[Ads-l] Facebook comment re guitar-playing

Christopher Philippo toff at MAC.COM
Mon Feb 15 17:10:31 UTC 2016


Is it possible to ask the person who wrote it on Facebook what was meant?

My own guess would be that butter fingers might not necessarily relate directly to calluses, just that the author was commenting on clumsy fingers (butterfingers).  Beginning guitarists without calluses reportedly can have some difficulty fretting the strings on the neck, finding it hard to hold the strings down with the right amount of pressure and without pain - in that sense it could potentially relate to clumsiness in fretting and consequently getting notes or chords to play properly.  It evidently can also be a problem for more experienced players when performing for hours at a time.

Google the subject, and there’s all kinds of tips on forming calluses, products to help form them, create artificial ones, or get around the problem with fingertip protectors or gloves.  In connection with that, there is also the horrifying, and I hope unlikely, possibility that the person actually tried frying their fingertips in butter to get calluses.

> From roughing up fingertips with an emery board, to coating them in a helmet of Super Glue, to dipping them into a hot frying pan, guitarists try all sorts of things to help them get through the pain that comes before the calluses.

https://www.guitartricks.com/blog/How-to-Toughen-Up-Your-Fingertips

There might also be the possibility that butter was autocorrected from whatever was really meant and the author did not notice that, though I cannot think what the word might be if so.
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