Beyond the Tremolo

Playing Technique
#1

So I’ve been working my way through the pick slanting primer and assimilating all the the knowledge - my only question is… what now? There’s not really any technical exercises offered to practice applying the new information (as far as I can tell), so my assumption is that I’m to just go back to practicing all the stuff I used to practice, armed with this new understanding of technique.

It still leaves some questions though, at least for me. I get that the idea is to find a motion that’s fast and then slow it down… but I don’t want to lose that motion when I do slow it down. There’s also not a really a lot of information about the left hand aside from the concept of chunking, nor L and R hand synchronization.

Any thoughts on these ‘next steps’?

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#2

Hi,
just a few thoughts, there will soon come more knowledgeable people to help :slight_smile:

As a foreword, I come from the “old guard” of Masters in Mechanics time - that’s 10 years back or more - so I haven’t caught up with the new terminology and all the much deeper materials developed since the three milestones back then: Yngwie, Eric, Michael Angelo :smiley:

To me - and that’s also part of the knowledge surely encapsulated in the Pickslanting Primer - there is Upward, Downward, and “changing” pick slant, as far as picking technique is concerned. These are “string change” methods, basically.

If you went through the Primer, you should know their basic rules and, if you’ve been playing for a little while, you know about scales, scale patterns, arpeggios and the like.

It’s now a matter of choosing which slant is more natural for you, or which one you slip into at your max speed for instance, and start studying patterns that explicity revolve around that.
If you’re UP, or DSX I believe in the new terminology, like Gilbert, Bonamassa, Di Meola… Then the last masterpiece by @tommo - Metronomic Rock - is full of melodic ideas to develop. If you’re DN, or USX, like Yngwie, Eric Johnson and others, then grab the first two chapters of Masters in Mechanics for ideas in music, so to speak.

I hope this helps a little :slight_smile:

Michele

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#3

There are tons of musical examples on the site. Almost so many it’s hard to know where to begin lol! These are all free:

These are for subscribers:

(Each interview has a “clips” section with high quality tabs and synced video)

What are you interested in? I might be able to save you some clicks :slight_smile:

Right. Easier said than done, and also be aware that some motions actually will change entirely if you slow them down too much. It’s like if you were sprinting and wanted to not go so fast…at some point you’d be jogging and that’s just a mechanically different thing than sprinting. It’s not a slow motion version of sprinting, it’s a different thing entirely.

I’ll agree there isn’t a lot about that, but it’s touched on here, and that may be the ‘chunking’ thing you’re referring to

In my experience, accenting is crucial for sync. ALSO, I noticed just due to the things I played a lot, I was weak on patterns that didn’t begin on the index finger and I had particular issues keeping sync when playing straight 16ths while using 3nps type shapes. I made a drill to address that and it helped me a ton:

I was also trying to kill 2 birds with one stone by addressing the fact that I noticed that sometimes my nice new tremolo would change entirely when I introduced the fretting hand.

Regarding fretting in general, this isn’t official CtC but since it’s on the forum and received a good deal of acclaim, it’s worth noting

Mind blowing stuff in there regarding speed potential and fretting.

More in depth stuff with video explanations here:

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#4

I like the idea of practicing the material centered around the guitarist who shares the style I’ve chosen, thanks! Will dive into the Seminars section.

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#5

Thanks a bunch for the in-depth answer with lots of links. I’ll definitely be diving into the seminars, and had already checked out the interviews, but didn’t recognize any of the names XD - is there anyone there who has more of a jazz-funk leaning? That’s the style of music I’m most drawn to, and while I know this site is more rock, metal, and bluegrass oriented, I still know the depth of knowledge here can carry over into any style.

#6

Not sure about the ‘funk’ part but lots of jazz cats in there, some are more ‘fusion’ though. Mike Stern, Jimmy Bruno, Oz Noy, Olli Soikelli, Frank Gambale. Marshall Harrison and Martin Miller are more modern fusion and also rock leaning, but have awesome mechanics to look at as well.

After going through the Primer, what motion did you determine is your primary? That could also help me narrow focus a little on recommendations. Cuz you’re right, plenty of this stuff can transfer to any place. A good line is a good line :slight_smile:

#7

I was finding that an elbow based dsx got me the smoothest attack and fastest tremolo - are any of the players that you named above kinda in that ballpark? Until this recent Metronomic DSX drop (which I still have to check out) I figured that left my only option as Yngwie, who, as much as I respect, I don’t necessarily want to play like.

#8

I’ve read a little down the thread that your escape motion is primary DSX - If that’s the case, there’s a ton of guitar players using that - As I believe I’ve understood, btw, the fastest altarnate pickers belong to that category. DiMeola, McLaughlin for the more jazzy-fusion-y type of t hing (especially the latter), Bonamassa for the blues-y, Gilbert and Batio for the shredd-y :rofl:

Lotsa fun!

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#9

None of the ones I mentioned do elbow, unless maybe Martin Miller does on some fast scalar stuff…not his core motion though. BUT, if you need DSX type lines there are still tons of examples around here for that. Like @MikeAnblips mentioned, DiMeola, McLaughlin, Gilbert and Batio all use a lot of DSX. Each of them are covered pretty thoroughly in the Anti-Gravity seminar and even if most of those guys are wrist players, if the phrase is DSX you can play it with your elbow mechanic and get by just fine.

Granted only DiMeola and McLaughlin are in the jazz/fusion world and probably have none of the ‘funk’ you’re looking for :slight_smile: I’d think you can adapt the examples to your own phrases or maybe even get some ideas for some new ones though

Also, one of my favorite things I’ve come across here is Troy’s explanation of John McLaughlin’s solo on Cherokee

It blew my mind that someone could be improvising at a speed like that and still be inside a mechanical framework with fairly strict rules. Sort of air quotes around improvising because it reshaped my understanding of what it really is. I always thought it was some sort of free-for-all where you randomly play a given set of notes for each chord. At least the way John’s doing it here, it’s clear that he’s rapidly deploying well rehearsed patterns (which of course work perfectly over the changes). They nearly all escape after downstrokes, because that’s what he does :slight_smile:

Last thing I’ll recommend, now that I know you’re an elbow player, is the Bill Hall interview

He’s got one of the best elbow mechanic’s in the business and to even Troy’s surprise, he has several other motions that he can swap in and out pretty seamlessly.

Anyway, have fun with all that stuff. I always sort of smile when people ask “where are the musical examples around here?” lol! If anything, there are too many. I have a bad case of ADHD with all this stuff because it’s all so enjoyable (for me) and presented so well that it’s easy to get distracted.

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#10

Ooh out of all of those, I think I’m drawn to blues-y shred the most… is Bonamassa ever discussed on this site?

#11

Very cool, lots to look into here! I checked out Bill Hall and I like his sound a lot… as well as the antigravity seminar as a good starting point on the seminars side.

#12

Glad to hear it! Re: your Bonamassa question, Troy doesn’t have interviews but he’s mentioned many times that Joe is a DSX player that will use a “helper” motion when needed to make the USX pickstrokes happen where needed. He has interviewed the AMAZING Andy Wood though and he has a very similar approach. The thing to be careful with Andy though is that he’s got a fully double escape motion that he can channel as well. Still, either of his interviews are gold mines. He plays in nearly every genre imagineable and like Bonamassa he can do a convincing Eric Johnson imitation.

Also, there was an amazing lesson of the forum members put together on a way to play in the Eric Johnson framework but in a DSX context. That would likely work with your elbow motion

Adam very sadly passed recently. I try to share his stuff as much as I can because he was a top notch player and teacher, also great guy.

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#13

Some excellent suggestions already!

I wanted to add one more: have a look at this primer section if you haven’t already. They give an overview of the different techniques that a lot of great players use, as well as a checklist to evaluate whether your current motion is working well for you:

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#14

@Byrnewell already quoted the excellent work by @adamprzezdziecki - whom I’m floored to hear has passed recently, that’s so sad :frowning: - There’s lots of interesting stuff in his videos as he managed to basically ‘flip’ EJ (and not only him) upside down :grin:
So definitely check him out, he’ll inspire you.

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