First-hand, but you’re right, it doesn’t add to the discussion, so I edited my post to remove that part.
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I appreciate it guys, thank you.
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How anybody can criticise Yngwie’s guitar playing skills are absolutely beyond me!
I know there’s a certain talented guitarist who saying sweep picking lacks “quality” and he’s a fantastic alternate picker but it’s a totally different technique with a different sounds for different musical situations. I mean take George Bella’s solo from his track Airborne for example, it has one of the craziest sweeping solos of all time, it’s not physically possible to alternate pick that.
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It is very interesting. I wonder who they are comparing him to when they criticise him - and the only thing I can come up with is they are comparing him to himself! I’m not sure of any other player who has the catalogue of outstanding picking that Yngwie has in the neo-classical field.
How many guitarists (from a technique point of view) are as good as Yngwie?
Here is some Yngwie alternate picking.
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I mean, not to be flip, but anyone can criticize anything for pretty much any reason, so it’s actually extremely easy to criticize Yngwie’s playing skills. 
Doing it wth cause, now, might be a little harder, but…
Speaking personally, I have a ton of respect for the guy and his ability, and I’ve seen him live a couple times now and enjoyed it thoroughly. But at the end of the day I don’t really care for his approach and there’s a bunch of other guys I’d rather listen to. Which is fine. Music is amazing precisely because it IS so diverse.
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Yngwie is not an alternate picker primarily. He is primarily an economy picker.
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One way economy though, still lots of alternate picked lines with even note groupings and the occasional use of outside picking. Very different to the Frank Gambale approach 
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Agreed, I think this (or more pedantically USX one-way economy) tells a more precise story than just “economy” (which usually makes people think of the Gambale approach).
Plus of course the outside-picked pedal point thingy that you mentioned, which I always found to be an interesting addition to his vocabulary (as in, it does require slightly different mechanics).
Actually, looks like for these pedal point licks he does both the inside and outside picking version:
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Pretty cool. His motion looks a little different on these too. It almost reminds me of Steve Morse, particularly in the section that starts around 1:30. Visible flex/ext happening, though I think I still see a little rotation so it’s likely the blend of forearm and RDT.
BUT…raise your hand if you heard some swipes in there too lol
I think it all sounds great though. He’s one of the most naturally intuitive players ever.
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Interesting that you can see him do quite a bit of elbow motion in that clip. During the section when he demonstrated mixing pedal technique with alternate picking.
Also occasionally spot him switch to floating forearm and wrist form. He’s got a mix bag of stuff going on.
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I know what you mean but I’m fairly sure I heard him do these things pretty much 100% clean in the past. Maybe in the REH video? I haven’t found the timestap but this shoud be a good watch regardless 
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Oh yeah, Yngwie sounds great! thanks for sharing these clips - all I hear is awesomeness!
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Oops I realized just now how my post probably came across. I meant no shade to Yngwie re: the swipes. I think swiping is genius and I never knew people did it, in my pre CtC life. I was more giving him props for yet 1 more engineering solution in his very very deep back of tricks.
Yep, total agreement.
Why apologize for that? It is what it is. It’s not a trick, it’s not cheating, it’s not bad technique, It’s just a way of getting from one place to another.
People might become impassioned about such things, but to me It’s like getting annoyed at somebody at a cross walk when they choose to walk diagonally when both walk signs at the intersection are are on, instead of walking in an “L” one direction and then having to wait again for the signs to change to walk the other. You could care about something like that, but you probably shouldn’t.
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Oh it’s just that I’ve seen a lot of posts on here where people seem to think swiping === bad and I wanted to make it clear where I stand on it. I was more clarifying than apologizing 
though reading again it did seem like an apology. I apologize for making it seem like an apology.
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Hey Joe - I didn’t take your post like that at all! All good, man!
So… would you call it “systematic swiping” then? The art of swiping with out it sounding like a swipe? Any of Yng’s recorded stuff is pretty much a bolt of effing lightning, any mistakes or 'oddities" sound like he meant to do that… Maybe it’s all part of the recipe?
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Right that’s what I was getting at. Any that exists would be just like how Paul Gilbert and Al Di Meola do it. Like you say, systematic. Which to me is brilliant.
Amen, brother. I’ve always maintained that Yngwie is primarily a feel player, his passion and sense of timing are on another level. In my teaching days one of my students asked me to transcribe a ton of SRV and by the end of Texas Flood I realized how many times he was able to use the same lick over and over, to great effect every time without ever sounding. redundant. I noticed the same thing with Dave Murray, another brilliant player. But it wasn’t 'till I started transcribing Yngwie that I realized he did it too . . . the Yngwie Sixes are everywhere, hidden in plain sight, always fresh and ferocious.
This is something you hear in Baroque music; it’s based in dance, the timing has a strong rhythmic pulse but the ornaments dance around it. Odd note-groupings, accelerando and rallentando, even a simple trill played well can have a devastating effect.
The idea that some teenager did all this while attending highschool is staggering; all I have to say to that guy is “Thank you.”
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Sure is. It is a wonder he is not famous than he is. Is it just that he never had the big hit with the big band?
I don’t I’ll ever be able to not think of swiping as this-
