HELP with picking resistance, knuckle dragging on strings when palm muting and upstroke escape motion

Playing Technique
#1

I’ve been working on my picking for 2 years now and I’m not seeming to get anywhere close to streamlining my technique. I use various different picking approaches for different situations which is detrimental to my playing. For palm mutes, I like to fan my fingers and almost do a downward escape motion but I press onto the bridge a lot to get the palm mute to sound right. That makes it IMPOSSIBLE to cross strings. For single note picking I prefer an upstroke escape motion with an almost closed wrist (fingers are pulled in). However, I have an issue with the picking resistance on the upstroke. It’s almost like I hook the string on the way back up. I think this is because I don’t tend to feel the string very much for reference. So I try to dig in/hook the string. To counter this I’ve tried multiple different picks including Dunlop sharp or Jazz picks with a sharper tip such as the Red Bear Lil Jazzer. But the sharper the tip the harder it is to play on the wound strings, especially palm mutes because the string resistance increases due to the sharp tip. I’ve been trying to unlearn my old way of palm muting by utilizing the same technique I use for single notes. However, I lose my anchor point when I don’t fan my fingers to palm mute. But in order to counter the string resistance when palm muting I try to close my wrist to get more momentum which results in my knuckles dragging on the strings. When I adjust the angle to get more clearance between the strings and my knuckles I don’t do an upstroke escape motion anymore. Do you see the dilemma? It’s so frustrating because it hinders me from learning the songs that my left hand could actually learn to play. My right hand is the weaker link here.

Summary:

1.) Like to palm mute with fanned fingers and a slight downward escape motion with a lot of pressure on the bridge to feel anchored which makes it hard to skip strings

2.) Prefer to use a closed wrist and upstroke escape motion for single notes but struggle with string resistance on the upstroke

3.) Palm muting with a closed wrist and upstroke escape motion in order to skip strings (even notes per string) results in extra noise due to my knuckles dragging on the strings

4.) String resistance on wound strings makes it hard to palm mute without pressing too much on the bridge and reverting back to a fanned finger approach for a sense of more “stability.”

Here are two videos of me trying to illustrate the issue. If you’d like a specific video to demonstrate something you want to analyze let me know and I’ll upload one.

#2

Wow, you have given incredible thought to all of this. I have some comments that might be interesting, but not necessarily correct.

I find that I need almost no pressure to get a palm mute that I like. Why do you have to press into the bridge? The flesh of your hand will start damping strings upon barely any contact.

I use a pointy pick exactly to try to get a very clear feeling for how deep the hit on the string is (I’ve surely forgotten the official CtC term for this), and I try to barely hit them. I also use a pick with a broad shoulder (the Dunlop Flow) rotated to hit with the edge, so even if it goes in deeper than I want, it will still have an easy crossing. I used to ignore the depth of impact, but now it has become something that I naturally pay attention to.

I don’t believe this from a physics standpoint. (But if it is real, then you might consider Elixir strings, as they put a teflon tube over the windings to keep them clean, so that might help.)

So in summary, I would question the physics things, (a) that you need significant pressure on the strings to mute, and (b) the point slows down over wound strings. Indeed, regarding (b), try the actual pick that I use (a 2.0mm Dunlop Flow), and you’ll see that the point is pretty good for determining depth, but so smooth that it just cannot in any practical way be influenced by the windings that it comes across.

Also I’m sure that people with a much better eye than me will comment here shortly.

(Final note: I randomly picked a 2.0mm Flow and stuck with it, and didn’t anticipate the benefits of broad shoulders and the rounded point when I first started with it. I’ll bet that each pick has an advantage.)

KEEP IT UP! :grinning:

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#3

Thanks for the response. Yes I’ve been really thinking about this.

I apply pressure on the bridge because without I feel instability. If I only lightly touch the string with my palm I don’t have an anchor point and thus use too much of the tip of my pick.

I also don’t believe that it should be harder on the wound strings. But the reason it is, is because my hand has less of an anchor point as opposed to when playing on the plain strings (which allows me to rest my hand on the wound strings which gives me stability)

I do have the flow pick as well. I pretty much have most types of picks. I like how easy it is but I do feel the sound gets to bassy and it’s hard to tell how much pick I’m using. For reference, I used to play the Dunlop sharp 1.5 mm for a long time. I really need a sharp tip but it’s hard to handle such picks especially for rhythm playing.

#4

Kinda late here so quick response. I’m similar to you and have a “fanned” finger setup for rhythm playing, and a pretty closed fist for leads. I just switch between the two as necessary, which works for me. I personally have not been able to get my “rhythm” setup to play my hardest possible lead lines, but I don’t mind. Likewise, my “lead” setup can’t play my hardest palm muting parts.

I’ll maybe test this tomorrow, but my gut response is that you need to “lift off” your palm muting slightly to switch strings.

I would experiment with more positive pick point to minimize string resistance on the upstroke.

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#5

What happens to your picking when you tremolo on one string in the 170-180bpm 16th note range for 30secs? :slight_smile:

To me it looks like your motion is flipping back and forth between forearm-wrist and wrist. You tend to start with more forearm and perhaps tense up a bit more as you go faster and use only your wrist. This would indicate to mean that you haven’t learnt a motion capable of the speeds you are trying to play.

