The struggles with upward pickslanting/downward escape motion

Technique Critique
#1

Hi y’all,
I am having a bit of a struggle:

After much experimentation and practice I realize I am definitely an upward pick slanted/downward escape motion player.

A little background: I’ve had four different wrist injuries growing up (fractures specifically) that definitely limit certain motions. For the life of me I cannot comfortably downward pickslant and have any speed.

The opposite however gives me crazy fast speed and stamina with trem picking.

The issue I am running into is figuring out licks patterns and riffs that would work with this technique as many of my favorite players seem to do the opposite particularly descending ones.

Please help with suggestions or good ideas to start with!

Video here:

Thanks!

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#2

If you look over the site (search DSX maybe - not being sassy, honest suggestion) you’ll likely find plenty of members that have posted DSX “translations” for USX lines. Here’s one that comes to mind:

I’ve had some wrist injuries in the past, not as bad as fractures, but did you rehab them properly to allow as much strength / mobility as possible? Even if they’re old injuries, it’s still possible to see improvement with some exercise. Does it limit wrist deviation? Flexion / extension? Is forearm rotation possible? Have you attempted finger movements?

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#3

Welcome back @Ldubek10!

Hard to hear what is going on in the video, but visually I agree with you that your dsx motion looks more solid.

Adding to the great suggestions of @Pepepicks66 , there are a couple of main “tricks” you can consider when DSX-ifiying stuff:

  • start things on an upstroke instead of down

and/or:

  • add pulloffs / hammers to avoid the upstroke string change

Additional tricks include re-arranging the fretting, including upstroke sweeps, incorporating hybrid picking, hammers from nowhere, etc. etc. :slight_smile:

Then there’s also the option of modifying the actual notes of a lick to create a similar-sounding DSX one:

And here is another inspiring video from the excellent @adamprzezdziecki , who managed to entirely DSX-ify an Yngwie tune (!!):

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#4

Interesting you say upstroke first because when I trem pick I naturally downstroke first.

It seems like I am naturally more comfortable starting on a downstroke with a lot of these runs.

Maybe we can solve the problem by analyzing my downward pick slant and fixing?

Here’s another video. I am trying to do a descending twos pattern as well as a trem pick. It seems like when I put it more parallel to the string I can go faster but I lose accuracy moving from string to string. Let me know your thoughts!

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#5

Just had a quick look — for the future better to make short videos (10-15sec) with only 1 example per video and description in text form in the forum post. This way it will be easier to everyone to go back and forth between relevant examples (as opposed to trying to find the correct timestamp for each example).

I suspect that if we analysed your “downward pickslanting” (or better upstroke escape = USX) setup with a close-up camera in slow motion we would find that there is not much of a “slant”, and I also suspect that the motion would not look very upstroke-escapey, maybe more like fully trapped or double escapey. I suspect your well-memorised DSX motion is interfering with what you are trying to do here.

So if you want to experiment more to find a solid USX motion, I’d try a completely different setup like a 3-finger grip (Steve Morse, Albert Lee, etc.). The further away from your usual, the better the chances to learn a truly new motion.

You DSX motion looks so nice and smooth that I think it would be a shame not to exploit it for some cool musical phrases. If you don’t want to start things on an upstroke, there’s other tricks you can do: e.g. with pentatonics you can play 1 or 3 notes on the initial string, starting on a down, and then go straight up and down the remaining 2nps parts of the scale.

E.g. in A minor pentatonic 5th fret you could start by playing 8-5-8 on the low E rather than 5-8.

In the longer term, I’d say the upstroke start is a pretty powerful skill worth developing. Look for example at Andy James, he has built a huge DSX vocabulary based on some of these ideas:

#6

So you are saying odd number groupings may be in my best interest?

#7

I almost feel like I’m more comfortable doing the opposite of what I’m being instructed so I want to make sure I am clear.

If I do a descending pentatonic phrase say starting on 5 on the high E and go

5
8-5
8-5
8-5
8-5

That first 5 I seem to gravitate towards an upstroke not a downstroke?

I think I’m getting a little confused by what motion I am actually doing as my trem picking seems to make my dominant motion more obvious but not so much on other runs.

Here’s two examples of me doing a descending run based on the tab above. However the first one is doing 2nps starting on the 8 with a downstroke vs the second one which is 1 note on the high eye with an upstroke then 2nps the rest of the way. Why is it that the second one feels more comfortable and what does this mean for patterns moving forward for me?

#8

Additionally I wanted some analysis of my 3nps descending lick here to try to figure out the most efficient way to do it as I seem to get stuck.

#9

HEy! Gotta leave for a bit but in short: I think you are not choosing phrases that match well with DSX (ideally you’d need phrases that only change strings after a downstroke to get started). More later!

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#10

Hey Troy,
No worries! Appreciate the help.

So here’s a startling change all the sudden my downward pick slant/UXM seems to be much faster on 2nps I am trying to figure out what exactly I am doing differently than before. There’s gotta be a wrist mechanic change that is helping me here…

It could definitely be cleaner of course but progress none the less!

Let me know your thoughts later

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#11

Sorry for the delay on this! Had a difficult start of the week!

