Hi All,
I recently worked with my guitar teacher on some Yngwie Malmsteen economy style licks (think groups of 6 on string pairs). He recommended that I start to incorporate “small circles” into my economy playing to get more accuracy and speed. I have also heard this suggestion from various YouTubers. What is the “Cracking the Code” position on this? Is there any weight to it, from your POV? Any videos that you guys already have on how to incorporate this?
Thanks
CTC don’t know a lot about finger motion but it can be incredibly effective, demonstrated by players like Yngwie (early on), Cesario Filho, Gus G, Ohmura Takayoshi, Mikio Fujioka etc. They don’t believe it is actually circular and just appears to be the fingers going back and forth. Troy sums up what they know here:
Thanks so much - will check it out.
Rick Graham uses finger and thumb motion with economy picking too. I have his economy picking course and try to mimick how and when he uses it.
I do find it works very well for economy stuff. If I do it from wrist only, I find my arm wants to flip flop too much when changing directions, which doesn’t work so well with quick and frequent changes of direction.
That’s just my experience though.
Thanks for sharing 
Another guitarist who uses a lot of finger motion and economy picking is Pasquale Grasso, in the jazz sphere. He’s got a few instructional works, but I’m not sure if they’d be as useful for you as something like Ohmura.
Just my perspective here.
I can do fast thumb/finger motion. It’s certainly effective, but I don’t feel that it offers any advantage over other picking movements.
It also seems to be a movement that a lot of people struggle to learn.
@Chris_Brooks has a great overview of thumb motion in his Viking shred course that helped me better understand where it should be coming from and how to apply it. It’s become my go to motion for 2 string “down down up” phrases like Yngwie’s 2 string arpeggios, the lions share of Marty Friedmans licks that I play, and those really fast pentatonic licks ala John Sykes and Michael Schenker.
Would highly recommend Chris’ course for this.
Thanks for sharing this. Will check it out.
Have you seen the very detailed (and free) discussion by my friend Tuck Andress about this? He wrote it long ago, long before this site and its terms were around, so don’t expect things to be described with Troy’s acronyms, but I thought it might be helpful with respect to your circle picking question (and it’s got a bit of hilarious anecdote mixed in!) - I see it was mentioned here at Troy’s site at least once but, in case you haven’t seen it: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5a5bd42e8fd4d2aea7b0b426/t/5eddf0091cb53938998f511c/1591603210434/Pick+and+Fingerstyle+technique+6-7-20+version.pdf
Thanks - didn’t know about this one
I think the biggest advantage it offers you is allowing you to use a very “classical” style hybrid picking technique without having to give up the pick or keep palming it.
Pasquale Grasso, who I mentioned, is often doing Oscar Peterson style four part lines with a lot of chord movement and because he’s using minimal wrist movement to pick he can easily add in those extra chord tones.l
Personally, I think thumb/finger motion is less compatible with hybrid picking than DT or RDT wrist motion, as the finger flexors/extensors are already engaged as part of the movement. The thumb/finger action and the hybrid strokes interfere with each other at higher speeds.
Wow, any recommendations? I have to see this!
This video from his youtube channel is a good example - when he’s working with a group he tends to play more single line stuff.
As for the hybrid picking comment: typically you’re not playing a chord based arrangement like that at massively high speeds and the ability to have the fingers in place to pluck the chord lines exactly when you need without too much wrist movement is a big benefit. Stylistic issues.
EDIT:
Here’s a video of him playing live without any editing
