What the heck is wrong with my 2NP DWPS?

I have this passage in something I’m writing that ends with some 2NP stuff starting on a downstroke, which would lead me to believe that DWPS would be the right move, but for some reason it seems to trip me up so much. This is my first time uploading a video, so also let me know what I can do to improve that. I initially tried with slow motion, but it wasn’t possible with the front-facing camera (giving me trouble with finding the correct angle), nor did it have audio.

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Its hard to tell, but this looks like it might be string hopping to me. It seems like your upstrokes are escaping when you’re going slow, so your hand may still be trying to do it as you increase speed. Have you tried using rest strokes?

Thanks for posting! This is not dwps - it’s crosspicking. Specifically, it looks like the supinated approach we outlined in yesterday’s broadcast. Looks pretty good too. It seems like this might be a case of not really knowing what movement you’re making, which is why when you speed up you don’t really know what movement you’re shooting for, hence the mess when it becomes whatever it wants to become. You should either be making a crosspicking movement, or a pickslanting movement, consciously, and it should not change based on the speed you’re traveling.

The moderate speed stuff looks good though. Honestly, I recommend watching the broadcast - it’s rendering now and should be up on the platform tomorrow. I think you’ll recognize your technique, and maybe this will give you some ideas on how to harness it consciously to do cool things. If you’d like to add a pickslanting movement in addition, then that broadcast has some very solid fundamentals on wrist movement which I think will clarify a lot of things. That, and the intro to picking motion talk - both in “Talking the Code” under, “Channels”, would be a good start.

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Yes, ditto of what troy said.

As a side note, it’s possible you have a a tiny bit of bounce in your slower mechanic… and if that’s the case… it would create a speed limit at about the rate where your mechanic seems to fall apart.

But anyways… watch that video that Troy is talking about… it’s pretty much perfectly catered to you.

Thank you so much for your reply, @Troy! CTC material has been a huge impetus in my guitar practice explosion over the last several years, so it means a lot to hear from you personally about my playing!

Hearing that I’m cross picking is a bit of a shock. I’ve practiced 1nps arpeggios at different points, but never thought I was great at it, definitely been practicing more of sweeping and hybrid picking (or swybrid, in the Marshall Harrison parlance) to achieve those ends.

I also generally think of myself as using definite up and downward slants in different passages, so I suppose I really need to re-examine my technique.

Short story, I think a lot of people get confused between “visible slant of the pick” and “slant of the picking motion”. You may have the “slanted pick” thing but that’s (mostly) not relevant. It’s the motion path that matters. Check out that broadcast. We’re still running the summer free trial so you can get in for no cash for the time being.

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That’s wild. I wonder if I’ve been switching between supinated and pronated cross picking all this time instead of TWPS :dizzy_face: … I’ll have to upload another video for consideration.

In the meantime, I’ll definitely be taking the free summer trial opportunity and try to get a better grasp on these concepts

I was definitely in this camp when I first signed up here, after watching the stuff on Youtube for maybe a year or so, and started working through it in earnest in MiM. I remember it being a pretty huge revelation for me when it finally clicked that “pickslanting” actually had little to do with pick angle, but everything to do with the trajectory the pick makes as it crosses through the string, a linear line that’s slanted relative to the plane of the strings.

In fact, given the jumping off point is Yngwie, a player with a very visible slant in the way he holds the pick, I almost wonder if (and it’s clearly too late now) calling it something other than “pickslanting” would have made it a little clearer, and really focused attention on the trajectory of the pick itself rather than the physical angle of the pick. :smile:

Well, ‘upstroke escaped’, ‘downstroke escaped’ might be more accurate… but that would confuse people accustom to the slanting terminology, since ‘upstroke escaped’ would be equal to DWPS.

Also, X-picking is a bit confusing… because I use the double-escaped technique for phrases that are certainly not in the style of X-picking. I try to also say ‘double escape’ when I can.

Indeed. The Molly Tuttle clip to me is a textbook example of that. You can see how her grip is slanted downward when she rests the pick, but the pickstroke is totally the opposite for her fast lines.

Maybe “slanted-stroke” or “strokeslant” would be a better terminology … but also maybe confusing :wink:

I’m seeing this now. I was mistaking the visible angle caused by pronation or supination as pick slanting, and then still sometimes playing with a curved trajectory.

I think I’m having problems with consistency of technique, especially across speeds, but I think we’ve seen this with other players for whom it isn’t a problem. I’ve definitely found myself playing lines with what I thought to be a slanted orientation where the pick is doing rest strokes, and I’m under the impression that’s a clear indication of a slanted trajectory. Or am I incorrect?

I won’t be so sure about that. You can do DW rest stroke within a line that is otherwise more of an UWPS slant (or 2wps, or crosspicking). That happens a lot in bluegrass actually, where players (lots of them who are not DWPS) do the restroke as an accent, or an eluded stroke. It’s quite common for the G-run for example.

It can be even weirder… As far as I’m concerned I’m more of an UWPS player, but I do (DW) rest strokes and when I use sweep or economy most of the time it’s ascending.

That does seem weird… Like, you’re still keeping the visible upward slant, but driving the pick into the next ascending string? I seem to remember Troy pointing out in a video that sweeping and strumming are a good way to see a pick slant in action without necessarily thinking about it all that closely. I feel like a DWPS trajectory plus the upward (shape, angle? Don’t know how to refer to the “visible slant” vs the trajectory now) would make the pick catch on the strings.

Also, random question. Did your username come from the Prefab Sprout song?

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Not really… I think it’s more because I used to learn those ascending licks way before I developed more of an uwps / 2wps approach. I actually was completely unware of that until I watched CTC material on YT few months ago. But as a matter of fact I have these ascending sweep patterns ingrained but when it come to play alternate picking stuff it is very clear I’m on the uwps camp.

Indeed, I’m a fan. And blueberry pie as a dessert …yummy :grinning:

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The visible angle is very often actually caused by grip. I will credit Teemu Mäntysaari with this insight - it’s something he brought up in our interview. If you like, check out the crosspicking talk from last week:

https://troygrady.com/channels/talking-the-code/crosspicking-with-the-wrist/

We cover this subject in detail, along with how it relates to pickslanting as a motion path. In the talk we demo the same movements, with the same forearm position, with and without “pickslant” just to make it as clear as possible what the visible orientation of the pick does and doesn’t influence.

Probably more like the other way around. Andy Wood is a supinated player with a uwps motion path, and (at times) a downward slanted pick. He frequently rest strokes downstrokes. But to your question, those rest strokes are indeed dwps motion paths. Because Andy is also a two-way pickslanter. If a pickstroke starts in the air and then goes into the strings and rest strokes on a downstrokes, that is absoluteley downward pickslanting. If the rest of your line is the opposite, then you are two-way pickslanting.

Check out the broadcast, it’ll make this all pretty clear.

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Hi troy where do i find the broad cast at? Thanks

The link I pasted! Or just on the homepage, Channels -> Talking the Code -> Crosspicking With the Wrist

Trying to lean into it now! Crosspicking nightmare