So, long story short: I am thinking of trying to learn to play the ukulele at age 50, using one that’s already lying around my house. It’s a standard “right hand strumming” uke, and I’m a lefty. Does this really matter?
In general, I’m “lefty” in that I throw balls, eat, drink, and reach for things with my left hand. I always place a desk telephone to my left. These are all things I “cannot” do with my right hand except awkwardly, constantly feeling like I want to shift it to my left hand as soon as possible.
But I write, I eat with chopsticks, and do other things like use a computer mouse or joystick with my right hand.
More relevant would be that when I was 10-11 years old, I learned to play the violin the standard way (right hand bow); and then when I was 16, I was given an acoustic guitar as a gift that was strung for left-hand strumming (because my aunt was told that I was a lefty), which I gave up trying to play after a week or two. (That was in the 1980s and my teaching myself with an instruction book - nowadays with YouTube videos, maybe it’d go differently.)
I couldn’t quite “get” the guitar, and I have suspected my earlier “right hand” violin instruction may have been part of that - is that possible?
I’m a lefty who took up guitar relatively late in life (27 in my case) and I made a conscious choice to learn righty so I’d be able to play any guitar lying around, not just a lefty guitar. I eventually got to be a pretty good but not great guitarist. I’ve sometimes wondered if I would have been better as a lefty player, but it could very well just be that I’m not that talented.
You seem like a special case in the sense that you don’t really sound like a true lefty to me. Your choice of writing hand is typically the standard for “lefty vs. righty” since that’s usually the first and most common thing we do that requires fine hand motor control.
If you learned violin righty, and already attempted guitar lefty and it didn’t take, it sounds like it’s worth a try starting out righty with the uke first and see where that takes you.
Well as is often the case, I was instructed in using chopsticks and a pencil/pen by having it placed in my right hand, at an age before I can even remember the events. I guess I just wasn’t “lefty enough” for that to be so uncomfortable as to “fight back”?
I mean, some people are so “lefty” they have to find and use left-handed mice, with “Button 1” on the right and placing it to the left of the keyboard, or left-handed joysticks (where there is only one button and it’s typically on the right - meaning, for one of those classic “Atari 2600” style of hand-held joysticks). That never even crossed my mind as something I’d need or want.
However, any desk telephone I have is placed on my left if I can manage it, and I always eat/drink/reach for stuff with my left hand, chopsticks excepted. (For example, I never do that “dance” with the knife and fork a lot of Americans do, I just keep the fork in my left hand and eat with it, whether or not I’ve had to use my right hand to wield a knife to cut with.)
And as for “fine motor control”, funny you should mention that, when I did model figure painting as a child I would do that with my left hand about half the time. And I thread needles, and then use them, with my left hand.
Well, in that case, tough call. Since you already have a right-hand ukelele, it probably wouldn’t hurt to give it a try and see if it feels ok to you. I don’t know much about ukes, but don’t you mostly just strum a uke? If you wanted to learn to fingerpick on a guitar, it would benefit to learn with your dominant hand, but just strumming with a uke it may not matter as much.
Oh, a friend of mine (who plays guitar) just put it me like this: “When you air guitar to music on the radio, which hand are you using?”
And the irony is… It’s complicated!
If I imagine Jimi Hendrix or Guns ‘n’ Roses or something with electric guitar, I’m definitely “picking” with my left hand.
But, if I imagine I’m strumming an acoustic guitar for something like Bob Dylan’s “Blowin’ In The Wind” or “Chimes of Freedom”, … it’s with my right hand. WHAT?
My guess is that at some point, a friend of mine invested the time to try to show me how to play something like that on his (righty) acoustic guitar, and that aspect stuck, even if I have no other recollection about how to play the guitar.
On the other hand (haha), I’ve never picked up an electric guitar IRL, at least not one actually plugged in and powered on.
I’m not at home and cannot check, but it seems like it would be fairly easy to turn a righty into a lefty (not like modifying a guitar which would need bridge work, a new nut, new setup, etc). The nut might be the only thing that needs a little modification. I did a quick Google search and it appears others do this.
I’m right-handed, and when I started playing guitar about a decade ago, I found it interesting (and, initially, weird) that playing right-handed involved using my dominant hand for strumming and picking, and my weaker hand for fretwork. Particularly when I was just starting out, the rock songs I was learning were a lot more demanding for my left hand (fretting chords) than for my right hand (fairly straightforward strumming), and I wondered why “right-handed guitar” forced one to use the non-dominant hand for the more difficult work.
I now know that, particularly with other styles of guitar music (jazz, classical), the demands on the right hand are much higher than what I was experiencing.
What part of what I said was bad advice? Since the OP already has a right-strung ukelele, and does a lot of things right-handed, I said to maybe give right-handed a try and see how it feels.
I just flipped my ukulele over and messed around with some fingering and strumming. I was surprised at how easy it was for me to mess around on the fretboard with my right (dominant) hand. I couldn’t do anything approaching a coherent strum with my left hand, but I couldn’t do much better when I first started learning.
So my relatively uninformed advice is that - assuming you just want to learn to strum your favorite songs and maybe do some simple picking - you should give it a shot right-handed and see how it goes.
Our son’s left handedness is similar to yours. He bats and throws lefty, but writes and eats with his right hand. Basically it’s lefty for things done standing and righty for things done sitting. When he was ready to learn to play bass I had him try one out right handed. He was sitting, and had no problems. By the time he was playing standing up he was used to it.
Yes, Jimi did. With a guitar with an adjustable bridge, you can correct the intonation. The biggest issue is the nut: The high E will be in a way too big slot and the low E won’t fit. So, you’ll probably need a new nut or cut the small ones larger and hope the ones that are too large will work.
I check my tenor and baritone ukes and it would be easy to swap string order and I think it would work with the nut as is (or minimal sanding).
BTW, going between these two ukes and their different tunings (typical GCEA on the tenor and guitar DGBE on the baritone) helped me learn a lot about chord shapes, positions, and how things work together. I started on the tenor and it was an eye opener when I realized those chord shapes were identical to those I’d been playing on the guitar for 20+ years. All it took was for me to get the baritone and think “Hmm, how do I play a G on this thing. Wait, that’s the same as a C on the tenor. How how about C…that’s the same as the F on the tenor. These are the same shapes and they are 5 steps up”. Mind blown. Yeah, I’m an extremely slow learner at music.
I’ve thought about this before and I think that it’s the order of execution in playing. You set up the chord or note with the non dominant hand and the other one strikes the sound out. The dom hand may feel at one with the non dom hand at that moment. I don’t know the anatomy of it.
Like playing pool. Your non dom hand is closer to the ball and is aiming. The dom hand executes the shot.
I think what dominance means for handedness can be a little complicated.
(Ha. Now I’m trying to imagine fretting with my right hand and I can’t see being able to do it.)
You are assuming the fretting hand is doing the more difficult work. I don’t think that is the case. I think the picking / strumming hand needs the finer motor control.
I’m no pool player, but I don’t think you aim with your front hand, that just provides a stable platform to place the cue. The aiming is done by positioning your body and fine adjustments with your dominant hand. The power and control also comes from the dominant hand.
The order of execution is secondary. It is because the dominant hand is doing the more dextrous work, it just happens that the more dextrous work happens after the less dextrous work.