Hi there! I’m a semi-pro guitar player with many years of experience and I realized I’m a string-hopper!!! I’m hoping to turn into a cross picker instead. Already made some progress but still trying to make sense of the information and the problems in my technique.
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How do you know? I know we’ve thrown this term around somewhat loosely, to the point where it has almost become a way of describing anything that is wrong with your technique. I will apologize for that - we need to be clearer specifically about what it is and what it isn’t.
In general though, if you think you have a stringhopping problem, then fast and smooth is where you should start, not end. Don’t worry too much about accuracy at first. Try any / all of the motions we discuss here:
…and try to get them happening smoothly at a realistic speed first.
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Thanks @Troy ! I will go over that video ASAP. By the way, I appreciate the effort behind the recent (I think) Getting Started guide, and the onboarding emails. Even then, there’s a lot of information to digest and not a very very clear path to follow. However, I’ve already benefitted immensely from this knowledge.
Let me tell you my story because it might be inspiring. I’ve been playing for about 30 years. I consider myself a classic rock / blues / soul guitarist. I don’t play fast, don’t use high gain sounds, you get the picture. So why am I here? 
I’ve always been slightly dissatisfied with my technique. At some point in my learning years, I decided to stop playing fast. I didn’t like fast players anyway, and my fast playing was really lousy. That might have been 25 years ago. Well, these past weeks I discovered that the reason I couldn’t play fast because my right hand position/movements were wrong enough to never allow it! No matter how patient I was with a slow metronome, getting gradually faster, I would very quickly hit a wall.
Not only that: there are some very easy guitar phrases (not fast!) that I could never play correctly! Turns out my pick was getting trapped in the wrong places. There are some “Hideaway” licks that I would consider beginner stuff and I could never execute them properly. Till now!!! What they have in common is: single note string jumps.
Having said that, I’m a more than decent guitar player that has recorded many albums and toured internationally - I’ve certainly been able to compensate for my shortcomings!!!
I hope I can go through at least all the intro material plus the Albert Lee and crosspicking interviews. It would be great to have some kind of “lesson” path to follow and get better at crosspicking.
Anyway, enough rambling and I will report back!
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