Should pentatonic (two note per string) and diatonic (three note per string) feel the same to play? When I try to play fast two note per string stuff I run out of stamina a lot faster and feel more tension most of the time. Is this due to not having my motion mechanic down yet? If so that is ok since I’m still working on it, but I was just wondering if others feel this difference too or if it is just how it is.
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I would say that yes, both feel very different. The more often you change strings the more difficult it gets with strict alternate picking. Even if 2nps lines are “mechanically” easy if you’re using downward pickslanting, it still requires you to change string pretty often and from my experience I would say that it’s physically more demanding compare to a 4nps or 6nps line.
On the other end, with 3nps lines, due to the change in pick slant I chunk it down to a 2 strings line. For those types of lines, it’s not as tiring as 2nps lines but it is more than 4/6nps lines. Also, to me scale runs and twps lines feel much smoother and the string change is less noticeable on my end compare to pure dwps lines.
I can play scale runs at about 180 bpm (16th) but for 2nps my actual speed is a bit lower and feels more out of control (around 160bpm in 16th) and I can’t play really long run in that case. Another thing to be careful about is the fretting hand, 2nps lines are pretty diffucult for me compare to 3nps lines when it come to the fretting side, which is one of the reasons why I’m slower on pure 2nps playing.
Also it would be great if you were able to post some videos so that we can see what types of movement you use in both cases, it might just be that you need to practice on speed if you already have the correct movement.
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In 2nps lines I still feel quite a lot the difference between inside/outisde picking, and in this case outside picking feels easier, as I feel like the momentum of my pickstrokes helps with the rapid string tracking.
E.g., to me it feels much easier to ascend a standard pentatonic box with uwps (starting on upstroke), and descend it with dwps (starting with down). Maybe you can give a shot to these options as well?
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I feel the same way. Descending 2nps I start dwps and then seem to end up in uwps by the time I track to the bass strings. I notice when I dig in a little, and try and play 2nps lines - they are a little better- the opposite of what I would have thought. Give it a try
I think most people are slower at two note per string stuff because of the rapid string changes. I can play a standard descending/ascending fours pattern (Zakk Wylde type thing) at 210-220 on a good day, but only for one or two repetitions. 220 I don’t think will ever be usable for that sort of thing. It’s just too fast. 210 though I’d like to get where I can actually play it. Maybe push it a little higher. I need to build up stamina first. As for videos I have posted some in the technique critique section. I am making improvements, but like I said my stamina needs to get better. If you want to watch them and give feedback it would be much appreciated.
I pretty much use only DWPS. And not an extreme amount of it. Just enough I think. I need to start watching myself in a mirror probably. When I play the Paul Gilbert lick or an ascending sixes type thing it feels like a bit of a rolling motion to get to the next string which I think indicates some degree of TWPS. For pentatonic stuff though it requires (I think) a one way pickslanting approach and I that may be the issue. If I’m trying to change the pickslanting slightly between the strings it might mess me up. But I’m not sure haha. Sometimes it feels ok, but no matter how it’s feeling I run out of stamina with it pretty fast at anything around 150-160 or higher.
I will try to do that.
Are there any UWPSers out there that are really good at 2nps pentatonic runs?
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I’m sure there are. It seems there are very few players in general who are good at really fast pentatonic stuff though. The Randy Rhoades/Kirk Hammett type stuff I find to be the hardest of all to play fast.
Lots of this in the recent Andy Wood ‘electric workshop’ interview.
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Judging from what you say here and from the videos you posted on the technique post I have two different ideas.
So first, let’s consider that you’ve got the speed, if you can play one rep of the lick at that tempo, I would say that you need to play it as relaxed as possible and then try doing 2 reps in a row, then 3 etc … I’ve never used a practice routine or anything but what helped me overcome the speed and stamina barrier was to take few days/weeks and practice those small chunks over and over again, and trying to play more rep progressively. That being said I’m not that fast, on good day I can play some licks at around 180bpm, maybe 190, but it’s a huge improvement from when I was unable to play two 6 patterns at 160.
On the other hand, watching a bit of your videos, your picking movement looks really small to me, I would even say too small. I don’t know if you practiced to make that movement as small as possible but it looks like it and I think that this is a good thing to do to an extent. The smaller the movement, the more you’re gonna need to extend it to reach a new string and I think that a big part of solving all those pattern is to learn how to do pick strokes that are not too long so that you don’t make unnecessary movements, but at the same time not too short so you don’t end up needing that much more effort to get from one string to another.
Hope that’ll help !
Thank you for looking at the videos. I never practiced making small movements really. I just ended up doing it. Troy has said the size of the movements don’t really matter, but I may be misunderstanding what he meant there. At any rate, I see your point. I feel like I am indeed really reaching for string changes. And I definitely have an issue with picking too deep on the high e string. Which is why I have trouble playing between the b and e. I also have trouble moving from the g to b, but that is due to incorrectly maintaining the same pick angle, etc when playing across the strings I believe. I will keep working at all this. I will definitely use your suggestions and see if they help. Thanks again!
This was my experience as well… There’s definitely an issue with many guitarists, who are very capable at playing 3 or 4NPS runs… but then run into major issues with 2NPS runs.
A lot of this has to do with 2NPS runs not giving us enough time to ‘pre-emptively’ switch strings to overcome our ‘weakness’ with either inside or outside picking.
It’s hard to explain this concept without visuals… but I will say that practicing you ‘weak’ xfers with 2NPS switches is super important to learning more advanced picking styles. I’ve had to spend over a year trying to get mine up to speed, but it’s been worth it.
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