The Lazy Sloppy Zebra or "Transition Time“?

Playing Technique
#63

Yeah I saw him before the pciking is indeed impressive (anyway thanks for sharing it). And it’s a neat idea to design a personal pick, I can imagine that one day we all print our individual picks perfectly matched to body and technique :slight_smile:

Wrist is my standard motion too, the motion i meant is a mix, the repetetion is elbow but the ‘endpoint’ is the wrist. So it looks as if the wrist is doing the work but in fact it’s totally relaxed and free to do some ‘finetuning’ like slant or angle. My impression is that the relaxed wrist causes better feedback and makes the thing feel less strange.

With some luck I’ve a free sunday, I’ll try to ut something together then.

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#64

I think I’ve got a better handle on the purpose of “planting” after this thread - it helps you to equalise your technique across different tempos.

As Troy has mentioned, and as can be seen in many, many instructional videos, there is a massive tendency for our picking motion to change completely as we get way slower, to the point where slow practise becomes unhelpful as we’re no longer working on the same motion.

If you think of the cycle as being “pick note, then pick another note”, because we have so much time between pickstrokes at slow speeds we tend to start swinging about like a gigantic pendulum, making this exaggerated “look ma, I’m alternate picking” kind of motion (if you don’t do that, then great! you’re ahead).

Planting changes the cycle to be “Pick note, THEN IMMEDIATELY GET THE PICK READY TO PICK THE NEXT NOTE”, which for me at least has the effect of helping me to use a more similar motion at a very very low tempo to the motion I would use at a (for me) very very fast tempo.

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#65

To me the whole planting thing just makes sense to get rid of that “string-hopping” movement while picking a single string. For the linear pickstroke-movement it would only make me make wider strokes, as I never pick as far as the next string. Only for phrasing reasons…

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#66

That would be great, and that’d be probably one of the few things I’d really put into an exercise.
But repetetion even on moderate higher tempos feels different (poitning out this is MY experience, no idea if this is general). The notes disapear, just tempo is left
Imagine you drive a car and pass trees on the side, now you have to adjust the tempo to pass them on click.
There’s still control in the whole thing, just matching the tempo is way harder than matching the stroke.

I’m pretty sure the tempo matching can be nailed by putting the time in effort in it.
But to me it seems there’s missing some information, therefor actually I’m more interested in understanding the thing, that’d would simply feel better and could be shared with others - imo musicians shared way to few information in the past.

So if you have an idea to adjust planting (I tried that a year ago or so when I saw it on RG’s channel) to the wheel feeling, I’d praise your name at night :grin:
… honestly that’d be great, and maybe you approach that more logical if you don’t have that note-disapearing feeling.

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#67

@TheCount, The technique Roy Marchbank uses in his “Picking Drills” looks like basically the same technique descried in Anthony Martello’s video titled “Hyper-Picking”, right? I’ve seen you use that technique too. Roy is able to play cleaner and more complex lines with it than Anthony Martello, but the basic technique regarding the way they both are able to generate that level of speed is still the same, right? It’s about making their arms vibrate by creating an extreme amount of tension in their arms and elbow joint. Is that correct?

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#68

I’m not 100% sure to be honest. I think Anthony was doing the elbow technique that me and @milehighshred use. If you watch the super long video I linked with Rowan, Roy claims all his movement is from the wrist. My wrist is completely locked when I do it, no movement at all, I can’t speak for John or Anthony, but judging but he conversations I’ve had with John, me and him basically do exactly the same thing, so i’m guessing he has the locked wrist as well. I have no idea how Roy achieves that kind of speed without using his elbow, but I’m certainly not about to doubt that.

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#69

I’m not sure anyone caught my comment about planting, but again, it has a whole lot to do with practicing release of tension following a given action. Graham takes it from his classical influences. It is not just about being ready to play the next note. Peace, Daniel

#70

Planting has been mentioned above from @Prlgmnr.
So maybe now combined with your post we get closer to the main problem, which is that in this specific motion tension is released at no point.
That might be the basic body feedback that makes this motion harder to control.

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#71

Yes, several folks brought planting up and @Prlgmnr discussed it further.

Interesting. So without trying to answer whether that is true or not, techniques like planting lend themselves towards making sure that everything that can be relaxed, is.

#72

Yeah I mentioned him (or her) cause I tried to describe the (or my) problem there before.
Just the release of tension, has never been mentioned, simply because the whole idea of that motion is to keep the tension and use it.
Anyway probably that’s a brilliant hint how to improve the timing feedback in that technique.

Every discussion is helpful in the end :grinning:

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#73

Well, it’s not completely locked. It still has movement as the meaty part of my thumb is the pivot point for my picking hand. The wrist isn’t completely rigid.

2 Likes
#74

Now you say that, I can totally see what you mean in this clip. I think I play with a slightly more locked wrist. Not something I consciously thought about though!

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#75

I think it’s something like a whip mechanic.
The impulse comes from the elbow, but there’s a (partially) loose point, what John calls Pivot Point i guess.

@milehighshred: just curious - i know you have a detailed explanation in another thread.
Does timing FEEL more complex to you when you play at that high speeds, or is it just the same as on slower ones?

#76

That’s a cool name:“Whip Mechanic” - you could name your band that!

#77

Yes if it’s countrymusic … YEEAAHH :joy:

#78

You will now! (characters)

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#79

The complexity never changes. The challenge increases though. The faster you play the harder it is to tell if you’re staying in line with the beat.

2 Likes
#80

That’s great help, thanks for the response!
To me that means i have to find some better feedback in the motion (which i now know exists).
I can play that mechanic at medium high speeds, which I also reach in my common wrist motion, to me there’s a huge difference in timing.
Anyway now I know what to look for, thanks a lot!

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#81

This is how Roy actually does it and there’s no tension, he’s relaxed. His technique doesn’t require extreme tension. Daily repetition over 30 years of hundreds of different alternate picking combinations create a muscle memory able to play mostly anything with ease. He believes daily repetition of small movements, with minimal to no muscle strain, creates accuracy & efficiency when angle/slant picking crossing strings. Hope you find this helpful. Whatever anyone makes of it there’s no denying his accuracy when picking at speed, this video is a good example. Regards to all.:v:t3: