Rattlebrained

It seems that when I remade the Jazz Up Your Washboard page, I removed the info on thimbles in an attempt at better organization, and then promptly forgot to do something with it. Sorry about that! Better late than never… :P

Best keep them on your fingers but how?

Some folks don’t seem to have a problem keeping the thimbles on their fingers, while other do. I suppose it has to do with finger shape and size as well as how you play. If you hit the washboard with the tip of your finger, you are basically pushing the thimble onto your finger which could be all you need to keep them from falling off.

Also, in case you were wondering, the “perfect” thimble is just large enough that it doesn’t prevent blood from getting all the way to you finger tips, but tight enough that you can “screw it on”.

However sometimes it’s not that simple, IMO there are quite a few elements that can make thimbles that seemed perfect on one day, not so good on another; sweat, stress, the weather, blood pressure… For this reason I try and have a choice of thimbles with me when I play.

Still, I really like, and often use, the wood thimbles I bought quite some time ago, but they are too big for most of my fingers; so I put a little strip of Tac Putafix – a “blu-tack” type adhesive – along the inside of the thimbles. Besides that it’s a bit sticky and sometimes leaves some residue on my fingers, especially in hot weather, I’ve found this the easiest way to make sure my thimbles don’t fly off.

The Elastic Waistband Thimble Trick:

Now, if like me you think it could be fun to grab a wisp or something while you are playing, then maybe blu-tack is not enough. I found this tip by the late Rick Fielding in the Mudcat Café forum and gave it a try! And I’m happy that I did, I use thimbles like these when I’m also holding other objects like drumsticks; it really makes it a lot easier.

Get your thimbles together, but don’t worry if they’re a bit on the large side (some folks pinch ‘em to make ‘em fit.)

Take some white elastic (one inch wide) waistband material (available in strips at any department store) and glue it (with contact cement) around the thimble. Leave about three quarters of an inch off the thimble. Pull it quite tight before gluing, so that you really have to wiggle each finger a bit to get it past the elastic and into the thimble.

The elastic will keep the thimble firmly in place (without pain) and you won’t lose the circulation in your finger-tips.

Plus, if you “elasticize” your thimbles this way you can use the thicker wrapped upper part of the thimble to hit your bell or cymbal. This give a cool gong tone since the elastic material has a softer contact.

Thumb Thimbles, Washboard Whackers?

Do-it yourself or not?

At one point I thought it could be interesting to have a thimble on my thumb to tap with, but a good thumb thimble is hard to find!

However I happened to have a piece of 1 inch aluminum tubing in my workshop so I cut it in half and then sanded down and glued each half to a piece of the same white elastic used for the thimbles which had already been glued into a loop just big enough to fit smugly on my thumb.

This idea worked out really well and with hindsight it’s quite probable that it came from seeing McKnowall Washboard Whackers (bottom photo) while looking for neat washboard products when I first started washboard playing. So if you don’t happen to have all the necessary ingredients to do this yourself, this is a product that could be really be worth it.

Since then I have experimented with a few similar taping devices by gluing different bits of metal on elastic bands, and probably should add that the metal finger picks used to play guitar can also be used for washboard playing.

Washboard Gloves

One comment on the old JUYW page mentioned the need to switch between instruments quickly as a good reason to make gloves to play your washboard with: It’s easier for me to slide on 2 gloves than 8 thimbles. I just bought cheap cotton gloves and added pearl snaps to each finger. The snaps come with the little kit for attaching them. It’s cheap, quick, durable, and sounds great!

This is similar to most of the tips for washboard gloves that I’ve seen on the web. Folks use all sorts of types of gloves and glue – or sew – all sorts of things to them: bottle caps, buttons, walnut shells, pearl – or other – snaps…
And of course if you glue thimbles on some old gloves, there you have it: washboard gloves.

I have a page on how I made the ones I used to use: my own washboard glove concoction.

And if you don’t want to make them yourself: Since 2012, Bone Dry Music has the world’s first – and only – Commercially Manufactured bottle cap washboard gloves

I’m sure there are still other ways to keep your thimbles on your fingers, don’t hesitate to share them here!