This would be another sign of not having learnt an efficient motion!

I’d suggest using 170-180bpm 16th notes as your starting point and see if you can work out a way to create a motion that can comfortably sustain this speed for at least 30 seconds at a time. Ditch speed bursts for now and worry about muting later as it can be applied a lot more easily once you’ve learnt an efficient motion :grinning:

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#6

What do you mean by positive pick point?

Yes, I do feel that as well. I used to pick away from the body using my whole arm. The issue with that was that I couldn’t accurately move from sting to string without getting stuck on a string when playing even notes per string. That’s because I like to start with a down stroke

I can’t efficiently. Tremolo picking has been a major challenge for me. I feel drawn to a gypsy style technique but I’m not very accurate with it. Another motion I often use is a mixture of form arm and wrist. Kind of like I wiggle my wrist by moving my forearm. But it’s not very accurate either. Sometimes when I have a good day I use a movement similar to Chris Brooks’ which is a combination of forearm rotation and wrist supination. But I can’t skip strings either way. I’m too anchored. I feel like I need to loosen up but without anchoring very firmly the distance from the top of the pick to the string varies. So in other words, I might miss one time or pick too deep another. It’s really awful. I’ll try it when I get home later and post a video.

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#7

Here’s some pictures I made a while ago:

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#8

I have tried that in the past. It does make it easier on the upstroke but gives me the sensation of less control on the downstroke because it slices through the string too quickly. I need that reference point that I hit the string. If I don’t feel that resistance on the downstroke I tend to want to dig in more which worsens the resistance on the upstroke. I’ll try it again when I get home!

#9

Here’s the video:
16th notes @170bpm

I cannot hold up for even 5-10 seconds. I tried adjusting my grip and angle. The upstroke is definitely the harder one. It feels very tense. I don’t feel the string being hit the right way. In other words, the pick attack isn’t good. I dig too deep and on the way up I hook the string. But if I try to back off I start hovering over the string instead of hitting it with the pick. There have been times when my tremolo was a bit better on a single string but as soon as I try to skip strings it falls apart.

#10

I use to be exactly the same!

Can’t see the video at the moment but my advice would probably be the same. Keep working in this speed range and changing and experimenting with different hand positions.

The contradiction of learning an efficient motion is you have to do something totally new and correct from the get-go. That is sort of the trick of getting it to work, you need to start in these high speeds until you find something that works comfortably and smoothly, starting any slower means your chances of doing something that works at higher speeds are very low.

Remember, it’s only hard because you can’t do it at the moment! Learn to move your hand slightly differently and suddenly it’s easy, your goal is just to work out how. Hope that makes sense :grinning:

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#11

I can’t see the video my man - I can only go by what you described. I can’t pick to save my life, so take this with a grain of salt.

Perhaps get rid of the hand “look”, get rid of the mute, try a different pick grip and only focus on super fast 16ths on 1 string - once you have THAT nailed, add the other aspects in afterwards ie mute.

For me personally, background tension is the enemy. I can do a lot when I am not having to deal with that so I’d personally start by getting tackling that; tension is an indicator… In sports of you’re tense you lose/get hurt if the balance isn’t dialled in (Of course some tension is welcome and necessary) from bowling to horseback riding to golf to judo. Music is no different, and guitar is a physical activity that requires a lot of coordination. Perhaps the CTC guys can help a bit? @Tom_Gilroy sure helped me a bunch!

Okay, good luck man I hope that helps a little!

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#12

Yeah same here @cwk84. Something happened because I watched the first one yesterday now I can’t see anything. I remember even though you slowed down (a little) you had a nice even motion around 1:20 or 1:30. I’m sure you could get mileage out of that one. Otherwise, good advice from @Jacklr and @Scottulus.

Ha! Whatever :slight_smile:

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#13

I just realized that the videos aren’t showing. Let’s try YouTube:

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#14

Cool video man! Great playing, you aren’t slow or anything - sounds pretty good!

I am no expert, and I could be completely off base but I’ll tell you what I think I see and offer it - if nothing else it’s something that can be eliminated;

Looks to me like everything is going good when you start, but your hand is ever so slowly pronating and then just before you “fatigue out” you are kind of resetting back to your starting supinated position so I am thinking that perhaps the fatigue is possibly from resisting the way your setup is kind of moving towards which equals tension. Maybe see if you can recreate that pronation where you fatigue and have to tap out, and start from there.

Good luck man! PS cool guitar, and great sound!

#15

Are you attempting to play with “just the very tip of the pick” by any chance?

#16

I did try to adjust my wrist position consciously to see where the sweet spot is. But I do feel more confident with a more pronated position because I tend to want to use my whole arm. That changes my escape stroke which makes it hard to skip strings since I like starting on a down stroke.

I’m trying to. That’s the tough part, though. I want to feel more of the pick hitting the string but that makes it harder to slice through the string. It also feels like I sort of have to hover over the bridge instead of anchoring to be able to only hit the string with the very tip of the pick.

#17

My suggestion (keep in mind I’m no big honcho here) is to whack the string a little deeper, but play with angles until it feels right!

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