This is amazing to me, Julian never seizes to amaze me.
I never understood his right hand technique. I think I use rotation in the fore arm as my main picking motion but if you look at Julian right wrist: it is completely flat, and it seems like it is a combination of the wrist moving from side to side (what is this called in Troys terms?) and that he is crosspicking using his thumb and index finger. Also the picking pattern (down down up) is interesting. I practiced this alot but I can’t get it up to a speed near Julians. His playing is so dynamic as well. Would give my right arm to see a close up slow motion video of his right hand technique…
Do you have any comments/analysis of his technique?
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In this clip he seems to be using similar patterns of three, with down down up picking. What puzzles me is in your vid he seems to be using the same pattern but skipping strings between downs, which makes DWPS seem trickier. In Troy’s vid on Eric Johnson fives, he goes over how to do this using a rest-stroke, and given Julian’s roots, maybe there’s something to that? I think crosspicking is part of the equation too…
Great stuff, what a beautiful player!
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I agree - rest strokes and crosspicking is probably part of the equation. But pickslanting? Perhaps at high speeds? Although he is not a shredding metal kind of guy - but he definately can pick fast runs and do incredible things with hybrid picking. What I do not understand is exactly how the equation is between wrist movement from side to side and what motion he uses when crosspicking. Is it from the index finger inner joint og from the wrist?
Does anyone have any advice on how to play this faster? It seems like my speed limit is pretty much half speed of what Julian is playing…
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I would wager cross picking is a big part of the equation. The down down up stuff is nice, ‘sweep’ for the first two, probably a ‘crosspicking stroke’ (curved) to get out of the second note and over the string to prepare for the third stroke, then could even be downslanted on that upstroke to pop back on over to the original. I’m ok with this pattern…what I find most difficult with this etude is that it does not JUST do that pattern.
Unfortunately I don’t have a much more helpful analysis beyond that, however, the opening bits of that etude is much more playable for me personally by using my m or a finger to grab the high notes. With that technique I can do it in tempo without much trouble.
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