Lefties Who Play Righty?

[oldwave maker]

When pal Gretchen won the Winfield fiddle contest in '92, a Sam Compton fiddle was the prize. I asked him about making a left handed fiddle for myself, since I'd already made several right hand ones already. He said learn to play righty, and went thru the astounding list of lefty fiddlers who played righty, from Paganini to Pearlman. No surprise Thile is a lefty, last time I saw him at a Telluride mando workshop with Sam, Mike, Tim, and Dawg, he made them all sound like righties!

[dustyamps]

R. Crumb plays his old Wabash right handed mandolin upside down left handed.

[HappyPickin]

Adam Steffey is a lefty that plays righty. It might have something to do with his first mandolin that was purchased secondhand. Interestingly, his first instructor was a lefty that plays lefty.

[sblock]

Wow. So far, the folks here on the MC have called out Chris Thile, Tim O'Brien, and Adam Steffey as left-handers who play a right-handed mandolin. These are generally held to be among the very best players today, and I'm assuming the reports about their handedness are correct. These folks certainly do not seem to suffer from problems with playing speed, problems with tone, problems picking accuracy, nor any problems attributable to left-hand dominance and a 'weak' right hand. Far from it!

I've been told that the great violin virtuoso, Paganini, was also left-handed, but I can't say for certain.

Anyway, folks who advise left-handers against playing the mandolin right-handed don't have much of a factual basis to stand upon, given data such as this. Mostly, I suspect that they're just projecting their own personal experiences, mostly negative, with trying things out right-handed -- and failing, for whatever reasons.

[bigskygirl]

Wow. So far, the folks here on the MC have called out Chris Thile, Tim O'Brien, and Adam Steffey as left-handers who play a right-handed mandolin. These are generally held to be among the very best players today, and I'm assuming the reports about their handedness are correct. These folks certainly do not seem to suffer from problems with playing speed, problems with tone, problems picking accuracy, nor any problems attributable to left-hand dominance and a 'weak' right hand. Far from it!

I've been told that the great violin virtuoso, Paganini, was also left-handed, but I can't say for certain.

Anyway, folks who advise left-handers against playing the mandolin right-handed don't have much of a factual basis to stand upon, given data such as this. Mostly, I suspect that they're just projecting their own personal experiences, mostly negative, with trying things out right-handed -- and failing, for whatever reasons.

Well looky here more hostility on the Cafe...go figure. Good to know the “I heard all I need to know” and “I believe everything I hear” methods are alive and well in this thread, that’ll save a lot of time in future discussions.

Nothing you have posted is factual in any way, we have no way of knowing why the quoted players play the way they do and it certainly does not prove that a lefty playing righty is the definitive method to be followed. You even admit straight out that you have no idea what Paganini is doing.

You are the one who is insisting that a lefty should play righty...you wanted facts, here’s some I am left handed and my picking is better using my left hand. There are several posts in this very thread that lefties playing righty struggle. There are many threads here on the Cafe saying the same thing. This in no way is definitive merely additional data points for future players to consider...certainly better than the “I’ve been told” method.

I don’t even think you are left handed which means you have no idea what you are talking about - talk about projecting...you’re doin’ it.

[MoreThanQuinn]

Bigskygirl and sblock, you guys seems to be talking past each other... and talking in circles.

From what I can tell sblock is saying that some lefties aren't held back at all on a right handed instrument. There are plenty of lefties who have reached the top tier playing righty.
And Bsg is saying, well, some lefties are inhibited playing this way, as she herself has felt.

There's no reason why both of these perspectives can't be true. Maybe some are held back and others not.

So, I propose we shake left hands and move on!

In any case, I'm just happy to have had all the input about lefties being successful on a right-handed instrument. Thanks for all the responses everyone! Next time I hear that little voice of doubt in my head, I can just tell it to go away and then I can get back to practicing my string crossings And if you all have any more anecdotes about lefties playing music, I'd love to hear them! Cool to hear that Perlman is lefty; I listen to his recordings a lot.

[Mandoplumb]

The truth of the matter is, like everything else we tend to argue about, there is no right and wrong way for a lefty to play.it depends on the individual. There was a banjo player some miles down the road that played a right hand banjo left handed. Think about that, the thumb string on the bottom! Some one once remarked to him they couldn't see how he could do that, they couldn't even play one right handed. He remarked he couldn't play one right handed either. Could he have learned easier if he had forced himself to learn right hand? Who knows. The point is he learned the way he did and became good at it. Some one else may never have learned his way but learn to play right handed, another may have required a " left hand banjo". Nethier one could play the same way as the other but they played their way. As long as the job gets done who cares?

[lloving]

I am an old lefty (eating, writing etc) who plays (music and sports) righty. As a child I was not pressured into or away from either handedness, I just used what was available and followed the crowd.