Not exactly Troy but I am part of the team. You can think of me as a cheaper version of Troy :rofl:

So, my more detailed thoughts on your examples are the following: I am not convinced that you achieved a clear USX motion in any of the examples, not even the last one that you say feels better (by the way, if it feels better and allows you to play enough of the stuff you want to play, that’s great and you can of course use it!).

I have the impression that your more strongly memorized DSX picking path tends to creep in every now and then. So there are 2 ideas to address / work on:

1 - Exploit fully the power of your well-established DSX motion. So you’ll want licks that exclusively change strings after a downstroke. A super-classic example is this (shown as a boring chromatic exercise, but can be applied to any 3nps fingering you know):

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------etc.-----------------------------------------------------
-------------------5-6-7-5-6-7-----------------------------------------------------------------
-------5-6-7-5-6-7------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-5-6-7----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 D U D U D U D U etc...

Then you could go into pentatonics and find patterns that satisfy the requirement while still starting on a down, e.g.:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------5-7-etc.-----------------------------------------------------------------
------------5-7-----5-7-----------------------------------------------------------------------
--------5-7-----5-7----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-8-5-8----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

2 - In parallel you could keep experimenting to find a USX motion to play other types of phrases (e.g. gipsy jazz, YJM vocabulary and so on). To do so, you are probably better off if you try a completely different setup (arm position, pick grip, etc.) compared to what you are using now. This is to minimize the risk of interference from the DSX movements that you know so well. Our most typical suggestion for this is to try the Steve Morse / Albert Lee 3-finger grip.

#12

NOW I think we are getting somewhere - I tried three finger grip but I couldn’t get that to work BUT I changed my hand positioning a bit and put the pick almost towards the center of my hand and it seems to get a better angle. Lmk your thoughts on what I’m doing differently:

#13

One more for ya!

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#14

Fast 2nps is an excellent test example for single-escape motion, because… there’s no way out! You either do the required single escape motion or you don’t.

Premise: your example sounds good, so for musical purposes it does the job!

However, since you/we are interested in the mechanics:

If you watch your latest video in slow motion, you’ll see that you are not picking every note: you use a pulloff almost all the time before moving to the next string. This is not a mistake, it’s exactly what you should do if you want to play this lick with DSX starting on a downstroke: a sequence of downstrokes + pulloffs, so that you can avoid the upstroke string change.

But obviously this also means you are not doing USX, you are just using your usual primary-DSX motion and your hands found a clever workaround by feel.

Have a look in slow motion yourself and let me know if you see the same things (because I’m not infallible :smiley: )

PS: in practice, you can now do a couple things (one does not exclude the other):

  1. accept the downstrokes + pulloffs as your default method of tackling these 2nps / Eric Johnsony licks. Practice this deliberately and become more aware of when you need to pick and when you need to do the pulloff. Note that this method is totally valid, it can sound killer and has been used by elite DSX players Vinnie Moore and Andy James.

  2. keep searching for a USX motion, and use 2nps licks + slow motion analysis to objectively test what you are doing.

#15

Interesting - when I practice at a slower speed I definitely pick every note but I could see how when I speed up I sneak in pull offs despite attempting the upstroke …

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#16

Upon some further practice you were right - the pull off was so subtle and minimal that it fooled me into thinking I was picking!

What I do is essentially this:

8 pull off 5
7 - 5

and so on and for forth. I think this is a great tool to have BUT I am also going to practice from the EJ video you shared:

U D U D U D U D
8 5 7 5 7 5 7 5

Will be cool if I could pull off using both fluently as there are times where I like the sound of a pull off but other times I like the feeling of picking everything.

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#17

Here’s some 3NPS vids - any feedback is appreciated! I’m following the recommended pattern from @tommo @Troy

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#18

Cool! So the 2 examples require different types of string changes.
The descending part you are playing as 6 notes per string, so it is only upstroke string changes, while the ascending part is all downstrokes. If you want to turn the descending one into downstroke string changes, you could just start with 3 notes on the high E and then have 6 notes on all other strings.

By the way I showed your 2nps video to Troy and he noticed you do have some legit upstroke string changes in the pentatonic examples, particularly on the low strings. So you are getting there! Watch it again and also try to see if you can figure out by feel what you are doing different on the lower strings.

#19

Hi!
I’ve been definitely improving. I think the big issue for me was switching to more of a Mike Stern picking type vs the gypsy style. What felt “parallel” to the string was actually more angled than I thought.

Here’s an example:

I do it pretty well at somewhat higher speeds but I tend to very subtly pull of on the second note of the run at max speed particularly on the high E. I think the higher strings give me more issues because of the angle and the distance from my hand to that string vs the lower strings. Think I’m just gonna have to experiment with the angle from the higher strings but let me know if you see anything.

#20

Hey there! Great playing especially in the ascending sequence at around 6 seconds — which I believe is almost all (or all?) downstroke string changes.

To be honest I don’t see a big difference between this last video and the previous ones.

I still think you’d have plenty success by building a vocabulary of primary-DSX phrases. At the same time, we have seen that you can do both types of string changes depending on the situation so I’d keep experimenting as you have been doing :slight_smile: