Ahh… the age-old question….
Which hand should you be scratching the record with??
I get asked this question ALL THE TIME.
And my answer is always the same…
It’s BOTH!
If you want to become a kickass Scratch DJ then you want to try to learn everything with BOTH hands.
Now before you get your knickers in a twist, just hear me out. It’s not for the reasons that you may think…
You DO NOT have to be totally ambidextrous to be a dope turntablist.
There are loads of incredible tablists that only scratch on one side.
And many of those who do scratch on both sides like myself, still tend to favor one orientation over the other as their “power” side.
That said, every scratch is unique and different.
Each technique requires the use of different muscles, movements and varying levels of strength or flexibility.
In other words, some scratches may feel easier with your right hand on the record, and some may feel easier with your left.
Your goal with this experiment is to figure out which side feels easiest for that particular scratch so you can learn it FASTER… and then ‘teach’ your other side.
You also don’t want to be that DJ that always has to cross their arms just to scratch on the other side.
(Pssst…you only want to do that because it looks cool, not because ya have to.)
You can train yourself to be more ambidextrous so you can comfortably use both hands
BUT FIRST, I can tell ya one thing for sure — you probably aren’t going to be able to use both hands confidently instantly. Be patient and enjoy the process, my friend.
The trick is to experiment with both hands and see which one feels the most comfortable right away (it’ll probably be your dominant hand, but ya never know… you may be surprised. 😉)
Once you know which hand feels more natural for that particular scratch, you’ll want to learn it with that hand.
As you practice, you’ll start to notice things about your positioning, posture, and stance. As you analyze these things, then you can start to transfer them over to teach the other side.
In this tutorial video, I show you exactly how to choose which hand to learn with and also how to “teach” your non-dominant hand
You’ll probably need to make some tweaks and adjustments on the other side to get comfortable, but you’ll have the general concept in place to start training the other hand.
Real Talk: Very few peeps are completely ambidextrous.
There will probably be some scratches that are super easy for you to rock with both hands.
While other scratches may be more challenging for one hand to do than the other… but don’t stress! That’s completely normal.
Ready for a deeper dive?
Check out this video where I break down exactly how to choose which hand is best for YOU to use on the record or jog wheel
Hope ya dig it!
xo,
Shortee
ps – FREE DOWNLOAD:
“Scratch DJ Toolkit”- Scratch Samples & Beats
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