Try to slow down (I know it’s counter-intuitive)…go down to 16ths at 140-150 and try to swing your wrist (or any combination of body parts you need to) with wider motions. Then try going for just one string change using 3 note per string phrases. The 2 note per string stuff is more challenging (in my experience) particularly when you are not used to the sensation of changing strings at that speed. I got the three not per string stuff…then when I tried the 2 note per string stuff I felt like I was starting over…just my experience. Keep at it. It both frustrating and rewarding…like anything.
This.
I’d suggest keep working on the Yngwie chunk. Do it both at “fast” and “slow” speeds, whichever tempos those might be for you. Do it with wide motions and small motions. Keep an eye on the mirror.
I’ll just say this: In my opinion, if you jump ahead now and try to get multi-string phrases to work while your hand synchronization is holding you back, it’ll backfire and it’s not going to make any sense.
I’m 32. I don’t have the Yngwie chunk down completely yet, but I’m 100% definitely progressing a bit every day. I think I can most likely can start trying it on multiple strings soon-ish. But it’s not tomorrow, nor the day after it. This is the long game.
Keep it up man, let us know how it goes! You can do it!
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I am 50 and am nearly at the 110bpm benchmark that Troy plays the EJ sixes exercise. It has been a struggle sometimes (but it is for everyone I think). It has taken over a year of trial and error (and trying about every pick shape and size in existence). I think the secret is not to get too obsessed with it. Practice a lick for a while then play a variety of other things. When you come back then to the lick you will likely have made some gains. Hammering away at the same thing gets very demoralising and frustrating.
I also found that playing in bursts of speed helps with a metronome. 3 times playing one note on the beat then a fast flurry of notes on the fourth beat. This sort of gives you room to pack the notes in.
Also playing with backing tracks a lot helps both to improve synchronisation and using the faster licks in a musical way. I think difficult techniques unlock over time when you are ready (and it’s far more enjoyable).
I hope this makes sense.
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I find this helpful too. I tend to do it the way John Petrucci shows it in his video here (timestamped):
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I’m past 40, just started doing 16ths up to 180bpm in the last 6 months after being convinced I would never really shred. I’m also now in the best physical shape of my adult life. Age don’t mean a thing.
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Thank you for posting @jpsychc! Already lots of good advice in here!
I’ll summarise my understanding at the risk of oversimplifying / repeating what you and the others have said:
You have one motion that is promising (the tremolo), and one that doesn’t work (the one you are using for the pentatonics). I (we) would suggest to focus entirely on the motion that works, at least for the time being. The goal for now is to convince yourself that you can play some cool lines using this motion. [We will come to the EJ 6s later on don’t worry!]
You mention two challenges: right/left hand sync and switching strings. For hand sync, the Yngwie 6s pattern on one string is a good starting point (or any other pattern that you like). Since you have watched the material, make sure you apply the “chunking” principle there - you can try different accents / subdivisions of the beat until you find the most comfortable combination of accents / notes per beat.
Let’s talk about switching strings: we have to first figure out what type of escape path you are making when doing the tremolo. Additionally, the suggestion of making slightly bigger motions is a good one - the basic idea is that picking & string switching will become two aspects of the same movement!
It is likely you are doing a single-escape path, either downstroke escape (DSX) or upstroke escape (USX) - see the pictures in this recent post of mine in another thread
To find out, would you be able to make another video of your tremolo, possibly with a close-up view of the picking hand, the highest framerate your phone can do, and better lighting? Here is a summary of how to best film your playing for analysis:
Once we have this info I and others can suggest some patterns that will fit well your current technique.
Hope this helps - any questions, please let us know 
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Thank you! I hope to have some time today or tomorrow and will post the suggested video of my tremolo. It is definitely upstroke escape but the problem is the range of motion is not big enough to allow coming down on another string. And when I extend the range of motion, I can no long so it fast.
Anyway, I will focus on Yngwie’s chunk for now to work on hand sync and when I can , in the next couple days, I will post a better video of my tremolo motion.
Thanks. How could I do 3nps with a one way escape motion? You mean I should add a sweep? I couldn’t do that at 100 let alone 140. My max with changing strings at all is about 105. Adding a sweep wouldn’t even be possible for me at this point. Would take like a year of practice.