That said after 60+ years of playing, or trying to play, stringed instruments, I have a few unscientific observations:

When I was getting started playing stringed instruments, baseball, and to some extent golf, lefty playing righty was a plus in that fretting strings and hitting balls a long way came easy. However, picking the right string and knowing where the ball was going, not so much.

Today I don't play sports but I still play music. I "fret" without thinking but still struggle to some extent with my right hand. A result I think, of being a lefty playing righty. At this age I can only wonder how my "playing" would have turned out if I had had the opportunity as a beginner to experiment with the correct "handed" instrument or had not followed the crowd in sports.

[HoGo]

I am righty and shoot the bow lefty. One of my fellow excellent banjo players played righty for years but he had problems with one wrist so he switched to left handed neck on his banjo and within year or so he was just as good on the lefty banjo.
Music is in your head and hands follow the your brain lefty or righty.

[Mark Gunter]

This is a very interesting thread, even for us righties. The bottom line, as I see it, is to keep doing whatever you need to do to get better, if getting better is important to you. If I were absolutely convinced that my current handedness were holding me back, and getting better was important enough, I'd have to go through the awkwardness and hard work of totally sucking all over again in order to overcome that. OTOH, since both hands are important and pretty much everything done on a stringed instrument is awkward and difficult to master for me whether the task is taken by my right or left hand, I'd probably assume that I need to continue the technical training of both hands regardless of the orientation of my instrument, in order to master it to the best of my ability, if getting better were very important to me.

Just keep getting better if that's what you want, and be willing to suck if you have to do any re-training in the meantime. C'est la vie.

[Jeff Mando]

Seems a weird thing to "choose sides" on, in this day and age, IMHO. Certainly not worth having "such" strong opinions on, to the point of argument.

Times have changed, but as a kid (60+ years ago) I was actually nicknamed "Lefty" because it was considered that unusual! Starting guitar lessons at 9 years old, there was no question -- start him on a right-handed instrument -- I remember the conversation between my parents and the teacher lasting no more than a couple sentences. That blunt decision was a blessing as I later became interested in vintage instruments. Imagine trying to locate a lefty vintage Gibson F-5..............impossible.

Could I have become a better player had I learned left-handed? Who knows? Certainly doesn't matter at this point -- I've had plenty of fun.

So, I offer a brand new stance against learning left-handed -- it just looks weird! So, stop doing it, ok?

[Jeff Mando]

FWIW, I wanted to add that during my years working at a guitar shop we hand one experienced right-handed player who purchased a left-handed guitar with the idea of trying a new experience. Obviously, not for everyone, but it didn't take him long to learn to play left-handed at a competent level and he claimed it opened some new doors for him soundwise -- hearing phrasing and tones he wasn't getting from his "normal" guitar. YMMV

[pops1]

Well Jimi Hendrix and Elizabeth Cotten were leftys who played right handed guitars upside down and it didn't hurt them. I think what ever works for each individual is great. Elizabeth had to use her brothers guitar and he did not like her retuning it so she was forced to learn upside down, worked out well for her. I am sure there were others, but can't think of them just now.

[JeffD]

I did not think it was a dominant hand for harder task type of thing. My understanding was more of a foreground background idea. The dominant hand does the foreground things. You hammer the nail with the dominant hand, and hold the wood with the other. Etc.

Then the question becomes which task is more foreground, fretting or picking. And I cannot answer that with any conviction. My prejudice is that fretting is more foreground, but I am a melody guy much more than a chord guy.

But going with that prejudice, lefties have a definite advantage playing right handed, as would righties playing left handed.

For the record, I think Chris Thile's awesome talent is due to so many other more important things (like practicing much more than you or me). But it is interesting to consider.

[sblock]

Bigskygirl and sblock, you guys seems to be talking past each other... and talking in circles.

From what I can tell sblock is saying that some lefties aren't held back at all on a right handed instrument. There are plenty of lefties who have reached the top tier playing righty.
And Bsg is saying, well, some lefties are inhibited playing this way, as she herself has felt.

There's no reason why both of these perspectives can't be true. Maybe some are held back and others not.

So, I propose we shake left hands and move on!

In any case, I'm just happy to have had all the input about lefties being successful on a right-handed instrument. Thanks for all the responses everyone! Next time I hear that little voice of doubt in my head, I can just tell it to go away and then I can get back to practicing my string crossings And if you all have any more anecdotes about lefties playing music, I'd love to hear them! Cool to hear that Perlman is lefty; I listen to his recordings a lot.

MoreThanQuinn, thank you. I think you hit the nail on the head. We are talking past one another, and there's no reason why our perspectives have to be mutually exclusive -- because they aren't! It should be clear to nearly everyone, by now, that there are a great many lefties who play the mandolin perfectly well right-handed, and a few of those lefties are among the very best mandolin players we know. But some other lefties clearly feel inhibited ("struggle") playing right-handed, based on their personal testimony, and feel held back. I have no reason to doubt those feelings whatsoever.

