5 Interesting Ways to Solve Drumming THUMB PAIN...
Вставка
- Опубліковано 3 сер 2017
- The obvious cause of thumb pain while playing drums is squeezing the sticks too tight. But what causes us to squeeze the sticks too tight? What can we do to avoid clamping down and compromising our technique? I take a look at some different causes of joint pain in the hand and find some possible solutions to this painful problem. We take a look at surface level issues (our skin), then delve into some deeper muscular/joint issues that could be a result of not-so-great technique. I hope something here helps YOU get rid of any pain in your thumbs. The last thing we drummers need to deal with while playing is any kind of muscle or joint pain. We wrap up the discussion with some thoughts on “relaxed playing” - keeping your shoulders and wrists nice and loose, no matter how loud or fast you’re playing.
If you like what you’ve seen, I hope you’ll SUBSCRIBE! This channel is all about helping YOU become a better drummer, one week at a time, so you can impact your audience and the musicians you play with.
NEW VIDEO EVERY FRIDAY!!
Further Viewing on the Thumb Fatigue Topic - Dr. Levi Harrison talks about thumb exercises:
• Thumb Pain: Treatment ...
Comment with YOUR thumb cramp story! I think my worst was a time when I played a short gig (just 3 or 4 songs), but my thumbs ended up cramping for DAYS afterwards. The songs were upbeat and loud, and evidently I let my hands get too dry before. I was squeezing harder to compensate, which wore my thumbs out, which made me squeeze even harder! Sometimes it can turn into a downward spiral if you’re not careful.
I had arthritis very badly in my left thumb. Hurt a lot when I played. Started using a product called Drumeze grips and they were a total game changer. They absorb all the felt shock from the stick and also allow you to keep a very good (but not too tight) hold on the sticks without them flying out of your hands. Highly recommend this product.
Mike Perry sounds perfect for me, where can you buy it?
@drummer mike perry- Nice!! I am buying it now per your suggestion.
When playing, I rely a ton on my pinkies for grip. While gripping with my pinkies, it allows my thumbs, and pointer fingers to relax. I hope this helps!
The zildjian stick wax works great and is cheap I've had the same block of it for years just rub it on the sticks before you play perfect grip every time!
I'm a 34 y/o drummer and have played since I was around 11/12. I used to get horrible thumb pain/cramps in my right hand. What I found worked best for me was switching my fulcrum to my middle finger. Ever since I did this I've never had thumb fatigue. The problem for a lot of drummers(myself included) is the way they hold their sticks with index finger forces the drum stick to move back (due to thumb being further down stick than index finger) and to compensate we'll grip tighter causing thumb fatigue. Moving to a middle finger fulcrum prevents this from happening as it's near impossible to play and have your thumb move behind your middle finger.
Search for just this kind of video, thanks for your tips!!
Stroke your drumsticks with crinkled up wax paper. You will find that you can grip your sticks a lot better if you do this! I’ve been doing this for years!
Good luck!
Great idea! I've been rubbing with ski wax, but the paper sounds cheaper and easier...gonna get some today, thanks!
Thanks for this! Great tips!
Thank you very much, I already used cream on my hands and I even thought it was my fault for not having good technique. But seeing your video I saw that many people go through this.
This is interesting! My physio told me once when I brought up my thumb cramps that it was likely I was over bending the thumb on the stick and that gripping too tightly would probably do it. Have tried to hold my sticks different but it just doesn’t work. I will try the stick wax someone was talking about in the comments!
It's all technique. I've found playing for 24 years and having issues with thumb cramping is it was all in my technique. I had to go back to the basics and work on my technique as if I had never played drums before. Using Gordy Knudtson and Jo Jo Mayer techniques I've been able to get completely away from any sort of thumb cramping. On top of that it made my hands worlds better.
You’re a hero, man lol. Ill sometimes play stuff like Chemical Warfare and The Party Song as warmups, (high BPM), and was wondering why I couldn’t play them without getting so fatigued quickly at this time of year. Subbed.
Spot on! Good, helpful, video.
Thanks!!
