Thumb on neck?

[spoonful]

Still on my "fluidity trip" I notice that I sometimes lift my thumb from the neck when practising scales, and just play "uncorrect?" without the support from the thumb. How about you guys ? On or off the neck?

[Blindboy]

I am familiar with the "classical", thumb on the back of the neck, wrist bent down way to hold your hand, but that exacerbates my carpal tunnel syndrome. I sometimes have my thumb there, sometimes it is along the top of the neck, sometimes I hang my thumb over the neck to fret the low E string.

[VikingBlues]

I didn't have a clue - I had to check this first as it's all such a subconcious thing I'm not aware of it at the time.

Like Blindboy - it appears it's variable. On the back of the neck, often creeping round towards the top of the neck (but not as far as allows fretting low E string notes). If I'm bending notes the thumb's always round towards the top of the neck. The thumb sometimes leaves the neck during vibratos, but I think that's the only time. If i'm sitting down playing the thumb is always round towards the top of the neck because the neck is a bit lower when I'm seated than where the strap leaves it when i'm standing.

I notice if I'm playing lead the pressure of the thumb on the neck is minimal - just sort of using it as a sort of guiding rail I guess. It does sort of feel a bit strange if I try to play without the thumb on the neck though.

[Golfxzq]

This is an interesting question, Spoonful... it seems to be a matter of personal preference, especially with Blues players.

Recently I have been trying to do a quick slide of a chord shape up a couple of frets and right back again.... not easy for me to do. I need the thumb on the back of the neck in order to keep the fingers down but the "pinch" increases the friction and makes it very difficult to slide quickly. I've tried it with the thumb off and the fingers seem to slide a bit quicker but it's very hard to hold the chord. Anyone have any suggestions on how to do this properly? I use "Fast Fret" on the strings and that helps a bit but the pinching seems to be the big thing that slows me down. Maybe it's just a matter of practice??