No chance to get Yngwie 
But I have always thought that if there is a player who would be open to being interviewed it would be Paul Gilbert.
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@GraehmeFloyd the closest thing to Yngwie that we’ll see is probably the Joe Stump interview. Although I only saw a 30 second clip many years ago, it seems to me that his technique is very much influenced by Yngwie, including his phrasing and note selection.
Check out this solo of Martin Miller playing a freakishly accurate version. You might get some ideas from another master:
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I definitely believe so myself. Petrucci has a indeed a huge following guitar fans who are trying to better their technique! And waht Troy is doing can help them a ton!
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How I imagine this meeting 
:
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As @Troy said, all our questions will be answered with cameras, so let’s wish for an upcoming John Petrucci interview 
Until then all we can do is speculate by watching his videos. By doing just that and having just finished pickslanting primer, I will try to create his profile here with the terms Troy uses. Please feel free to add anything I’ve missed or correct me by providing footage that supports your argument. I will only discuss about technique, since that’s the main goal of the site. I am leaving musicality, creativity, composition, harmony etc. out of the equation.
JOHN PETRUCCI - TECHNIQUE
MAIN PHILOSOPHY:
Use strictly alternate picking whenever possible 
. Use legato only when you can’t play the lick at wanted speed or when you want the lick to have the fluid sound of legato (apparently). Don’t use sweep picking (economy picking) for scalar licks but only for arpeggiated one note per string super fast licks that cannot be played with alternate picking 
. Be accurate, efficient and articulate when playing, without hitting unwanted strings (when playing fast). Practice a lot and regularly using a metronome (metronome increase step: 8 BPM). Practice guitar like practicing lifting weights at the gym. Always warm up before playing so as not to hurt yourself. Remember to pay the monthly subscription fee for “Cracking the Code” to learn as much as possible and to help Troy Grady spread the “good word” about guitar technique hehe
PICKS:
Jazz III from Ultrex by Dunlop - 1.5mm
STRINGS:
Ernie Ball (nickel would)
Gauge: 10 13 17 26 36 46 (6-string guitars), 10 13 17 26 36 46 56 (7-string guitars)
In the past he was using Regular Slinkys and RPS (Reinforced plain strings) Slinkys, but now days he is using PARADIGM Slinkys
STRING TRACKING
- From shoulder using slide motion
ANCHORING:
- Forearm (below ulnar bone): on the guitar’s wooden body
- Palm (extension of pinky finger): On the bridge saddle
- Pinky: On the lower end of bridge pick up (reference point)
- Although he is touching at all those points his anchoring is not static. As I’ve mentioned above, he is actually moving using a slide motion from shoulder to track strings
- When playing fast he tends to hold the guitar higher than usual (above waist). To do that during lives he puts one of his feet on a boogie in front of him
RIGHT-HAND POSITIONING:
- Elbow position: flexed
- Wrist position: not deviated, very little supinated, very little extended
EDGE PICKING:
- Uses leading edge picking
- Holding pick between thumb and index finger. Thumb is mainly straight (will get back on that). Pick rests on the side of the index finger. Pick is sticking out of the fingers only little (just the point of the pick)
- Pinky/Ring/Middle fingers are open/loose
PICKING MOTION MECHANICS:
- Mainly from the wrist: radial-ulnar deviation (from the videos I couldn’t detect any forearm rotation movement or extension-flexion movement in fast picking)
- He categorically says that he is not a fan of elbow movement when picking. I think it has to do with the lack of control, maybe because the motion is far from the pick. Indeed, I couldn’t detect any elbow movement in his fast picking, but that remains to be seen after closer inspection
STRING SWITCHING:
He also noticed that he uses thumb movement, not deliberately, when picking fast! (Thumb changing from straight to angled and back). He specifically says: “Bad thumb”, which I take as the thumb is moving on its own will. I couldn’t detect this movement when he is playing slow but it’s visible in many cases when playing fast. My speculation is that he does it unconsciously when changing strings to surpass the problem of being trapped (locked) between strings. I think he developed it with a lot of practice without even realizing it
Judging from the pick angle in videos, and that he plays a lot of licks with even number of notes per string starting with downstroke, I would say he is a DWPS but I can’t tell for sure. In that case, he maybe uses his thumb to change to UWPS thus actually using TWPS or simply to jump strings
In arpeggios and in slow licks he seems to be using cross picking
Lastly, we don’t know if he is actually swiping or not (as Troy and other users discussed this propability). We have to wait for slow motion to be sure for that because it’s almost impossible to hear
I hope this helps. That’s all from me for now
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Excellent analysis, I agree 95%
I would add a few comments
- recently he seems to use the elbow a bit more (but I may be wrong)
- in a recent YouTube interview with ‘the captain’ he mentioned that when he plays fast live he doesn’t worry too much aboit hitting unwanted strings… however we can not hear them!
