Left Handed Guitar

Playing An Electric Guitar With The Left Hand

Can you become a successful electric guitar player if you are left handed?  Yes you can.  Just look at what Jimi Hendrix and Paul McCartney accomplished. 

Guitars can be built for anyone who is left handed.  With a left handed person, his dominant hand is the left hand and his right hand is the secondary hand.  The dominant hand strums the guitar strings and the secondary hand holds the strings against the guitar’s neck. 

If you are a left handed person, you may not want to settle for a right handed guitar.  Your left hand is your active hand.  It is this hand that will tell your right hand what to do.  By changing the strings around, you create a guitar that is meant to be played with the left hand.  An electric guitar is a guitar that has been “plugged in” to create an “electric” melodious tone.

If you are unable to afford to have a left handed guitar built, than with practice you could learn to play a right handed guitar like Jimi Hendrix.  He just learned to play the right handed guitar upside down.

There is an advantage to playing a right handed guitar, even an electric one, with your left hand; you will use your left hand to play the notes.  This will build endurance and your left hand will have enough strength to play and do pull-off without using a pick. The neck and top of the guitar will be pointed to the right and the strings will be played from the high to the low.

Let’s face it.  It is a right handed world.  There are many artists and musicians who are left handed and that is the hand that does all the fingering work.  The main advantage in purchasing a right handed guitar is that you can share with others as well as try out theirs.  When upgrading, this can be a big advantage.

Left Hand Guitar Playing

There are many great left handed guitarists; all it takes is some minor adjustments to your guitar and attitude in order to become a competent at left hand guitar playing. Firstly, never think that you should be right handed because of the way that most guitars are designed. You know if you are left handed and you can not change that.

Your right hand is the passive hand and your left hand is active. Paul McCartney is a famous left handed guitar player who tried playing with his right hand but failed. Other famous left handed guitar players include Kurt Cobain from Nirvana, Slim Whitman and of course, the great Jimi Hendrix. As you can see, being left handed is no handicap when it comes to guitar playing.

The “King Of The Surf Guitar” Dick Dale is one exception in that he learned to play on a regular right handed guitar so he made himself adjust to playing with his right hand as the active hand – he did not change the string order on the guitar as many others do. Once he was able to buy left handed guitars he still chose to play in the right hand position as he was used to that. Albert King and Bobby Womack are two other players who played in this style.

To make a right handed guitar into a left handed guitar, the strings need to be reversed so that the lowest string, the E string, needs to be on top as it is on a regular guitar. Also the nut and bridge – the parts that hold the strings on to the guitar – must also be adjusted for a left hander. There are slots on these parts so attach them to the strings, and they need to be turned upside down so that the strings are able to fit in the reverse order.

Many players have noticed that price difference between right and left handed players. You need to shop around to get a left handed guitar for a good price. There are now many more mid range models available for left handers. Gibson and Fender now make left handed guitars of all their top models.

Some books that will assist in your playing include Mel Bay Left-Handed Guitar Chords by William Bay and Guitar Case Guide to Left-Handed Chords by Rikky Rooksby.

Websites and forums can also assist in your left handed guitar playing as well as choosing a left handed guitar.