I'm relatively new to steel guitar - a few years of casual playing with a lap steel and a few weeks with a pedal steel.
However, I have decades of playing with my fingers as a bass player (electric and upright) and finger picking on guitars (mostly church/folk music). In all those years, I never used finger picks until I started messing around with the lap steel, and even then never really got comfortable with them.
Now that I have a pedal steel, I need to get my finger picking with picks caught up with my finger picking without picks.
My main source of frustration, which I'm sure is familiar to some: I can play the lap and pedal steel decently without picks. I can intuitively find the strings and get most grips without much thought. Finger and palm blocking follow naturally from how I play bass. As soon as I put the picks on, I struggle to even hit the right strings, let alone have any control over tone and blocking.
I know there are a few players out there that eschew picks and just play with their fingers. But, I don't want to discount picks since they're so fundamental to many of the tones.
My questions for the community, and especially anyone who's come at steel with a strong pick-less picking background:
What exercises can you recommend to help gain comfort, confidence, and control with picks?
How would you structure practice to include both pick and non-pick exercises (specifically, without picks, I can focus on pedals and songs)?
When did your picking with picks catch up to your picking without picks?
Well I'll try to share my experience, I am only a little more than a year into pedal steel and played armpit guitar for many years before. I think fingerpicks are gonna feel weird if you have never used them, there's just no getting around that. I was googling players that were using fingers only, I tried to find 'alternative' finger picks, basically tried to find any other option. But eventually I just started putting them on and playing. Yes it's weird at first. But just do it and it becomes less weird until it is normal. I don't think you need to do any special exercises or anything just accept that it's new and strange and force yourself to do it. If you're practicing a lot it won't even take a couple months before you're getting very used to them. I think it's a case of not overthinking it, this coming from a guy that loves to overthink everything.
I don't have any specific exercises to recommend, but I found that shaping my picks had a huge impact on playability. You might try to shape the picks such that your hand is in a similar posture with and without picks; then you can naturally palm mute the same way either way.
This image from a Jeff Newman instruction book helped me realize that stock picks are too straight for my liking:
Newman Right Hand Picks.png
I use a cheap jewelers dapping block set (inspired by Toshiyuki Shoji) to increase the curvature over my fingertip in a smooth arc. If the blades stick out straight like stiletto fingernails, I find myself digging in or getting caught on strings by accident.
Another piece of advice I read on this forum was that the muting will improve naturally as your skill level rises; just be sure to record yourself so you're aware of when you let unwanted strings ring out. Get the grips under your fingers without thinking and you'll begin to notice how your unique anatomy finds ways to mute strings (palm, left middle finger/thumb, right ring fingertip. etc). YMMV
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Adding picks is a b1+c4... you can observe even Buddy Emmons and Lloyd Green fiddling with them in between lines.
Buddy Emmons even ditched the metal picks for a while, saying he was battling them for ages... and went back to them anyways.
They are prosthetics and they'll always feel like that.
All you can do, is snuff it up.
Start them like teachers like Jeff Newman and other greats state is as "correct"... and only modify from that slightly after a while and not constantly. You will need to get USED to them at a point.
Just don't start with a bad habit, or inventing "rubber" and "bandaids" and other contraptions to make them more comfortable... I mean, we've even had discussions on here about the use of "super glue". Don't!
You will see some professionals with weird "bad" habits... as most will tell you "don't"... it proves that everything may eventually work, but the fact that it works for one does not cancel the debate.
Look, it's like military boots... they were not meant to be comfy... they were meant to serve a purpose and last the time of the battle. Again, snuff it up. Practice, practice and practice.
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Did you try getting used to fingerpicks on your standard six-string? That might be an easier way to get used to them and get them "fitted" in a more comfortable zone.
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I was in a similar situation. It took repetition. I also practiced using them on my 6 string guitar. Shape the picks as shown, and I recommend not changing picks. I've used the same picks for years, and am obsessive with not loosing them. I use nail polish to color code my index and middle finger pick. They now almost feel like a natural extension of my fingers. Pickless is fine too, just a different sound.
