How would you expert pickers attack this (pun intended)? I’ve tried for years to alternate pick, but it just seems too difficult. He plays this incredibly at about 150bpm. After years of practice I can’t seem to get past 120. I guess he did some economy picking in here, but it’s just SOO clean. Any thoughts as to how to pick this? I’ve attached the soundslice with video link
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This really is a pickle! 
I haven’t been able to figure it out, but I found out a few things in the process.
This video
and this one
show us that Johnny is primarily a Django style forearm/wrist USX player. He seems to favour sweeping when ascending and an even number of notes per string when descending. (Even though he expresses the sentiment that sweeping, in his words “glissing”, is rhytmically inferior – like taking two steps with the left foot…) Sometimes he plays arpeggios sweeping in one direction and alternate picking (double escape?) on the way back. But none of the stuff in the videos is anywhere near as fast as on the recording!
So how does he do it? At one point I was convinced he had tuned down the high e a whole step to d, but that seems highly unlikely. There is some consensus online that he sometimes used a drop D tuning, but that’s not the same thing…
The only clue I can hear on the recording is that the second and third notes sound like they’re being held down at the same time and swept (because of a slight rushing of the timing). It could be a false clue though.
Interestingly, he uses the same pattern in Lover Man, around 1:40, but slower.
Well, I guess that wasn’t much help but I found it very fun to try and understand how it was done! He really does play it insanely fast and very cleanly. I mean, the right hand is one thing, but it is no easy task for the left hand either – fast position shifting and fingering.
I really should be sleeping by now but I simply couldn’t resist this puzzle… I had to pick it apart (yes yes, give it a rest already 
).
This is how I think it’s done:
Cheers and goodnight!
Came here to say all this! I think @Johannes has it right — a lot of Johnny’s fast stuff where we have video of it, appears to be upstroke escape, aka “downward pickslanting”. So the trick is you want either two or four notes per string. So no descending three note per string scales, for example. Instead, you go for four notes per string with sliding / position shifts. Either that, or pulloffs.
If you can find any video of this, that will confirm. That’s always the best way to go, but a lot of the bop pioneers like Johnny, Tal Farlow, and Jimmy Raney, there’s not as much footage.
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Wow, thank you both so much. I do understand the concept of the upstroke escape and how it relates to notes-per-string arrangements. I guess in the end, my flaw with this passage was that I was just too tied to the shape I had on the fretboard. Now to get to work 
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Wow - what a cool lick by Johnny Smith and great transcription by Johannes! I would add one adjustment to Johannes’s transcription - I think Johnny plays this whole lick on the E and B strings. This is a half-whole diminished lick (octatonic scale) so it is basically moving down in minor thirds. Because the half-whole diminished scale is symmetric, you can take any phrase in the scale and move it in minor thirds or tritones - IMO, the lick is easier to play on the two strings without changing strings…
I’d have to agree with you here. Check this out - this is SO “extra”, but if you listen to the video at 25% speed you can here the most minute changes in pitch as Johnny slides from one position to another, and they match up with how you would expect him to be changing positions via geoffk’s interpretation of the lick.
There is a slightly noticeable fall in pitch (sliding over the fretwire) heard in both the F#'s of the first full measure. The same goes for the two D#'s heard in the following measure. Additionally, you can hear the slightest rise in pitch that matches up with the C in this measure, as Johnny moves higher on the fretboard. In the following measure you can also hear the C and A notes on the 1st string “falling” as Johnny slides to a lower position.
Thank you all for your help with this. I’m embarrassed to admit this lick has plagued me for 10 years! With each of you giving me valuable input I feel confident practicing this the RIGHT way for another 10!!
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