Anyway, 140-150 is 50% faster than I am able to pick so that would not be slowing down for me. Even my one note tremolo is only 160 tops. I can’t change notes let alone strings at anything more than 105
I hear you. You have a good, fast tremolo - if it’s 160 - that’s great. It’s steady. Can you do it with wider motions? Forget about slowing down. Try your tremolo with wider motions first (that is…when the pick is in the air you could potentially hit another string). If you can’t swing it wider at 160…then try slowing it to 140 and see if that helps (it’s just trial…something I would do for myself). Once it’s wider, try just switching a string…that is…do 3 notes on one string and a 4th note on another string…then stop. If you made it to the other string - try it again but completing 3 notes on each string (so 6 notes total). It might be sloppy and feel ‘uncontrolled’…its kinda weird…but…you get used to it over time and it gets cleaner…
Also, to clarify: ‘3 notes per string’ can be three of the the same note followed by a different note as the ‘4th note’ on the next string…playing 3 different notes per string is whole other problem that deserves a separate suggestion.
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I would try holding the guitar differently and maybe put a strap on it. It seems like you’re bouncing the neck around a lot and maybe without being conscious of it, you are putting effort into holding the guitar in position. Without that added job your hands and leg are focused on, they may be able to get in better sync and you get a little more speed too.
…just a thought.
Also are you a Southpaw playing a “righty” guitar? That is a challenge I face and I was stuck where you are for years. I believe had my guitar teacher not told me to “flip the guitar around I have it backwards” on the day of my first lesson and instead said “come back next week with a lefty guitar” I would be a much better guitarist picking wise. I struggled my entire guitar playing life with getting my pick hand in sync with my fretboard hand and I really believe that is the reason. BUT …I will say this site has helped me make tremendous progress. I wish I found it about 20 years ago LOL
Replying here rather than on that other thread about changing strings. A little further upstream @Johannes hit the nail on the head, as he is getting pretty good at doing. Your single string playing motion is efficient. Your multi-string playing is playing motion is stringhopping or at least something less efficient. When you try to play multi-string licks, you’re switching from the motion that works to the motion that doesn’t. You’re doing this deliberately. I know it doesn’t feel that way, but you are.
So that’s great news, because having at least one motion you can do fast and smoothly is a thing some people don’t even get to at first. So you have nothing to worry about yet.
The next step here is to get your fast motion happening on a single string with tight hand synchronization. This is how I started with the Pop Tarts type stuff. I did it using the Yngwie REH tape and the six-note pattern. You can use whatever patterns and shapes you want. You want the first note of each grouping to be your landmark note and you can accent it if need be to really hear it in your mind. The six note pattern is this:
You can try moving it around while keeping the sync:
You can try different patterns and variations on this. Make it fun, make it musical. Put on a song you can play along with and make little one-string solos that have musical melodies with these pattern based licks in between. Pretend you only have one string on your guitar and you need to make the most of it. Half of Yngwie’s most terrifying playing back in the day was on one string and I never knew it.
Getting the hands locked up on a single string over the course of the next few months, is a major enabler. Variety is key here. Feed your attemps with as many cool left hand patterns as you can think of.
Please don’t do this for many hours per day. Just do it for short sittings of 30-45 minutes and note if you are making progress. If you’re not, then more time won’t help, so don’t risk injury and burnout by piling on massive time. Instead figure out what’s not working or report back here so we can help.
Everything is working great so far with your fast motion. Get synchronized playing with that motion and unleash the power!
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Thanks. I have been grinding the yngwei 6 note chunk, the first 8 notes of the pop tart lick, and a simple four note descending chromatic lick (since I have identified going pinky-ring-middle-index is a problem for me as opposed to the other direction. I am keeping a chart where I track my progress with a metronome. I am up to 95 bpm on the six not yngwei chunk. (6 notes per best). So that’s much slower than my tremolo which means that my sync is certainly a limiting factor. Changing strings is another limiting factor of course but probably irrelevant at this point. I will continue to grind these up and then revisit. Thanks.
Ultimately I am a bluegrass player so I want to actually have a double escape motion but I try to use your advice of trying it fast until it clicks rather
Than working up slowly but can’t seem to click. I have worked up from 95 bpm to 110bpm 16th notes doing that and I’m hoping by properly learning an usx speed, and improving that sync, it may transition over to the bluegrass technique. But I still am having half my practice be bluegrass even if only 110 bpm. That’s my end goal is just to play bluegrass up to 135/140 bpm.