These are great tips, thanks for all the comments, pictures, and videos so far! Some good material to digest.
I hadn't thought of using them on the 6-string, that sounds like a good way to just get comfortable with them. Maybe I'll even practice bass with them a bit (that will make an interesting sound!).
Yes first time pick use sucks and you will get over it in 3 or 4 months. Got to build callouses on the fingertip area to avoid pain! Remember when you first started to play guitar how your left hand fingertips hurt? Same principle. As a young draftsman in the 70's I had to get used the the knurled grip on mechanical drafting pencils. It took a while.
I highly recommend using the Paul Franklin picks on your fingers. Thumb is less important. Watch Right Hand Alpha by Jeff Newman, already discussed. if you are used to playing without picks, your are attacking the strings with the pads of your finger tips. This will put you into an incorrect position for playing pedal steel. The picks should extrude beyond your fingers and you should pluck the strings on an angle, not straight on. Hard to explain, but Newman’s course will explain it better than I can.
Picks are a weird thing. Primarily because their use on steel guitar largely came from a need for volume, that predates electric instrumentation.
So it is somewhat strange that we still use them with fully amplified instruments in this day and age.
But, they do bring with them a different stylistic approach and feel, that is very much tied in with the dialect and sound of the steel guitar as we know it now.
Give yourself time.
I played lap steel for many years without picks, but when I got into pedal steel, the transition to picks eventually happened.
I think using picks is a tricky thing to see value in at first, to believe is worthwhile, especially if one already has a developed skillset for playing finger style guitar and there is no problem getting decent sounds without picks.
I played pedal steel without them for about a year, and was even doing gigs and some recording as well. It was an extension of my guitar and lap steel playing.
But my curiosity more than anything pushed me to try and get a feel for the "prosthetic" approach as JD aptly describes it above.
Not suggesting you need to do this, but I consciously put any long term impatience aside and gave myself a framework of 2 whole years before deciding whether or not picks were for me. This way, I'd be deciding objectively, with an honest comparison, and not ditching them simply because they weren't immediately familiar and comfortable.
That was close to 15 years ago, and as you may guess, that two year point came and went and I hardly even thought about it. The picks had become a natural part of my playing.
It does take a while to genuinely adapt to them, but I was playing pretty confidently with them much, much sooner than the two year deadline decision time I gave myself.
My fingestyle approach to guitar without picks is still very much intact and I keep my nails filed about a centimetre long, and often play lap steel without picks. Its a different approach that has its place.
Perhaps one could think of it like learning to dance or do sports with footwear on, as opposed to barefoot. Up here, we skate a lot on ice, and yes, you can slide around without blades on pretty well, but...
I think you get the analogy.
Picks are a funny thing and the fact is, you never can feel the strings through a solid material like plastic or metal. But the same thing goes for using a plectrum on guitar or mandolin yet that feels pretty intuitive to most people...
Good luck with it. And if you find that picks aren't your cup of tea, so be it.
There are some great players who've played beautifully without them and there is no rule that says you have to conform.
Last edited by Andrew Frost on 22 Sep 2025 12:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Picks can be a bear to get used to in the beginning. But, once you get them to fit right and your hand posture is comfortable.... practice, practice, practice.
Start off slow with string grips and then some single string picking. And then, combine the two using connecting chords. This whole process will take some time. Don't try to rush it. You'll only get frustrated.
Good Luck !!!
Proper fitting picks, That fits you are very important to learn to play with.
Here is the first picks a friend gave me years ago. They were ill fitted and would catch on each other and 1 would go flying for parts unknown. Are pentagon shaped.
DSC00808.JPG
You want an oval circle that fits each finger. Using either Jewelers pliers with smooth round surfaces to bend with. A drill bit clamped in a padded vice, And a small hammer allows proper fitting. Like this pair of picks.
DSC00807.JPG
Be careful forming the picks, So they extend slightly past your finger nail edge. Adjust to fit you.
WARNING: Once you get a pair of picks fitted. Have an extra set. If someone wants to show you something. Put your picks in your pocket, Hand them the other set. To bend to fit them.
