For those who are not familiar, there is a great player on here called João Matheus. He’s got that old school PG type aggression and cleanliness but is also an amazing DBX player with formidable chops across the board.
Below is a cool video from his YT channel
His Instagram is below, give him a follow!
I CONSTANTLY stalk his video page here too 
I’ll use some strong language (I hope to not start a war, these opinions are my own, I respect disagreements)
Technically (purely talking picking technique) he is in an elite group of people occupied by Paul Gilbert and (gasp) Rick Graham and (double gasp), Anton Oparin.
Everyone should make sure they’re logged in on the platform site and watch these beautiful clips
https://troygrady.com/users/Joao667/video/
Thanks for sharing that I had no idea these were on the site!
I agree, he’s in a very elite category that very few reach! Amazing player
Thank you very much!
Holy cow! Dude is awesome!
@Joao667 great playing! What I notice (or let’s say it least it looks to me) with players like you or Anton Oparin is that even at high speeds there seems very little tension in the forearm let alone elbow movement. Do you feel any tension there and related to that: did you focus on not engaging your elbow in any way when working up to those speeds or did that just come naturally?
Excellent question. I have my own thoughts here, but I really want to hear what Joao has to say.
Just a general FYI, Joao has been working with us on the instructor team for almost a year now. If you have taken a with us over the last year, then you probably already know this. If not, now you do! We’re still working on getting his filming environment set up, but it’s looking good, so you’ll see more of his incredible playing in upcoming lessons. And of course, in Technique Critiques when you open them on the platform.
Thank you!
I focus only on my wrist motion (RTD). But I also use a lot of 2wps so the forearm is always doing something.
And yes, I always practiced with the intention of not moving my elbow at all, even at fast speeds.
But initially this happened because I didn’t see my idols using their elbow, but rather their wrist, like Paul Gilbert and Kiko Loureiro. So I wanted to follow that path.
So would it be true to say that your practice was focused on precision, and that your motion was built over time rather than discovered through trial and error?
To be honest, after 3 years of playing guitar I still didn’t have a very fast wrist motion. But that’s because I was doing some random things that didn’t help me much. The principles of a good wrist motion are to have at least good reference points, such as the bridge of the guitar, pisiform bone, and also the anchorage of the forearm. Once you have everything supported, just move your wrist. There is no “secret”! The wrist alone is capable of making any string change. Molly Tuttle, Andy Wood, Paul Gilbert are examples of this. But to answer more directly, I needed to do a lot of experimenting and making a lot of mistakes to get a precise technique.
Good to hear, it’s what I’ve been trying over the last couple weeks. I’ve always tried to work on my wrist movement but now I actually did it with filming myself which has been a huge help because before I thought my elbow wasn’t moving when in fact looking at myself in the video (or in the mirror) it actually was. Focusing on that really helped in my case I think and now I get more and more comfortable also in higher speeds. I also tried to copy a bit what Kevin Heiderich is doing because to me he’s one of the top tier wrist pickers currently out there.