I know Grier uses Down escape SOMETIMES but he doesn’t seem to follow rules i.e only change after down strokes. He changes after upstrokes and skips strings entirely as well without losing speed. Seems when he’s on the lower bass strings he does use down escape but when he’s on the high strings it reverses. So while he does seem to favor down escape in certain cases, usually when moving to a higher string, he doesn’t use it as a rule and he doesn’t let him constrict him to only certain amounts of notes per string or follow rules. He can play whatever note he wants whenever he wants, and he just happens to use down escape when it’s called for, as opposed to people like yngwei who use their system as a rule and configure their licks around those rules. So I consider Grier a 2wps and Double escape player, even though you identify sections of wheel hoss where he favors down escape, I notice sections where he doesn’t and where the transcription doesn’t add up. (I have transcribed literally dozens of his solos from video. He follows no rules I am pretty sure of it ) Do you agree? I Ultimately need a double escape motion I think. But I’m going to train up my one string chunks as discussed above to get sync up and learn what it feels like to be fast.
Sorry for Novel. I want nothing more. I appreciate this site so much.
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Everything you’re saying about David is on point for his faster playing. For his medium speed playing he’s mostly all double escape.
But try not to overthink this. The core requirement for all guitar picking is a speedy, fluid, synchronized alternate picking motion. It doesn’t really matter what kind of motion it is at first. If you don’t have at least one motion, then you have no reference point for what synchronized fluid playing feels like, and that will hold you back in anything you’re trying to do because you won’t really know when you’ve got it and when you don’t.
I’m not really following what you mean by grinding up slowly. If you can already pick fast and it sounds good then you don’t have a picking motion problem. If you’re saying you have hand sync issues that’s fine, but I wouldn’t phrase this like you can’t play fast. If left hand and right hand are both fast, then you have no “speed” issues per se.
Learning hand synchronization, just like picking motion, is about trying lots of different tempos until you can learn to recognize what sync feels like. When a fretting pattern is unfamiliar to you, sometimes it can feel very different when played fast compared to slow. So hanging out at slower speeds isn’t helping you learn why the fast speed feels different and has errors. It is not a linear process where you move up slowly over time. It’s more like a cluster or scatter plot of accuracy that improves at all tempos gradually.
Can you pick fast with smoothness to where the motion feels easy and the attack sounds smooth? Then when you introduce left hand on a simple repeating phrase, can you do the same thing but with a little sloppyness if they’re not locked up? Why is there sloppyness, is the fretting wrong at the faster speed? Are notes missing? Can the video help tell you what is wrong at that speed?
Film that and let’s take a look.
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Here is a video
ok so, you say if i already can pick fast and smooth then i don’t have a picking motion problem. But i do, because my real goal is to play double escape blue grass, and my fast smooth picking motion is a single escape tiny stroke tremolo.
practicing yngwei chunks, i already have my tremolo up to 180bpm, and left hand sync is up to about 140 bpm (16th notes). That theoretically is fast enough to play bluegrass right? But no, because in bluegrass i need to change strings after up strokes and downstrokes and not be counting notes on strings when i improvise common bluegrass vocab,in bluegrass, i use a double escape… and THAT particular motion, even on one note, i can’t do paster than 110 bpm 16th notes.
So i am practicing my yngwei chunks, just to learn what it feels like to play fast, and to improve my had sync, but i still spend half my time playing bluegrass and that speed won’t budge because i can’t find a double escape motion.
Thanks for filming! The Gypsy style form looks pretty good and the attack sounds good too. Not only that, but your synchronization is actually pretty close. The landmark note seems reasonably tight. The problem is your coordination inside the phrase. You leave the ring finger down too long on note 4 of the pattern so sometimes you’re not playing note 5 at all. Watch this in slow motion and take a look.
Think like an engineer. Now that you know what the problem is, what tests can you devise to fix it? What other fingerings or phrases can you use to test to see if and when the problem goes away sometimes and what causes it? I can’t figure this all out for you, but you can - I know it!
No, you use stringhopping. You do not have an efficient double escape motion. There is almost no difference in feel between single escape and efficient double escape, and no feeling of speed limit either. If you feel a difference and a speed limit, then you’re doing it wrong. If you only had a single escape motion and just played a bluegrass tune all the way through completely ignoring any string changes that your brain tells you aren’t supposed to work, this approach would be actually closer in feel to what someone like Molly Tuttle does than what you’re doing here.
So… get any picking motion down, any one, I don’t care what it is. If you feel tension and speed limit, it’s wrong, don’t waste any more time with that approach. Think about what an amazing time saver that is. No more hours “grinding up slowly” as you say, because now you can automatically know when to not bother with that. Awesome.
Have you tried this motion yet? What does this look like when you do it?
Also, when you film test clips, just the playing is enough and no more than 30 seconds with no narration please. It doesn’t take more than that to see the issue and it just makes me hunt around to get past the talking.
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thanks Troy - i will shorten videos and elimnate narration going forward, sorry about that.
So 1) yes when i play bluegrass i am string hopping, i should say that i am TRYING to play a double escape motion, but failing. Althought to me the line between those two does seem to be a bit blurry.
- i have tried downstroke escape but my hand can’t seem to figure it out. Upstroke escape seems to be what I can do for the time being, so if the goal is to learn any motion, i’m going to stick with that one since I seem to be able to do it already, and can’t figure out the others.
My goal in doing all this and joining this site is to learn to play a double escape motion in bluegrass up to even just 130 bpm, hopefully 140. But since it currently seems physically impossible for me to figure out a double escape motion, I’m just going to try to nail upstroke escape first, and then maybe try double escape later.
As for the sync issues you pointed out, yes you nailed them and I am crafting drills to adress each of those weaknesses. But there’s one weakness that is even worse than any of the ones you pointed, and that is changing strings. I can’t seem to do that, even if i just mute the strings and forget about the left hand and try to play four notes on high E and four notes on B, switching off, i just can’t do that. So, i am crafting drills to work on that as well.
I guess i will keep working hard at building out my up-escape movement, and the sync that goes along with it. But I also am going to continue to try to figure out a double escape motion. I just don’t seem to feel that i’m physically capable of it, but maybe time will tell.
I personally don’t do double escape on a single note. I would have no way of knowing if I was really escaping or not, since the feel, again, doesn’t really feel like anything I can grab on to. The only way I know of is to work on phrases that require it.
But back up for a second. Your goal isn’t to learn a picking motion. Your goal is to be able to play tunes. If those tunes end up being a mix of different kinds of motions that you can’t feel, depending on the phrase, so what, who cares? It only matters that they sound awesome. That’s why I’m saying a lot of what you’re seeing in David’s tecnique you shouldn’t worry too much about because he can’t even tell he’s doing that. You can actually learn that kind of complex mix of motions while not really having to think about it if you just focus on smoothness and immediately throw away any motion that doesn’t have it.
The USX motion is a great tool and you can do cool ass Gypsy type stuff with that. You can play bluegrass with USX if you like. Tommy Emmanuel does a great job with that. He jams with Jake Workman and Molly while he maybe sounds more country shred or Gypsy than grass he still hangs. I have not heard a single word about him not being good enough to play with those guys. You can play any of Tommy’s lines with your technique here. Maybe give some of those a shot?
In the mean time if you want a more typical form for grass, you know that the arm position usually looks more like what you’re using in your stringhopping form. What happens when you use that form but just try to play fast on a single string, what does that look like? Forget about which motion type it is, just go fast. Can you do that?
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Yes, i can do that, but the pick doesn’t leave the plane of the strings, so doesn’t that mean it’s useless? Anyway, Here it is! I do it a few ways. One with fingers curled in liek Grier/tuttle. one with fingers resting on pickgard but not anchored, like Sutton. One with Pinky anchored loosely, like Miner. But all three are in the “arm position” that i believe to be more correct for bluegrass. The problem is that i can’t change strings with this motion! (sudden epiphany, i can’t change string with any motion anyway, so i’d rather practice this way if it’s better for bluegrass in the long run ) Anyway, thanks so much for interacting with me, this alone is worth the price of membership.
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My ymmv amateur assed assessment of those picking methods: Go with the 2nd resting but not anchored option as it appears to be the most fluid, relaxed and consistent of the four, plus it has the added benefit of sounding crisper and clearer with the pick attack.
- Edit I watched it again again (x4 now) and think the 2nd and 4th are currently your closest to what you’d want.
Thanks, i will, but the problem is the pick is not escaping the plane of the strings, so what’s the point? i understand the goal is just to find i way that you can play fast, and smooth, and whatever motion it is, it is,… but, shouldn’t i at least be making sure it’s a motion that allows the pick to leave the plane of the strings? This goes back to episode one of the cracking the code web series. If the motion is not leaving the plane of the strings, then regardless of how smooth and fast it is, it will never be usable, right?