 12, to your ring finger, on fret 11. It finishes by then moving to your pointer finger on fret 9, and to your middle finger on fret 10.
Example 6 is the inversion of the first exercise we started the series out on, so it should be nice and easy to execute. Like the previous exercise in this post, Example 6 starts with your fourth and third fingers but changes the finger pattern to 4–3–2–1. The fret order for this is 12–11–10–9.
If you’ve found this or other posts helpful, please leave a comment below or click the share button to spread the word on your social media channels. As always, keep shredding!
For the other finger independence posts in the series click the links below:
What to do with Your Fretting Hand When You're Beginning Guitar
Finger Independence Exercises Starting on Your Second Finger
Header Image Attribution: Flickr Creative Commons: Larry Jacobsen