Most of my time is spent either worrying about health problems I have no control over or worrying about making my landlord happy. The other sliver is either spent asleep, or trying to figure out where exactly that wrong turn was taken.
1 Like
Probably the simplest version would be two strokes on D and one on G.
No fretting, just the picking hand, that gives the alternating, alternating picking. You could do this easily n mindlessly watching TV or something.
This kind of defeats the purpose. He’s trying to get better at strict alternate picking.
That is alternate picking. It’s as alternate as you can get.
1 Like
I got you, I misread and thought you meant just hammering on while watching tv.
I would try it with two fretted notes though just so you associate that coordination.
1 Like
Recorded it! you can see the additional swing with outside picking assisted by some finger extension I think.
1 Like
Cool cool.
I’ve gotta confess I’ve gotten a bit dejected and stopped working on my picking and playing fast this week. I’m sure a lot of my problems are left hand problems but I know my escapes are umm… faulty and I don’t know if I can ever fix them after playing like this for so long.
I’m listening to a lot of Pink Floyd and trying to convince myself I don’t even need a fast left hand or decent escapes to sound great. As soon as I start listening to Vai and EJ and JP again though I’ll be back in the room.
1 Like
I feel the same, I can play my own stuff fast but other peoples is really quite hard. It gets very frustrating when you just can’t nail someones playing. But then most people can’t.
I think guitar is a good excersice in trying to be happy with yourself and what you can do.
I’m happy just soloing over a slow backing track and attempting to play the melodys in my head. I’ve really nailed the sound thats there most the time, it’s just EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! Forever.
2 Likes
Haha that’s exactly what I’m hoping to achieve, I was thinking about recording a long abstract piece, so I have some thing to represent my madness filled mind of the past year when I picked up my guitar again.
It’s an ego thing I think, wanting to play other people’s amazing music to prove to yourself that you are good enough and more likely to prove to other people that you are an amazing player just like Vai or Satch, which is really a damaging and frustrating frame of mind. Unless you really are amazing and can learn and play anything quickly, but I’m certainly not in that category.
1 Like
I feel that. There were at least a couple times in my playing that I was considering ditching picking altogether and just doing legato stuff.
I’m sure you can. You just have to take many steps back (which might require a good amount of “pride swallowing” and discipline) and commit to never reverting to “bad habits”, even if that means you can’t play what you used to for a little while.
1 Like
Agreed there really no getting out of that part. The couple of steps back may feel pretty bad at first but sometimes are necessary. Not going back and correcting them is probably the biggest reason progress stalls.
1 Like
Thanks for the encouragement guys I did feel like I was making progress with the anchoring thing and I almost got some traction with thumb movement to help with escape motions.
However when I play my V the pinky anchoring on the body technique falls apart, as I move down the strings, obviously because the gap between the strings and the body is greater on the V than the Strat. I also find my trailing pinky brushing the strings as I move down to D and A strings causing noise which is no good. Anchoring on the bridge seems weird, seems like I am picking too high up but maybe I just need to get used to it.
My playing style is loose and sloppy, and… well I sort of don’t wanna lose that, but to get faster I have to tighten up. So I was thinking about using the metronome more. I haven’t seriously used the metronome for 30 years and maybe it will help me to become more accurate and iron out some of the bad habits I have with escaping and left hand movement and sync.
I personally would recommend economy picking. It’s much faster than alternate. I put in quite a bit of time practicing alternate, but it’s just to much work, and stresses my wrist to much.
Now I play fast runs with economy and also use alternate for slower stuff. It’s a nice blend. It really works for me.
You don’t need to tighten up much, just like how Marty Freidman is very loose yet can shred.
I’m sure you’ve already tried before, though I can see it really working for your current picking. It’s paid off for me way more than alternate.
I acually find alternate picking everything to be way to digital, it lacks character to me.
Just to be sure what exactly do you mean by Economy?