Thanks for the video, my experience with this is ongoing and I have to stay on top of this issue before I play . I gig almost every weekend . I think you definitely hit major points in the video. The fact about the grip is huge and one thing I've been using for a few years is Zildjian wax on my sticks. It works much better then other grip type solutions for me. Tape is great but can be very costly if sticks happen to break, I'm not about unwrapping a broken stick to use the wrap again on a new stick so unless your endorsed forget that. The wax is awesome . The other thing is stretching. That is a muscle that needs to be strengthened and stretched. I always have a hand exercise gripper in my car. Before a show, on my way driving, I'm working my hands getting them stretched and stronger .. that alone seemed to help my fatigue in my thumb muscle.. hope that helped ..
Great advice there about exercising the thumbs! That's a good idea...having an exercise gripper in your car. Not to mention that probably relieves stress sitting in traffic lol. I've heard about the Zildjian wax too, but never tried it! I'll have to get some of that and see how it works for me.
Stephen Clark absolutely sir ... that hand exercise gripper is a life changer ... it also helps blood flow in advance for your forearms.. it's great when you don't have time to sit with a pad to warm up before a show ..you can find them anywhere .. Walmart , ebay sporting good stores as well
I’m just watching a lot of your videos will playing paradiddles at the same time. I want to make an advanced band in school and what I have to do is play paradiddles fast, drum rolls fast, and a very hard piece of music. So anyways I just subscribed to your videos because I’m teaching my hands to do paradiddles while learning from your videos.
Thanks Mr. Clark! I have pain in the upper joint area closest to my nail of the thumb finger. I tried these things before and still it hurts. what do you recommend?
I saw in a questlove interview he used to dumb the sodas they didnt drink back stage on his hands to make them all sticky
No way! That's awesome. No joke - I thought about doing that one time because my hands were so dry and "grip-less". I was desperate. But now I won't feel so weird about it if Questlove does it :)
Stephen Clark , yea Im not sure im I could stand the sticky sweet all over my hands, although he grips the stick ever so gingerly. Ive been streching alot and conditioning my thumbs in the position and it helps, but have you ever had your thumb lock up on you?
thats a good one....an old black guy once told me about playing bass with your thumb that if it started to make a blister to rub it on the side of your nose and the oil will stop it...opposite problem i know, but it really works.....
Something I learned early from someone suffering from carpal tunnel in their right hand is to grip the stick with the thumb to the side. Because of the hi-hat cross, people tend to naturally twist their wrist and play with their thumb facing up on the right hand. Once I became aware, a little twist of my wrist and I'll get blisters before ever coming close to cramping.
I think this is my problem. My physio pointed the extra thumb bend to me when i mentioned I was getting strain/cramp. My hi hat hand is the worst especially when doing a fast 16 note hi hat beat. My wrists all mostly face the floor, so you’re saying to have my thumb facing the ceiling instead of facing me? I
Tor Charlesworth no, definitely thumb to the side. The more the thumb creeps to a thumbs up position the more likely it is to move. Use the crook in the forefinger as your fulcrum and with your thumb to the side with a loose grip. You’re wrist and middle finger should control all the stick action. If your thumb is controlling any motion at all, boom that’s when the pain hits. At least for me.
@@TheCrippledWerewolf I was largely using French grip, and developed tendonitis in my thumb out of nowhere. No issues whatsoever, and all of a sudden I was wrecked. I've been off the kit for about 2 months now, and unfortunately off guitar as well. Lesson learned.. Thumb to the side from here out!
@@SteveHubbardGuitar how long does it took for you to develop it ?
Going to try out the lotion technique as I have constantly dry hands. I started having pain in the top of my hand around the base of my thumb while practicing really lightly. I’m not sure if it’s the same thing as a thumb cramp but it hurts to bend my hand downwards from the wrist. I also had the same experience with the Vic Firth grip sticks. My hands got really sweaty and being so in the moment of the show I didn’t have the foresight to switch sticks. Both hands were completely torn up after that gig.
I am left handed but I learned to play on a righty kit. Recently I switched to left-handed playing on a righty kit (open-handed while holding my right hand traditional). I had to move a few things around, and some people reading this will bash me for “playing wrong.” However I decided that I shouldn’t set up my kit left-handed, as someday I hope to sit in with a few bands. Before switching, the pain from holding the stick matched in my right hand grew, even though I had good form. Playing matched in my left hand and traditional in the right comes much easier, as my right thumb pad doesn’t make direct contact with the stick. I already have twice the speed and control, and it’s only been two weeks. There is still pain though, just not as intense, I am kind of worried. I think I have a pretty unique style and I don’t want to be injured permanently.
Thanks so much! And btw will you be doing a back ache vid? Great vid!
Glad I could help! Thanks! I will add "dealing with back aches" to the list 👍 That's definitely an issue that comes up a lot and can definitely be avoided.
I hate the back ache! I can never figure out what's causing it
PLease do use anything I have told you about "sport" medicine.
I've always used white electrical tape as a snare drummer in a drum corps which is a lot of outdoor drumming in the sun and extreme amounts of sweat. A fresh coat of tape on a regular basis keeps the tacky feeling on them. But I will say that the tape was more to keep the sticks from getting chewed up than for helping with grip. That being said, drum set folks don't usually like adding tape to their sticks because it makes the sticks heavier or out of balance. So if sweaty/dry hands are a real issue for you, I would suggest keeping a towel nearby for sweat. I've never heard of people having dry hands affecting their grip strength though. If that is an issue for you, I would check out your technique before using waxes/resins. If technique doesn't help with your thumb strain issues, and it should, a last resort would be waxes/resins. I've also seen in some rare cases guys like Carter Beauford from Dave Matthews Band using golf gloves for grip. He uses them as a matter of preference though, and not to assist or replace technique since his technique is awesome. Technique should be absolutely paramount above all else before using gimmicky waxes/resins or even tape. Some other people have also mentioned stretching. Like any other exercising, drumming can wear out your muscles, joints and tendons, so you should stretch before AND after extended periods of gigging or practicing. Along with technique, that is super important. Not stretching can lead to much more serious problems like tendonitis and/or carpal tunnel if you don't do it. Just my 2 cents though. Happy drumming.
I came up with a great "trick" to enhance grip, even if I washed my hands before playing. Just thinking if someone like me, likes to have newly cleaned hands before playing... 😉
I just start playing, and efter a while when I start breaking a sweat I simply whipe my forehead with my hands and rub them together to get a little grip but not too much... 👍
Works like a charm for me at least... 😀
Of course, forehead sweat isn't keeping your hands clean if we're gonna discuss bacteria and stuff... 😜
But that's a different topic... 😉
As mentioned before, GREAT and ispiring videos! Keep up the good work! 😀
I can tell you that after playing drums for over 50+ years, I have been diagnosed and will be undergoing surgery for both carpel tunnel and cubical tunnel syndrome at both hands and elbows. This comes from repetitive motion over time. Having proper technique is not a factor. My instructor was the great Alan Dawson, who emphasised proper technique at all times. I'm commenting here because one of my symptoms is thumb weakness when holding drum sticks, especially at tempo and when executing advanced techniques around the set. Before my diagnosis, I also thought it was dry skin, and lotion helped somewhat. As the condition worsened, it helped much less. Just an observation I felt I should throw in for those experiencing thumb weakness when playing. One last factor may be due to the fact that modern drumsticks are coated with a lacquer far more slippery than the sticks of the 60's, 70's and 80's. This could force drummers to apply more thumb pressure. ..JF
Very interesting. I appreciate your insight! What would be your advice on prevention? I always hear that stretching is important, frequent breaks from playing etc. That's true that wrists take a beating playing drums regardless of technique.
I'm not sure if there is a remedy for the prevention of carpel / cubical tunnel syndrome. I can tell you that my first 20 years involved an average of 6 hours a day practicing. That's not counting performig, band rehearsal, or teaching. During those years, there was never a problem, and in fact the problem has not been troublesome until recently. All I can tell you is be careful as you practice for speed. I maintained for years a reliable single stroke roll of 1158 b.p.m. and could perform Alan Dawson 's famous "Rudimental Ritual " at a half note =132 on the metronome. Keeping that kind of speed over years of playing has,I believe, taken it's toll at my ripe old age of 62. What we do in youth, we pay for in old age. Perhaps some sort of stretching would have been helpful. I still recommend hard work much practice...just be careful. ...JF
Been on recovery for my left wrist for a month, shooting pain from my elbow to the wrist when i play too much. Definitely a grip and overstriking issue but i have no diagnosis yet. Started really digging into left arm exercises this year as well as getting my first car driving everywhere, but i just wanna go back to drums!! Its been a month! :(
Have you heard of gig grips? They're a really cool product that helps a lot with grip without putting anything between your hand and the stick. They're a little expensive, but still much less than gloves.
Interesting! No - never heard of these. I wonder if any music stores carry them. They'd be cool to try out.
I find that if I use hand lotion, I get major blisters because it makes my skin too soft. I discovered that sing rosin is the way to go. Just like with a baseball pitcher, rosin gives us complete control of--in this case--the drum sticks. I have been playing for 53 years. Have had carpal tunnel surgery on both hands, and now am having a thumb problem which started way back when, which has now reached the stage that I lose my grip strength. Playing the music of Emerson, Lake, and Palmer (Tarkus, Pictures At An Exhibition, Karn Evil 9, to name a few) really abuses the hands. I've tried the therapy putty, squeezing a ball, etc. and nothing seems to work to completely relieve the loss of thumb grip strength. I was surprised to see your video about this terrible problem. I had no idea other drummers have this problem, I thought it was just me. As I said, the rosin seems to work best for me, but everyone is different so it may not be for everyone. Thanks for your video.
I have the same issues, now called "trigger finger" ..a bass playing buddy just had the surgery (In the DR. office) and it completely cured his. Gonna look into it, cuz I have lost strength also. Grip exercisers exacerbated it, finger splints at night while sleeping has helped. I also found that rubbing a little wax (ski wax in my case) on the sticks prior made it easier to control the stick using a lighter touch. You can tell trigger finger by the locking that happens if you close your hand tightly and one (or two I've heard) fingers will hang up or "lock". And it hurts like hell ! I believe I over-did it when I decided to train on more finger techniques, like a couple hours a day for a few weeks! Thought I was doing great until one day, lock-up...smh Try some wax, just might help! Cheers!
Thank you! Playing at a worship team it crampy bc I'm in a "cage" and it gets mad hot in there and so both sweat and thumb cramps is ouchy thank you!
.you can also use pine rosin on your sticks for grip, the warmer they get the more sticky it gets....they make a product called 'Gorilla Snot" that works great, but its expensive.....down here in Florida the humidity is always a factor...
left trapezious & right thumb. Thanks for the tips. 50 years of playing, and I have much more in me.
This is so helpful. I always wash my hands right before playing, lol.
What happened to mw is while playing uptempo jazz i develop a bit of thumb fatigue, is there a better way of incorporating the wrist to uptempo jazz ride patterns?
I'd also like to mention that I work out daily for the last couple of years with metal drumsticks on a urethane practice pad. I have three different weight sets - One of machined aluminum, one of machined brass, and one set I made out of 3/4" steel rod cut to 14" in length. They are quite heavy, and make my forearm muscles tired very rapidly. My hand and forearm muscles are much, much stronger then they were when I was in my 20's , and it has helped tremendously with my chops. If you do try something this extreme, be sure to warm up before using them, stretch frequently, and only practice with them for short periods of time. If you aren't careful, you can injure yourself, or cause permanent damage to your wrists and fingers. RSI and arthritis are no joke.
Early on I had to rest for a few weeks because of tendon inflammation. I got too ambitious about gains, and tried to work out while in pain. Bad idea - Older guys don't recover that quickly. It hurt like hell whenever I did anything with my hands, and so I have since moderated my workouts, keeping things more realistic. All the same, I wish I could have done this when I was in my 20's. I could have been playing this good all these years...
Wow that's intense! How was it switching back and forth between the metal sticks and wood sticks? I guess this would be sort of similar to practicing finger exercises on a pillow, then switching to a drum.
Predictably, when you work out with metal and then pick up the wood sticks, they feel like they're made out of air. That doesn't keep you from tiring out when you practice, thought.
I'd say that the most obvious effect from using insanely heavy sticks is that your forearms, wrists and hands get thick and hard, your muscles become more developed and stand out when you flex them - plus you can bring normal men to tears with a handshake :)
I mainly went to all the trouble just to bring my left hand up nearer to my right in terms of control and speed. I also spend most of my practice time playing open handed now, with my left hand playing on the hats, and I have added an extra ride over my high toms.
My left hand is still an idiot, but it's significantly less stupid than it used to be.
You should try Promark's Active Grip sticks. It gets tackier as your hands heat up and sweat.