Good luck fitting a set of picks, Then practice practice, practice with them.
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When you go to metal finger picks, The finger picks have raised your hand and fingers slightly. You may need a longer thumb pick, Than when picking 6 string with thumb pick and fingers. To put your thumb pick tip, On the same level and arc with the tips of the metal finger picks.
Joe Wrights videos "Secrets of the Wright Hand" and "Blocking Basics" may give you a solid foundation for your picking hand.
His 32 moves done slowly and diligently will give you a good basis and wearing picks will become second nature.
They can be found on his hompage in the "Analog Years" section and they are gratefully free to use. https://www.pedalsteel.com/prt/members/index.shtml
This is such a valuable resource when it comes to basic principles of movements on the steel guitar. Be sure to check out his vids on the Sierra Homepage. www.sierrasteels.com/lessons/lessons-index.html
It might be worth emphasising that no picks (that I've seen anyway) work straight out of the box. The blades need to be bent round Newman-style, and it takes a lot of patience with the pliers to get a snug fit on your fingers. Once you've achieved all that, they will stay on without any tape or glue, as your picking action will tend to push them on, not pry them off.
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Chris,
Come on over and I'll show you a couple things about wearing picks. One thing I used to do just to get used to them was wear them around when I wasn't playing. I also found a little picking practice neck that I would keep with me so i could practice during dead time. How you use picks is sorta like how a violin player uses a bow. There is allot there.
For a time, Buddy played without fingerpicks and still a thumb pick, but went back to picks because without them, he lacked the attack that picks give.
Of course, I had to try no picks and after playing without them, I built up some callousing. What I liked about that was the nice variety of tone that the fingers gave, brighter with the calloused part and nice variety moving onto the fleshier part of the finger.
all good advice, but most doesn't go far enough,, Here's what I did many many years ago when finger picks felt unusable, and i was going to invent some radical new approach to playing steel without them,, Then of course realizing i needed to use finger picks -period.
I put them on, and never took them off,, I ate with them on, slept with them on, went about my daily business with them on, unless work or writing or perhaps a romantic interlude made that impossible.. Seriously, just keep them on all day, every day, as long as you can until they feel natural, and you will start to feel like they belong on your fingers.. It made things a lot easier for me in a short time... bob
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I think this has been said before, when Jeff Newman started a class, he'd show how to bend the the rear part of the shafts of the pick, up for a comfortable fit, so the pick doesn't dig in to the cuticle.
I had several no-name picks I found in lap steel cases that we very bowled. This eliminates/minimizes the scraping sound from picking on the edge of the pick.
the old National picks are coveted for this reason, but the bowel is not as pronounced.
If your picking scrapes the string, you can try bending the blade a little so your picking doesn't cause this.
Having played thumb pick + bare-finger style guitar for 30 years, adding metal picks to my fingers felt awful. After much trial and error, including the Newman/Alpha lessons, I found a compromise by shortening the length that the pick blade (Acri fingerpicks) extends past the fingertips, down to about 1/8”. It required almost no bending and fiddling around with pliers. I think I got lucky, though, because I have no reason to distrust the advice of most of the old pros here regarding pick-shaping.
Understanding that your default style of playing is pick-less, I don’t see a need for focused practice on it until you are more comfortable playing with fingerpicks. I can play my steel guitar pick-less any time I want, but knowing it will sound and feel different.
As far as picking exercises go, just make it part of your routine to practice your 3-string chord grips. Play each triad across all 10 strings, try to land accurately from one string group to the next. Then pick each string in the grip individually. Use a metronome to keep your timing honest.
Joe Wright’s videos and e-books have some exercises that demonstrate these ideas, and thousands more to obsess over to the point where you could spend your entire evening practice session on them. Don’t do that.
Seriously, if you want to develop your skills efficiently and logically, save up some cash and invest in the Paul Franklin method. At least the Foundation course.
I don't think this has been mentioned......... finger and thumb picks are like guitars, amps and everything else associated with making music in the area of finding ones that suit you personally. I think most of us have tried different brands and types of picks until we find ones that feel comfortable using (along with using them until we feel that comfort with them). I guess you could say finding the right picks is a picking exercise.