You mean Yngwie style or EJ style down sweep to change strings ?
Years ago i had a habit of doing the opposite upstroke sweeping to change strings going down from B to G for example but it never seemed “fast” to me, very smooth and nice but I could never speed it up properly.
It’s the same for the down sweep thing, which I have been working on recently, I can’t seem to make it work fast but that might be a left hand sync problem as well. My brain just isn’t used to doing it fast and the left hand doesn’t fret the next note in time with the sweep.
Yeah just a sweep basicly.
You can try muting the strings for timing, so just placing the finger on the string and not fretting fully. Good for syncing up.
Just basic downward pickslanting picking. I think it’s worth putting the time into it over alternate.
Trying it just now I do, do upward sweeping, though I don’t even think about it… Thought I did it less. Though I guess that shows how natural it feels. I use lots of pull offs at higher speeds though. I find it helps legato a lot, if I was to alternate pick everything I’d always be thinking about my picking, despite it only being up down up down over n over, I have to guide my hand to much. It’s to much thinking for me. Perhaps thats just me.
To really get good at it you can learn full on gypsy jazz style, really solidifies the picking, it’s improved my picking more than anything.
To me economy picking is both downward and upward sweeping to change strings depending on which direction you are going. You hear people call it directional picking too, which is just an extra term made up for the same thing by people who take things too literally.
On that note they are both just extra made up terms for plain old sweep picking, because that’s all it is.
I practice the one way method. It works well with the forearm and wrist blend, like the gypsy jazz guys. Can’t sweep the opposite way with that blend of motions, would have to switch to wrist only or something for up sweeps.
I wouldn’t worry too much about the anchoring with a finger thing. I only really do it when I’m trying to mute certain strings. But I always do keep my hand planted somewhere between the bridge pickup and the bridge.
I would certainly work with the metronome or drum machine though. It will affect the way you play and you’ll find you may even be forced to use different muscles and movements in order to play in time with it. It can be a pretty good litmus as to whether or not you are on the right track.
Ok so once again thanks for the advice guys, just a quick progress update.
I have been anchoring on or near the bridge more but now have trouble moving my hand to go up or down the strings. If the hand is floating then there’s more freedom to move the hand up and down from top E to bottom E it makes sense of course.
I think I might have made a discovery that I am more a natural DSXer than a USXer, and I come to this conclusion based on the natural position of my hand especially when standing and the fact that when alternate outside picking, which is mt goto method, it’s the upstroke that requires the most problematic jerky unatural escape.
However I do still feel that my natural picking style is basically USX for descending licks and DSX for ascending licks it’s just an automatic thing I do without thinking, like I said it’s burnt in after years of playing. Even though my natural position is more DSX I always automatically slant down to go USX if I’m playing a lick starting on the top E.
I have now and then hit the DBX sweet spot of getting the escape angles and motions just right for the Paul Gilbert lick for example, it’s just hard to reproduce it every time fighting my bad habits.
Also I have to say that @Pepepicks66 paradiddles do help in that search for the most efficient escape motions.
Unfortunately yesterday I went a bit overboard and tried to play the For The Love Of God solo, those fast stretched pinky licks on the B and E strings, and when I woke up this morning my pinky was locked in a curled up position, it loosened up after a while and I could move it but it has been locking up all day on and off so I think I really need to lay off taxing left hand stuff for a while.
So I thought I would concentrate on doing some simple controlled tremolo picking of 2 or 3 or 4 attacks of the same note using simple pentatonic shapes and using paradiddles, in particular double down or up strokes, or just alternate picked to really get the picking motions down and the anchoring right, as well as the thumb movement although I am not 100% sure what I am going for with that there’s definitely something happening with it that’s positive.
1 Like
@SlyVai I don’t know, I think you need to get on that doctor about testing for rheumatoid arthritis, or even potentially other diseases that may put you at risk for this. your kind of too young to have general arthritis to that degree.