Fingerstyle Nail-care Regiments

...my response should be taken with a grain of salt, since i am not a finger style player, per se.

that said, i gave up on using my fingernails. too high maintenance.

i find i get much more mileage and tonal variety from using the fleshy part of my thumb and fingers, although i tend to play electric more often then acoustic.

-dh

Hey Clinton,

I use a UV Gel-based acrylic coating on my nails which I get refilled once a month at a local salon. It's pretty simple really and is certainly hard enough for steel string playing. If the tip breaks, I get a plastic one glued on until it grows out, otherwise the length is all natural nail.

There's a good description of the process here: http://www.nailsplash.com/gelnails.html

"using the fleshy part of my thumb and fingers"
Too muted and mid-rangey for me, thanks... I MUCH prefer using my nails... and I just cannot get used to the feeling of fingerpicks

I'm barely tolerating the one thumbpick I've found useful....

Herco, Heavy G.... in a variety of colours

Fingernails on my first three fingers, and a Fred Kelly thumbpick as I've just never been able to keep a thumbnail. I keep the nails shaped relatively short (but I get mostly nail on the strings when playing) and sometimes employ some hardener. Compromise is in order as they have to play nylon and steel strings. I play some self-penned tunes, hymns, classical pieces, celtoid tunes, and a variety of other stuff. For heavy bass gigs I'll knock the nails back shorter as I prefer more flesh for bass.

Peace, Mooh.

"I've just never been able to keep a thumbnail"
Heh... My thumbnail would have to be a mile long to come close to being where I'd want it for my pathetic fingerpicking....

So I've never even tried

After dealing with broken nails every couple of weeks, I trimmed all my nails down to fairly short. That decision was made easier after learning Kelly Joe Phelps (no slouch at finger style) plays that way, and I remember a fairly famous classical guitarist saying he preferred short nails. While I don't get the zippy sound of long nails, I do find the overall sound clearer than before. There's still a bit of nail left to get the string ringing, but it is a mellower sound - definitely not muddy sounding at all.

Down side is the couple of weeks getting calluses on might right hand fingertips.

Read an article a year or so ago about Bruce Cockburn who uses Nail Envy (I'm not sure of the spelling) and tissue paper to "fiberglass" his nails.

I can grow a great natural thumbnail, but the rest are weak and split easily. So I am forced to go with short nails, basically flesh on string, or do the acrylic gel method and get infills every 3~4 weeks.

I've played fingerstyle for about ten years and have never been able to corral a pick. I've just begun to play steel and i realise that I MUST GET PICKS!! As a solo instrument any guitar can survive w/o picks but as any kind of a group, especially electric, picks, i'm starting to think, are a must.
My finger regimen has been to shingle houses. I haven't had to chew off a callous in years - except when i play bass, and on my right forefinger and thumb. I try to dictate my tone w/o a pick and often fail because of a lack of nails/picks/callouses.