When I first started using fingerpicks for guitar a long time ago, I just kept them on pretty much 24x7 as Bob C. suggests, for quite a while. I found that very useful, and probably sped up the process of getting used to them.
But I think comfort is really important. There are some fingerpicks I have trouble with because they hurt too much. I don't agree with the 'just suck up the pain' approach. I started out on old (used) Nationals that had sharp ends at the cuticle end of the band, and the bands were not at all flexible. I never thought to try to bevel/round those edges with very fine sandpaper, which I've done in recent years with some success. But initially, I turned to Dunlops, which I used for a long time. I found it easier to start with slightly lighter gauge picks than the usual 0.025 gauge picks - ultimately 0.020 seemed to be a good compromise. I know many here don't like Dunlops, but I found them more comfortable than the old Nationals I tried first.
These days, there are a lot of options. I tried a bunch. I like Pro Piks, but found that the double-band didn't stay on well. But the traditional single-bands are pretty comfortable. Right now, I'm actually using National NP-2 picks. Being new out-of-the-box, the cuticle-end of the bands are not sharp, the bands are smooth and shape pretty well, and I like the feel and sound. I have yet to try the Paul Franklin Nationals, but I probably will give them a shot.
I think it's also important to shape the band to the finger, but I try not to do anything drastic. I especially don't like to have corners on the bands - I like them smooth and simply contour to my fingers as much as possible. For me, having maximum contact between the band and my finger is important. I want them to feel like a part of my finger as much as possible.
I tend to like the blade of most fingerpicks as they come out of the package. Some players contour them pretty tightly to the bottom of the finger, some people like them sticking pretty straight out. I like them in-between. I think part of this is that I don't like the fingerpick to stick way out - instead, I prefer it to come out just to or past the end of the finger. But doing things this way, long fingernails get in the way of my fingerpicks. So I keep my nails pretty short - probably significantly shorter than many, if not most, bare finger pickers do. I play slide guitar pretty much strictly with thumbpick and bare fingers. I keep just enough nail to have contact with the string, but play predominantely on calloused pads. That's because I prefer this type of tone on slide guitar - otherwise I'd just use fingerpicks.
Overall, I don't think one-size-fits-all works very well. Practically every guitar player - steel or standard - I've ever known does things differently in terms of picking mechanics. I think there are some things that probably, mostly, don't work very well. But on the other hand, I've seen people do stuff that makes absolutely no sense to me, but work just fine for them. For me, it's a journey that never ends. I will still change things if I see a method that works better for me. But at first, I suggest finding a set of fingerpicks that is comfortable, set them up so you make good contact with the string, and then just practice, practice, and practice. There will be plenty of time to diddle with picks, shaping, and so on.
And BTW, I play steel with three fingerpicks. This came from doing a lot of guitar hybrid style, with small 358 teardrop-shape flat pick and fingerpicks on middle/ring fingers. Again, a personal choice. No doubt, there are advantages and disadvantages to either 2 or 3 fingerpicks.
As if this post isn't long enough - you asked about picking exercises. For me, pretty much the same as without picks, but I find practicing the major-chord string-skipping grips - strings 10, 8, 6, 5, 4, 3 - over and over again, moving the bar up and down the neck in all positions, is useful. For example, major chord pinches and arpeggios (3 at a time, 4 at a time with 3 fingerpicks, etc.), or major scale runs on strings 8, 7, 6, 5, 2, 4 using the A and B pedals to get the whole scale. When I first started playing pedal steel, I used my old Earl Scruggs 5-string banjo book and did tons of roll permutations he suggested - alternating, forward, reverse, backward, and mixed rolls on different string groups. When you get more acclimated to the other pedals/levers, there are others specific string-skipping grips. I do this kind of stuff for warmup and practice just to get my fingers/picks on the strings and get a feel for where I am that day. There are lots of very specific lick exercises. But just to get practiced with picks, I think simple stuff like this is useful for me.