I quickly get thumb fatigue in my left thumb because my left hand is overall very weak and does hold the stick very well so I end up having to grip hard to avoid just dropping the stick. I've been practicing playing slowly and concentrating on holding the stick the same way my right hand does but I think the main problem is my left index finger. It is so weak that my thumb is doing all the work to hold on to the stick. I think writing left handed might help that.
I'm super late on this video but that hand washing thing is really a thing😀 In the military we were not supposed to wash our feet before long marches because it got rid of all the natural oils of the skin and feet will break. Suppose it works the same way with hands.
i have the inverse problem, my hands get to wet, and if don't wash them before playing after 2 minutes i have wet sticks flying around
The griped sticks used to be my main but they started to tear and I got nasty blisters during a gig- hurt like hell. Even better: I was playing Through the fire and flames.
Hey hi have got so many hurt in my fingers can you telll how to get rid of this
I had realized for awhile that whenever I wash my hands right before playing I would drop a stick that show.
I use a squeeze ball. Strengthens the whole hand. It works definitely
this always happens to me, so thanks for the tips lol
Haha I'm glad you can relate! I'm hoping this helps some folks out - This used to drive me insane.
Thanks for the advice! I gotta stop washing my before i play!
Haha give it a try! Hope it helps you out 😃
this is an interesting video. sometimes when I practice, I feel like I'm tearing my right hand apart and I didn't really understand what caused it. maybe I should shower after practicing instead of the other way around..
My hands would go numb so I started stretching before playing and the numbness went away. Never had a thumb cramp. I would stretch as much as you can before a gig might help too.
Awesome! Yeah stretching is huge. I always try to continue stretching as I'm getting started to make sure I'm staying loose.
Hello, i wear one of zildjian's gloves so I can hold the stick better and avoid blisters, the downside of this is that i loose blood circulation around my rists and they start to feel numb, all this with alot of pain to the mix, but without gloves, I get so many blisters that I cant play for more than 1/2 hours or else I start bleeding, what do you recommend to do, with and without gloves?
Loved the video tips! They look really useful!
Bruno Drums sounds like you got the gloves on too tight, loosen up or maybe get bigger gloves
They are the right size, and even if I loosen them up it still happens, but thank you !
How long have you tried going without the gloves? If blisters are the issue, I'd try to keep playing, maybe use some skin tape to wrap fingers, and try to tough out the blisters until they form calluses.
Stephen Clark sometimes i try without them and others with gloves
Ill try some tape, it will probably work
Personally, I feel that most of the times I experienced thumb pain was due to bad monitoring on stage - if everything on stage is too loud and I cannot hear my drums, I feel like I instinctively start to hit them harder, which leads to squeezing the sticks too much. For comparison there has been shows where my thumbs get fatigued after 20-30 minutes of playing, while during rehearsal the next/previous day everything is fine, even though I’m playing the same songs for much longer periods of time.
This. So true.
I hate when this happens my band instructor puts the track on loop and this happens to me especially when you are standing for 1 hour playing a practice pad
I can't play snare drum solo because my right finger hurts but only the right 😭 is it because I'm left handed?
How do I help my cracked knokle
My thumb's tense up every time I play The Knack's "Good Girls Don't" on drums.
That's a pretty fast song! Never played it, but I can tell how it might cause tensing up. Those are the toughest situations to stay relaxed for sure.
It it just me or do other people also experience arm fatigue especially when playing beats on the floor tom.
I've developed arthritis in my left basal thumb joint. Need cortisone every six months. Now my right thumb gets sharp pains along the tendon running to the nail. Hurts like a knife. Hoping a specialist can help.
Anyone else have this experience?
Could you maybe figure out some way of helping with sore fingers, in the middle of my index and middle finger they're always red and peeling and blistering and bleeding, any tips?
Between your index and middle finger? Hmmm... Oh do you mean like on your finger pads on those two fingers? You know I actually have calluses in those spots come to think. So I probably had blisters there at one point. I'd say just power through it and see if you can develop some calluses over time!
Stephen Clark yeah that's it on both fingers where the sticks rub a lot, mine are healing but longg practices or shows make them real bad again and it's like back to square one, I'll just ride it out lel
I've just straight up wrapped my fingers in masking tape before to avoid blisters. Actual "skin tape" works better, but I've found any tape to be better than nothing. I've done that during a gig when my skin starts to burn...catch it before it becomes a blister.
