It sounds like Jed's right hand position is similar to mine. In my case, I started as a classical guitarist, and gradually incorporated other styles, with a lot of my style having been influenced by John Renbourne (you can see how a young classical guitarist with a brand-new steel-string guitar might be drawn to Renbourne's playing), as well as Leo Kottke, Martin Simpson, and others. Volume is one benefit, although I'm not a particularly loud guitarist (unlike Jed, I gather). What I find is that a quasi-classical right hand position allows for a lot of finger control and independence (one finger's motion not being dictated by the adjacent finger's motion), and a range of tonalities that might not be available otherwise.

However, that there is a lot more variability in classical guitarists' hand positions than might be apparent to the non-classical guitarist, and a good deal of debate and disagreement in classical guitar circles about which positions yield the greatest benefits. Some classical guitarists extend their thumbs very far towards the neck, while others have them closer to the other fingers; some rely heavily on rest strokes, while others use them only rarely; some use more nail, others use more flesh; some play with their fingers almost perpendicular to the strings, others with more of an angle. These topics sound kind of arcane to non-classical guitarists, but in classical guitar circles they are the equivalent of the ubiquitous "what is folk?" question on this forum.

Volume can be nice, but in most ensemble settings a fingerpicked guitar will lose the volume wars to other instruments, no matter how aggressively the guitarist plays. And, of course, there are tradeoffs -- beyond a certain point, volume comes at the expense of tone (or at least, at the expense of the range of tones available). Segovia, the grand master and touchstone for classical guitarists everywhere, has often been critiqued for his insistence on not using amplification, and the way this forced him to limit his tonal range in order to be audible (sometimes barely audible) in an ensemble or concert hall setting. If I am playing with others, I generally like to use a little subtle amplification, because it allows me to make use of the full range of tones that I can produce, rather than being forced to limit myself by the quest for unamplified volume. Others may feel differently, of course.

Thanks for the "technical" threads, Rick. I often visit the forum these days without contributing, but I'm always happy to jump in on threads like this. Glad to see you back in action. -- WS