Tremolo tests, with and without metronome

Technique Critique
#21

Cheers @JB_Winnipeg. It is still hit & miss and a work in progress on the lower strings, but definitely smoother - its feels like when I’m warmed up, but its accessible almost straight away.

It was almost impossible to do the version of the knocking motion that I did with the pen/credit card, but it seems to have shown me what a knocking motion actually is - it looked more like forearm rotation to me at first - I didn’t see the flexion/extension.

If I was to sum it up, I’m feeling the knocking motion on the upstroke. I only need to add a tiny amount when I get it right, which is good considering the below

Problem to fix is on the lower strings, where the slightly different position of my ring and pinky affect my ability to knock. I tested it on the table too - if I hold out my pinky and try to knock, I can barely knock at all! On the guitar a similar problem occurs when I try and lift my middle, ring and pinky up out of the way of the strings.

That aside, I’m pretty pleased with less than an hour’s work!

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I have been trying so hard and have made no progress!
#22

@Troy, I know that its early days in experimenting with adding the knocking motion, but the issue mentioned above relating to being unable to use the knocking motion on lower strings is proving difficult to get past.

Simply put;
If my middle, ring or pinky open up or are lifted (to get out of the way of the strings), its like the breaks are put on the knocking element of the motion. :pensive: I’m going to continue experimenting, but it made me wonder - How common is it for a player to systematically use more than one motion, depending on the string being played? (Regardless of the picking patterns). For example, a single-escape pattern using elbow for lower strings and wrist for higher strings?

#23

I’m not sure what you’re referring to as a “knocking” motion, is the most recent video? Because that’s not a knocking motion. That’s forearm rotation. It’s the last of the tests in the Primer which (I think) you watched, the one with the credit card tapping. It’s probably the most specific in terms of some people being able to do it right away and others (for whatever reason), not.

If you’re getting good results forearm rotation, by all means use it. Nothing wrong with that. It is typically a USX motion and needs to be paired with USX phrases. But take a few days and see if you can do it consistently in time for at least a couple bars. WIth/without metronome doesn’t matter at first. Just see if you can get it consistent without stopping.

#24

Indeed there is forearm rotation, but it seems (by feel) that it engages when I flex or extend, like thats where the driving forces is. The flexing/extending combined with a deviation, results in an amount of rotation, but feels very different to the straight wrist forearm rotation with the credit card tapping.
I’m totally fine to accept if you say “that is forearm rotation dude/dumbass, plain and simple!” :grin: (I’ve always got more stuff wrong with CTC than I do right, so no change there!), but the physical feel of that flexing and extending is hard for me to ignore and trying just the credit card motion doesn’t yield the same results.
Also, what about the issue with the middle,ring and pinky? The same issue occurs when knocking on the table - am I adding 2+2 and getting 5?
Is this a showstopper or just more experimentation needed?

I was pretty bummed out that I couldn’t seem to take advantage of the knocking motion as you did above - either a change in grip or finger curl epically doomed my ability to execute…

#25

Yes there is some flip flopping here between wrist, wrist-forearm, and forearm. If you were to flex your wrist and only move at the wrist joint, you would end up with something like this:

This is a similar motion to the knocking motion except being performed with a lot of flex in the wrist to begin with. This is also similar to the motion Mike Stern uses here:

However, it seems like when you get going in this clip, in the middle, your motion switches to mostly forearm, similar to what @qwertygitarr does. Also a great technique. If that works well for you, no reason not to use that. This kind of experimentation is great, and pretty much where all motions I know came from. This is also where more explicit knowledge of the mechanics (which joint is which) can keep yourself from getting really confused and going around in circles chasing every new motion you come across. Because at some level they are all similar.

In your case, the number one goal is to find one motion that is fast and consistent, and does not involve speeding up / slowing down, or random starts and stops, for at least a couple of bars at a consistent tempo (with or without a metronome).

While you do this, I recommend playing some music with it so it’s not just sitting around making picking motions all the time. Create some song that has some chords, with tremolo lines in between them, where the tremolo parts have a specific number of notes in them, like four beats of sixteenths, then another chord. The Mike Stern clip is one cool way to do that. This will naturally force you to consider these motions in units or chunks of four, six, or eight notes at a time. That really helps with the hand synchronization and the ability to start / stop without losing the motion.

At some point you may find that you do less flip flopping and start doing one or more of these motions more so than others. If so, fine, take the hint and keep doing that.

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#26

Thanks @Troy, much appreciated. Just one question regarding the below quote - with my existing motion up to this point I have been able to perform mixed escapes (albeit with suspected swipes at the higher speeds). If I develop this rotational movement, is this likely to cause any issues with dsx?

#27

If your current picking motion is all starts and stops and can’t be done consistently, then it’s not super usable in its current form. So as far as causing “issues”, I would say the forearm motion, if you can do it more consistently, is actually removing issues, not causing any. Yes these motions are usually USX, but that doesn’t seem to have held Mike or George Benson back from playing complicated stuff.

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