Tip: to prevent is better than cure! Always stretch and warm up before you start to play!
Right now Mana right now... I was playing along to blew you know having a good time and my right hand just started killing me it's the worst
My doctor is ACTUALLY a sports medicine with HUGE clients . I was his first drummer complaining about neck pain and cramped trapezoids. He was amazed how much of athlete's ailments plague drummers, but as kindda "duh"! he said well drummers ARE athletes. Hes been able to cure me of my excruciating neck pain (the same thing that almost finished Phil Collins career) and gave me exercises to do. ONE this that he preaches is FLUENCY . kind of a "let it flow" do not think about it .
I wish the man wrote a book about this. but ALL his tips have worked. He blames all these ailments and chronic shit on "FEAR OR FAILURE". I have a phobia about dropping sticks especially when I do a traditional grip buzz and go to a match grip accent on the toms. The caused me terrible pain in my left wrist. It was fine perfect ,muscles (as he said) you can choke a cow with that grip ... I thought THANKS and he soid THAT is not good .....you are tense and your muscles are suffering. This may sound very Kung Fu like but if mantra is FLUIDITY .... If you find yourself fearing dropping a stick. go for three hours and drop 50 sticks and DO NOT agonize over ONE. The fact is IT WORKS . ANY thoughts that are not being IN the music are fighting your muscle memory and your confidence. Of course he talks for hours about sports analogies."You fear fast inside balls?... let someone hit you with a few. See how fast an easy your body looses the fears and learns to weave out of a 60 mile an hour to the head by just BARELY moving your head.
He works with all kindda athletes and never thought about musicians. My Ex girlfriend plays violin and her forearm would hurt SO bad it'd be paralyzed and in tears. So if you are OVERTHINKING ANY move you will suffer consequences. Your brain will make your muscle hurt out of fear.
HOW FUCKING MYSTIC IS THAT? Ignore that you fear and it will go away.
Oh my doc's name is Dr. Shapiro so NO asian magic here 50 years of hearing exactly the same stories. Now I come in with "drummers" aches and pains. Oh BTW .. he has never prescribed a painkiller . His pain cure "THREE TYlenols capsules" are as efficient as one codeine tab.
So STEP into the pain , produce the pain , dare the pain .. the SOB will go away.
That's fascinating! - and makes total sense. It's usually any kind of stiff, unnatural motion that causes problems. If we can relax and just "play music" without thinking about the motions, everything's usually fine. That's also really cool how this compares to sports. Playing drums can really be a sport, and we drummers are prone to injury as well.
As for your neck pain - did he prescribe just basic stretches before and during playing? Just wondering if it compares to the usual wrist thing where you always want to stretch wrists/arms.
As far as he was concerned IT IS a sport . my problem was a top vertebrate off alignment so bone was rubbing bone and the spine was being compressed. With Collins they went in they cut in, to position the vertebra and they cut a nerve. Career shot to hell.
Mine was only what apparently athletes. you use reverse force to put your unaligned vertebrate (or finger or whatever where the pain is being caused by bone/nerve pinching.
So... the easiest way I can describe it is SIT STRAIGHT . put two hand (one over another) on your forehead and push back, at the same time push forward with your neck and head. About 20 times a session.
Now go to the back put your two hand slightly above the neck and push forward using head and neck push back against hands 20times . Left and right the same. Push with your hand and resit with your head and neck.
I do not want to oversell this but after a month I could play a 2 hour gig pack up get home watch TV and NO pain killers involved.
ANd nothing special before playing .. just a warm up and a few head pushes AND to loosen up BEFORE I sit on the throne. Calms you down and gives you a kindda "nothing to it" attitude. What surprised me the most was my muscle memory was THERE. I COULD plan like 4 bars ahead of time I was going to do some syncopated figures on the ride bell. so my brain kindda planned for that but I am not counting it is ALL as if I let someone else drive. effortless. I have this "crash" move where I hit the RIDE cymbal from underneath upwards with a flick of the wrist and then hit it back down I call it GOdzilla hi hat because it does sound like a gigantic HH opening and closing
Kinda cool.
I get wrist, hand and thumb fatigue from just hitting the ride fast. It's so annoying that I feel like I want to break my drumset and give up. It's obviously my technique but I'm fucking done with drumming.
Not washing your hands before playing definitely works however a little unsavory!
