Analyzed my 25+ years of picking and for the vast majority of stuff I play, I am crosspicking. The only place I get tripped up is the really fast stuff, but I have managed to do that by using sixes that don’t require a change in pick slant.
Crosspicking doesn’t care if there are different numbers of notes per string, even single notes.
Crosspicking doesn’t care if the rhytym changes, because your hand/wrist is not locked into hyper speed. You can inject swing or other changes.
Crosspicking can be used to play everything up to about 70% speed.
If I am to understand CTC pickslanting primer, many people use predominantly downslant or upslant, and in order to play the majority of stuff, they “hop” upwards when their pick would otherwise get trapped between strings. Is that really how other people play?
It seems that there are two basic choices:
-
Use primarily upslant or downslant and:
a) Adhere to the “five rules” (or)
b) Learn to change pickslant when required -
Use crosspicking for everything up to 75%. For speeds above 75%, use primary upslant or downslant and:
a) Only play speed runs that don’t require change in pick slant (or)
b) Learn 2w pickslanting for these fastest shred runs
It seems like there are two fundamentally different ways to approach pickslanting. Either it is something that you NEED in order to play everything (if your pick is primarily slanted), or its only something you need for shred licks if you have good crosspicking.
If this is true, it might be possible to make a case for one approach or the other. For instance, I could see someone having serious problems learning the Martin Miller licks and playstyle for improvising over CAGED, if they primarily have a pickslant (the phrases are dissimilar enough that you really need crosspicking.)