…this leads me to think that he has excellent muting technique and he is somehow aware of using swiping (at least occasionally). Based on the clips above, I think this happens in ascending outside changes.
PS: sorry about being a broken record with my swiping obsession hehe
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in a recent YouTube interview with ‘the captain’ he mentioned that when he plays fast live he doesn’t worry too much aboit hitting unwanted strings… however we can not hear them!
I ve just seen the interview with the captain. What I got from it is that, he hits other strings ONLY when trying to play a screaming bending, NOT when he is playing fast. So I have to disagree with you on that. In case the below is not the part you are talking about, please post again. Thanks!
Here it is (forward to 1:34:30 and watch until 1:37:00):
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I have updated the post adding the possibility of swiping (hitting unwanted strings) in the end. It remains to be seen with a slow motion camera
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Hehe thanks for giving space to my obsession! But I must agree with you on that interview, he was only referring to screaming bends. Indeed it would be great to put the man himself under the microscope
I am now practicing the erotomania lick with dwps swiping and it works quite well (except that I need to get used to the primary dwps setup, which is still a bit awkward for me). Perhaps this is not the way JP plays it, but it certainly makes the lick easier for us mortals (the speed feels quite insane for full on TWPS acrobatics)
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IIRC you’re already a quite fast and tight UWPS guy. Why not just use UWPS swiping? Might be a little trickier on the left hand, but I suspect it’s doable, and would probably be more comfortable for you.
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Thanks for the compliment! Indeed I have been mostly uwps so far, but I have discovered that dwps with forearm rotation can in principle allow me more speed and especially relaxation. Also, the primary uwps setup makes ascending scales a bit tricky and hit/miss.
I have not found a fingering for the erotomania lick that does not require at least a few dwps rotations, which can be hard to do at these speeds! But you are right that with some clever reorganisation of the fretting hand it may be possible to go full uwps.
The high symmetry of the JP fingering is hard to resist though
@tommo
with chunks of 5 notes per string I find it to be one of the best exercises for TWPS. You could try that as well
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Just warming up before the show 
https://www.facebook.com/johnpetrucciFB/videos/1383452105040131/
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I haven’t looked at Petrucci’s technique in a long time and was stunned what a huge amount of elbow movement he uses in the high speed stuff. I was aware that it can be done that way, but didn’t realize that’s how he does it.
And in this kind of close-mic’d video, even the unamplified sound of the attack is almost a giveaway of how much elbow he uses, because you can hear how forcefully the pick is powering through the string. You can tell he’s either using little or no “edge picking”, a deep pickstroke, or both. In my experience, a very forceful elbow mechanic is the only way to execute that kind of attack with this sort of sound at high speed. Even big forearm rotation with a deep pickstroke doesn’t seem to produce a sound like this, and everything I’ve seen or tried with wrist-only mechanics seems to require a much shallower or more “edge-picked” pickstroke at high speed than we’re hearing here.
Edit: Looking at the clip again, he does seem to be using a significant amoung of leading edge picking, but the sound at, for example, the 35 second mark makes it clear that he has a lot of pick on the string, and the use of elbow in the motion is pretty unmistakeable.
Note that this doesn’t mean he always uses elbow. In the Anderton’s interview posted above, there is lots of rhythm playing and “less crazy fast” lead playing where he sometimes uses forearm rotation, and sometimes uses wrist movement (and sometimes forearm rotation and wrist movement together). But the Facebook video above clearly shows that there is some stuff where he plays certain fast alternate picked things with what looks to be UWPS or 2WPS driven mainly from elbow flexion/extention.
The older video below shows this as well, with the lick starting at 7m20s. Notice how when he demonstrates slowly, it’s wrist only, but when he goes fast, you can see the telltale reciprocating movement of the forearm that shows his elbow is working:
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I have updated my long post about his technique with your views as well. thx for the input.
First clip, can’t see anything. Second clip is very clearly majority wrist movement. Accuracy is way off on these takes though, so I would take anything you see here with a grain of salt. Rock Discipline John was all wrist, and accuracy was high.
only DWPS with swiping is starting to work quite good for me as well for that erotomania particular lick. I use swipe for outside picking from low string to high string.
Hehe that’s funny, I am now trying with TWPS instead as you suggested
No matter what method I use I am still finding it difficult to play the 4-string jumps at that speed.