In an ongoing discussion with my zither friends, I've been trying to figure out what to do about the damage to my left thumbnail from too much 'glissade'/too much thumb vibrating against the fretboard strings, creating a notch in the nail. Everyone had a different answer/different idea.
I tried taping the thumb, changing position, using less thumb... and ended up going to a nail salon to have the woman add acrylic over the the right side of the nail. So far so good.
How do you deal with this problem?

Question: Is there a "standard" gap between the griffbrett strings and the frets? Does this change as one progresses up from the first fret? How does one measure this gap? Can one use an automotive/machinist type "feeler" gauge??

Can this string/fret gap be modified, making the instrument "lighter" ? This may be important for young players whose digits might be ultra sensitive. It was for me, and turned me off at an earlier age.

Regrets, no answer, only more questions.

Rudi

Addenda: playing guitar, one develops an ever-so-slight callous on the left thumb. Hmmm.

Rudi

Probably heresy - but I'm a lowly newcomer to the zither world.

Isn't there a simple rubber or plastic "cap" you can wear on your thumb when you're first getting started? Something like these thimbles:



Tom

A zitherist that attends our Sterling Zither Seminars visited a nail salon to address this very same problem, that is, nail loss of the right-thumb due to performing frequent slides. By his own account, he is very satisfied with the results. To protect the nail, there are a number of commercial nail products available that may provide a suitable do-it-yourself solution.

Dave

And so I bought some different finger guards from Amazon, a few presented here. Mostly they were the finger portion of rubber gloves, so it was impossible to do glissade or any sliding movement. One set looked like hamster condoms that roll on; not helpful.

I'm sticking with putting on a few layers of small pieces of medical adhesive tape each time I practice; it seems to work.
Adding some liquid acrylic to the nail side worked as well, but it weakens it each time I'd use nail polish remover to take it off. And that's my take on solving this problem. So far.

Here's the result

To answer Rudi's question several posts back, I think what he is asking is what is usually referred to as the height of the action on the fretboard. There really is no "standard" answer here. Lower action is easier on the left hand but reduces your ability to play expressively. A higher action is harder on the left hand but you can play louder when necessary and use a more forceful attack without getting any buzzes or lose tone. It's a balancing act. If your action is higher, the string has more room to move. Volume is a matter of amplitude. The greater the arc of the movement, the more air is moved and the louder the sound is. The kind of attack that Karras gets sounds to me like a higher action. His thumb hits the string with enough force to really give you some tone. It has the same kind of impact that Django Reinhardt got with a flatpick on the guitar. You can always raise your action by inserting a thicker wire at the bridge. This will change your intonation however. Like I said, it's a balancing act. Hope this helps.

Ken Bloom

Ken - In addition to using Vienna tuning, didn't Karas sometimes lower the pitch of his strings, to enable a more expressive sound? Especially for vibrato?

see: http://www.antonkaras.at/english_instrument.htm

Would be interesting to see a close-up of his left hand thumb nail!

Tom in CT

Hi Tom,

That's info I wasn't aware of. Thank you! Lowering the pitch would certainly contribute to the rather pointed tone that Karas gets and make vibrato easier. Have you ever seen one of the Karas zithers? I saw one once at Rudi Wacek's house. The body was much deeper at the bass side than the fingerboard side and had a sound port that faced the audience. Quite distinctive.

Ken Bloom