Try a small blob of hair wax it really works, just the right amount of tackiness.
I dip all my sticks in Plasti Dip, the black liquid rubber you can find in hardware stores. Two coats, and the stuff will last longer than the stick will. I can play very relaxed without risking a drop no matter how hard I play. I have to pour the liquid into a 12" section of PVC pipe to get the right length on the stick because the can it comes in is meant for dipping tool handles. I pour what's left back into the can, and then cover it with aluminum foil and the plastic lid to seal in the solvents, or else they evaporate in a week, and you have a can full of solid black rubber. That Plasti Dip is $9 a can - not cheap.
Use gloves, lots of paper towels, and some newspaper to catch the drips. Hang the sticks butt down with a wire for four hours per coat.
It's better and longer lasting than the coating used by Vic Firth on Questlove sticks and the like.
Ah - that seems like something I probably saw rdavidr do on his channel. I actually thought about doing that with some hotrods that I made. That would be interesting to compare the feel of plasti dip versus Vic grip. Good idea!
How does the plasti dip feel on your skin if your hands get sweaty?
hmm. Hard to say. I don't play enough at that energy level to know. I'm 50, so I take it pretty easy. I can relate that my little brother doesn't like the feel of sticks that have been coated like mine, and he plays rather more vigorously than I. He says the coating hurts his hands, but then again he hasn't been able to play regularly in years. I think perhaps he is gripping too tightly because he's used to bare wood.
As to a comparison between the plasti dip and the vic firth coating, I can say it has the same 'grippyness' in your hands, but the vic firth stuff tends to bubble up and peel off because of how thin it is. I think they are identical formulas, but VF use more solvent in their coating to make it less viscus and allow for easier mass production. Store-bought plasti dip goes on thick and tends to run or slide off if you don't insert and remove the stick slowly enough.
Interesting... thanks for the input! I'll have to try that out the plasti dip and compare. I have a feeling they'd rub blisters on my thumb pads when my hands get sweaty, but they'd probably work great when getting my hands warmed up.
My high hat hand cramps so bad at my thumb muscle. My snare hand is no problem. No amount of stretching helps.
Well for me its harder because I have an electronic drumset and the pads are bouncy
I don't really get thumb aches more than back aches any tips?
Joseph Pope try a different throne height.
You could definitely play around with throne height and see if that helps. Good call, there, Thomas. How comfortable is your throne, Joseph? I used to practice on a hard, cheap one, and I'd always end up with back pain. Just switching to a softer, more comfortable throne solved that for me.
I believe that my thumb pain is because of the impact the stick does when I hit my China (positioned on my very right)
After playing for about an hour I noticed my fingers were stinging, looking at my fingers I saw the skin was peeling so I grabbed my drum gloves and continued to play without any problems. So long story short, if you're going to play/practice for a few hours you might want to wear drum gloves. I bought mine at walmart in the baseball section.
it's really hard not to wash your hands during these days
I'm Handicap Drummer
I Need Tips For Drumming
do you ever use Baby powder ?
I find weight lifting chalk helps no end. I don’t think Stephen does much weight lifting though.
dude im a double jointed drummer this has only happed once to me
Sounds interesting... haha! Are you talking about your thumbs being double jointed? ...meaning you can bend them back further? I'm curious 😮
Well, maybe don't watch them _right_ before, but don't wait too too long either
Could it be muscle development ?
Same stuff you feel when working on developing a weaker limb where there's just not the same amount of endurance before it starts hurting.
That's very possible, and I haven't really explored that. A good test would be if I just started exercising my thumbs (grip in general) every day, and seeing how I feel playing. My thing is...the sticks never need to be squeezed hard anyway, so I doubt having a stronger thumb would solve anything. But there is SOME degree of pressure, which requires SOME muscle strength for sure, so you may have a point.
Try putting pine tar (sticky stuff you put on baseball bats) on your sticks.
That would be interesting to try. My only issue would be once my hands do start to sweat a little...I wonder if the extra stickiness would cause blisters. That was actually the problem I had with "Vic grips". Has pine tar worked for you?
Stephen Clark I havent tried yet it was just an idea.
I get hella thumb cramps it’s so annoying
You got that right - super annoying. I hope some of these tips might help you out!
Its always the damn left hand
'Sex Wax' on your sticks works and lasts
I already apply lotion regularly 😏