Mateus Asato Fast Pentatonic runs

Playing Technique
#1

Greetings guitar friends,

I’m having trouble trying to differentiate the picking technique Mateus is using (0:09) also throughout the video where he’s doing the fast runs in general. I’ve studied the Eric Johnson Pickslanting (DPS UPS )technique a few years back following the course (Which changed my playing completely thank you!) but Im stuck on how mateus’s motion is different to how eric would do it? I could be completely wrong here but if theres anyone that could explain to me essentially what Mateus is really doing that would be amazing. Thanks guys.

1 Like
#2

From a glance it doesn’t seem like there’s anything much different from the way EJ would do those sorts of runs. It looks like his right hand is less “slouched” than Eric’s but that could be explained away by some of the very fast sweep fills he does where the hand has to tilt upwards on the descending portions.

This track is around 115 BPM and Eric tends to play many fast lines around 170 BPM which is the 16th note equivalent. I wouldn’t get too wrapped up in the way Mateus’ hand looks.

Could also be the wider shot which tends to put more of an emphasis on elbow movement of the picking hand. I suspect if the camera went up close and did more of a Michael Angelo Batio “Speed Kills” picking hand angle you’d see more of a DWPS slouch and an accompanying rotational movement.

2 Likes
#3

Appreciate you taking the time to reply. Sounds like I’m just overthinking it but this is very helpful. If anyone has anything else to say on the topic or about Asato’s playing in general feel free to comment. Thank you @guitarenthusiast

1 Like
#4

I found this video and when I look at his pentatonic playing it looks to me to be a wrist technique with a small amount of forearm to put him into position when he plays the descending scale and a wrist technique which is moved more into position by the forearm on the ascending scale.

1 Like