Yep. One is just a consequence of another.
@tommo, been working on the etude; thanks again. I’m playing it faster than I could have with hopping, but not up to the tempo you play it in the video (more like a bit over half that speed). I’d say I’m doing a 2BX thing at this point, rather than a more trapped motion (the latter being my goal for this etude).
I feel like that’s okay, maybe even necessary. Agree?
I say you are probably still practicing string hopping.
At half the speed of tommos etude, that risk is very high.
Even if it aint so, that tempo is to slow to be a Benchmark for an efficient picking motion.
The sixteenth sextuplets at 108 bpm (original tempo), starting in bar 14, that is the goal. To fast for string hopping, but not superfast. The ones that @tommo just casually shreds down, in front of his washing machine. 
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That’s exactly the idea 
These fast runs are designed to work perfectly with the USX motion that @Yaakov has demonstrated a few posts ago.
I forgot to mention that there is one passage in the main riff that requires a downstroke change, albeit at a slow enough tempo. This can be done with swiping, double escape or even hybrid picking, whatever feels easiest. I am pretty sure I swiped that most of the time. This is the part I’m referring to:
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Again about this, because you expressed an opinion about this at the very start of this thread, that you still seem to carry with you, despite all the contrary responses it got. If you could really do 2BX (DBX?) the runs of tommos etude at at least 90-100 bpm shouldn’t give you problems. At the speed you are talking (about~60ish bpm?), I would just call any double escape string hopping, because it just might as well be.
You may be right. I need to see it to know. That’s why I 'd love to know how to get my down-the-strings camera view onto the computer screen, instead of just checking intermittently. But one way or the other, you’re right, I gotta check… as soon as the wife can part with her iPhone:)
You could also just play fast. There is no way to practice the correct motion at a slow speed, and then speed it up.
So filming yourself playing that slow (60 bpm 16th triplets) and checking it would be entirely useless. Even if it looked right, it wouldn’t get you anywhere.
The only way for you to be sure you are doing an efficient picking motion, is to play fast. At least 100 bpm for 16th triplets, or 150 bpm for 16th.
I think this vid would help you a lot:
I’ve seen this. It’s a very interesting point, about slow not leading to fast. The mechanics change, so right, you can’t expect slow mechanics to ultimately yield fast playing. Philip Johnston, a pianist, calls it ‘largo-only fingerings.’
Playing Tommo’s etude fast is such a train wreck for me, though. A real mess. It’s a catch-22 - you gotta do this technique fast, but you can’t do fast without the technique.
This is basically what I’ve been trying to figure out in my Great Guitarist/Never Practiced thread. But I’m struggling to articulate the question properly.
There is no catch-22. You’re just starting with phrases that’s aren’t simple enough for your current stage of “fast picking” development (or more likely, coordination between the two hands when you pick fast).
Get your fast picking and two-hand coordination figured out with simpler things, Then after you have a foundational sense of what a fast and smooth movement looks and feels like for you on simpler phrases, you can try to increase the complexity of phrases you apply it to. That’s why there is so much repetition on this forum about “single note tremolo” and “repetition of a 6 note pattern on a single string”. Until you get your “fast picking” working on those two things, there’s very little likelihood it will work on things that are more complex. By all means, attempt things that are more complex. But if they don’t work right away, the solution is to reduce the complexity, gain competence playing fast at the lower complexity, then revisit the higher complexity stuff.
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Yeah, @Frylock put it really well. Use a really simple thing on one string to get things going. And make sure it is fast enough so you will use your USX tremolo motion like in the vid.
I hear. That does sound like a better starting point than the whole etude. Okay, I’m on that. Thanks:)
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Trying to work out the tempo for the Yngwie exercise. A bit tough with sixes; is it about 180bpm?
(Don’t worry - I’m not starting there! But I’d like to shoot for your recorded version, as a goal)
I think it was 6 notes per beat at about 120bpm. But I realised recently it may not be the most comfy exercise for the fretting hand, due to the many 3-4 combinations!
Thanks:) (tough for me to hear sixes for some reason)
You could try to replace all 4-1-3-4-3-1 with
3-1-2-3-2-1 fingerings, courtesy of @Tom_Gilroy
But maybe it would be best to just try a very simple repeating scale chunk as @tommo suggests, like
1-2-4-1-2-4 etc.
And start at least with 100bpm for sixes
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@tommo, I’m still working at the Yngwie sixes etude. Chunking is a topic that interests me a lot, and it’s applicable with this etude big time. How would you (or others) suggest to apply chunking here? (As specifically as you can, please)
Hey @Yaakov! For the sixes I would work at 6 notes per beat (the most natural subdivision of the pattern), and place a deliberately louder accent on each beat.
In your case the fast motion is USX, so you can start on a downstroke (so all the string changes will work) and all the accents will also be on downstrokes.
Again I wouldn’t go too slowly, try to go at a speed where your “new fast motion” kicks in, but slow enough that you can start working on being clean.
Thanks, @tommo. Appreciate your feedback as always.
Now I’m not trying to be obstinate, but… While I do hear loud and clear the logic behind starting with some speed rather than starting very slow and speeding up incrementally (that seems to be widely considered ‘best practice’ around here), however…
You saw my vids. I’m a big hopper w/no real ability to play fast (save on one string). So I pieced together from other threads that I might work on each hand in isolation.
Okay, so isolate, fine. So what? I’ll illustrate, and you’ll see the problem.
I’m using high volume so I can hear my fretting hand basically hammering-on, and doing so slowly enough that it’s accurate. I can only do those 1-3-4 and 1-2-4 patterns you wrote for the Yngwie thing at around 65 (six notes per beat) if I want them to be accurate. The recorded speed is nearly double that, I know. But I just can’t do it any faster right now, if the actual notes mean anything.
With the right hand (again, I think I sort of culled this from other threads here) I kill the volume and play on open strings, doing all the correct changes. Just sticking to the ascending half of the etude for now. That’s only at 74 if, again, I want to play what you wrote and not some gobblydigook version of it.
So like this, I wanted to build speed, and then put the two hands together at a point.
And what if I don’t isolate? My fretting fingers get super tense and my right hand loses the pick slant entirely. What am I practicing, then? Do-it-wrong-until-it-becomes-right just seems completely counter-intuitive to me.
But… I can already hear in my mind everyone shouting, no, no! Too slow!! You’ll never get out of a rocking chair doing that!
[BTW, this is why I made such a thing over ‘teenage noodlers’ in my Great Guitarist/Never Practiced thread. I just cannot picture a future-competent guitarist sitting there in his bedroom - playing like $#%&! - going ‘yeah man, this rocks!’ That only works with a tennis racket and loads of imagination, not an actual guitar.]
In short: because of this insistence on speed, I am thoroughly confused.
[though somehow I feel that my public humiliation might someday help other frustrated guitarists. that’s somewhat comforting;)]
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Hey @Yaakov! No problem I understand your doubts, but I can tell you you already made big progress by finding a good tremolo.
Now of course we have a few things to work on, like timing, hand sync and string-switching. Maybe it’s too much to tackle them all at once.
For example, you could start working on timing and hand sync on a single string. I think my very first lick of that type, when I was a kid, was the single string run in the Highway Star solo. You can do that one, or the Yngwie 6s, or anything else you like really.
I wouldn’t start below 140-150bpm 16th notes ( or 100ish for the 6s). Just give it a shot and let us see / hear what happens
PS: have you seen this before? Worth a watch:
