Left hand thumb/index squeezing

[holdyourponies]

I've been playing for some months now but I've noticed a habit and not sure if it's good or bad (I'm assuming bad). When I play I notice that I tend to squeeze my thumb and index finger on the knuckle closest to my palm together to help grip the concertina. I've had to tighten the straps recently but I keep doing it passively. Should I keep focusing on relaxing my hand? 

 

I'm on a standard anglo. 

[Ryan Galamb]

I'm having a hard time picturing your grip from the description 🤔 But the bottom line is that your index finger should always be ready to press buttons. Keeping your hands relaxed will help the fingers be more nimble. But I find some rigidity is helpful for keeping the instrument stable (especially when playing standing up.) I'd be most worried about hurting yourself by keeping too much tension in your hand long term. If it hurts, then it's probably bad!

 

If you are comfortable sharing a picture of how you're holding your concertina, I'm sure that'd help others chime in.

 

I'm also curious to hear about how others hold their concertinas. After playing for years, I admit I haven't thought too much about my grip beyond what it takes to keep the instrument stable and my fingers nimble.

[hjcjones]

I too am finding it difficult to visualise. However novices often have the straps too tight. They understandably feel a need to keep the instrument stable and under control, but tight straps can restrict movement and make it difficult to reach some buttons.  It may be necessary to adjust the position of the hand in the strap in order to reach outlying buttons or manage a particular fingering sequence, and for this looser straps are better. However it can be difficult to achieve the right balance between control and freedom of movement.

 

My approach is to have the straps moderately loose and to control the tension by tightening the thumb over the strap, and by bracing the back of the hand against it. This is harder to describe than to do, but it enables me to dynamically adjust the strap tension and allows me to shift my hand to reach all the buttons on a 40-key instrument whilst not letting it flop about. However I always play sitting with it braced on one knee, which helps with stability.

[Steve Schulteis]

This video I recorded a while back seems relevant. I'm exaggerating things for the sake of demonstration, so I'm squeezing harder with my thumbs than I normally do. With the normal amount of pressure, it usually looks more like my thumb is just resting on the strap, not pushing it down. My thumb is also not pushing directly against the rest of my hand.

 

 

 

Sometimes I'll also lightly curl my thumb down a bit around the hand rest when I need some extra stability. You can see me doing that with my left hand while I play chords in this video:

 

 

I may adjust my pressure and grip throughout a tune as required. None of this is static.

 

[hjcjones]

Steve's video illustrates what I described. I think a lot of players take a similar approach.