That said, I take strong issue with bigskygirl writing "Nothing you have posted is factual in any way." That's not only overly broad and defamatory, but it's also completely untrue. A closer reading of my posts will show that I have tried to back up my advice with the available evidence at every turn. Furthermore, I presented my case as advice. No one is forcing anyone else to do anything. We're all free to make personal choices about how we prefer to play.

Bigskygirl also mistakes my meaning by writing: "You even admit straight out that you have no idea what Paganini is doing." This is a gross distortion of what I wrote. I wrote "I've been told that the great violin virtuoso, Paganini, was also left-handed, but I can't say for certain." I wrote that to be careful, because we don't know the handedness of Paganini for certain, although you can find plenty of historical speculation that he was left-handed. There's also historical speculation that Beethoven, Rachmaninoff, and even Mozart were left-handed (Google this!), but claims from so long ago are also uncertain. So let's not twist things beyond recognition, please, in a misguided effort to undermine my argument.

The OP asked for some advice. The advice stands: If you're left-handed and just starting out, and don't feel that you are so left hand-dominant that you simply can't manage it, you're better off learning to play righty. Why? Multiple reasons! Greatly more varied, and often better, mandolin availability, for one. Easier to fit together in a tight space with other players, for another. A bit easier to copy right-handed players and instructors, etc. These are facts. Here's another fact: it takes considerable dexterity with both hands to play an instrument well, and all good musicians develop that dexterity. Dexterity in either hand is developed through intense practice, and it does not seem to be limited by notions of handedness. The brain undergoes both physical and chemical changes depending on how you use your appendages (e.g., hands), and this is well documented. Another fact.

I count myself among the happy left-handed people who play their instruments right-handed, including guitar, banjo, and mandolin. I have never felt that my left-handedness ever held me back in learning to play music that way. Evidently, though -- based on her testimony -- there are some left-handed people, like bigskygirl, who feel that it has been a "struggle" (her word). I sympathize with her about this. That said, there are a great many reasons why we don't all get to be as good as Chris Thile or Adam Steffey, despite our intentions to play well, and I am not convinced that hand dominance is among the top reasons. Not at all.

Anyway, as Mandoplumb wrote "As long as the job gets done, who cares?" Amen to that, I say! He also makes the important point that folks who learn to play one way really have little idea what it might have been like to have learned to play the opposite way. They're just speculating about what might have been, like bigskygirl did. We tend to learn one way first, and that's it. If you switch after that, fine, but the experience can never be the same as having started out switched in the first place. We can never rewind the clock.

[Austin Bob]

All I know is that I turned my mandolin upside down yesterday and tried to play it left handed. Suddenly I was thrust into a Bizarro world where nothing seemed as it should be. I tried to play Mary Had a Little Lamb and Happy Birthday, but neither was recognizable.

I'm very grateful I was not forced to play left handed.

[Mandobart]

This comes up a lot on many musical fora. I too am left-handed, always have been, but play musical instruments right handed. I started with violin, and in a school orchestra I think there'd be a lot of poked eyes if you mixed right and left players in a string section. Learning violin was foreign to me as a youngster; it didn't matter which hand did what - they both had to learn new roles. As I learned guitar, bass and mandolin it was natural to continue rightie.

About 11% of the US population is left handed. I've worked in nuclear propulsion and power for almost 40 years, and in that time I've noted about half of my fellow operators are also left handed.

[Bob Visentin]

I once worked with a guy we called Lefty. One day I noticed he was right handed. I asked "Why do we call you Lefty?" He said "That is my name." He showed me his drivers license and , yes his mother named him Lefty.

[T.D.Nydn]

I'm not sure I'm exactly left handed,where do you draw the line?All my writing,drawing and painting I do left handed,,everything else I do right handed or with both hands,I bat right handed for ex. I play the fiddle both left and right, all other instruments right,I play mandolin right handed,. I play with a friend who plays guitar,he is,hopelessly left handed,to the point where if you flush his toilet,the water goes down spinning in the opposite direction,,but when we play it works out,I sit on his left,so his guitar neck points to the right and my mandolin neck points to the left..

[Timbofood]

I have two hands and use them both.
Left dominant but, I do a LOT of most other things righty. I just don’t see the big deal, and certainly no reason for the hackle raising from some. The simple reason I learned righty is I’m CHEAP, I’d never heard of a left handed typewriter, and I simply didn’t see any advantage.
All that and the completely selfish desire to be able to play some really cool instruments which I may never be able to afford. The limitations of that and seeing how few lefty instruments were available 45 years ago, it didn’t make any sense. In today’s market, that has changed significantly. Play music or complain about hand dominance. I just don’t see the hub but as being worth it.