Wrist position while playing runs across all six strings

Playing Technique
#1

Hi! I’ve been having this problem for a long time. Not sure if I’m able to describe it correctly.

Say, I play a scale starting on 6th string and ending on 1st one. As I go from string to string, I either have to change angle of the wrist regarding to elbow, or change the position of the hand moving it lower as I move across strings. Both options feel kinda awkward for me, but when I don’t think about it, hand stays in its original position, and pick ends up picking high strings at a very different angle. I recall this topic is covered somewhere, but can’t remember where exactly. Would someone point me?

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#2

Correct! In general we call this problem “string tracking”. Most people do a blend of both of these. A little arm, a little wrist. But the type of picking motion you use also influences this. If you use a deviation style wrist movement, its range of motion can easily cover a three or four string distance. So no arm tracking is necessary. You can anchor in one spot and reach all local strings. This is what players like Andy Wood do.

We also asked Martin Miller about this in the interview with him a few weeks ago. We determined that his upper arm only moves about an inch, even when going across all six strings. So he is using a small amount of arm tracking, and the rest is either wrist or elbow joint motion, or fingers, since Martin’s picking motion has a significant finger component to it.

Lots of variables!

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#3

I think we can probably spend quite a bit of time discussing all the different variations here. Most people use multiple mechanics, and a lot of people have ‘rest points’ with their wrists.

I’ve switched to using elbow-only. I know it’s uncommon… and it relies on a bit of ‘inertia’ from the pick stroke itself… but it makes things much simpler for me… especially when traversing the strings from top to bottom.

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#4

So in this scenario you’re “tracking” with the wrist only, that is your wrist is anchored somewhere at the bridge and the pick path goes circle from lowE to highE, is that correct ? There’s probably nothing wrong with that, but indeed there’s a change of pickstroke angle. That said the change is minimal and is manageable, so if you are comfortable with the wrist anchored it shouldn’t be a problem.

Maybe what you have to take care is the position from which your wrist pivot on the bridge to start with. Like if you start from low E and your wrist is too high (like pivoting from the low E saddle), then the attack angle of the high E might be a little awkward. If that is the case just move down your wrist to the next saddle (A string) and it should be better. YMMV. It’s all about finding the good wrist position for a correct angle for every string and makes it second nature. Slight attack angle adjustment can be done on the fly with the pick grip, like variation of edge picking to compensate the pick path curve.

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#5

Yes, exactly.

Also, somehow I experience this problem especially in the case of rapid string changes (3 notes per string). Seems like some time required for wrist to adapt position for playing given string. Changing pick slant (because of assymetrical nature of 3 nps picking) makes things even worse.

When I play some other pattern with more notes on every string and without changing my usual upward pickslant position, the problem with tracking almost disappears. I’ll try to make a video of this later.

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#6

Here’s a quick example of me not having huge problems with tracking. I think it’s because the lick is one-way pickslanting all the way through (UWPS in my case, starting with a downstroke). I kind of developed this position very long time ago, in times when any kind of guitar instruction (other than classical guitar) were impossible to get.

I also notice another problem – the problem with start of the lick. Somehow it is not that easy to play those three notes on the low E. I guess that may be because there’s no lower string beyond E. However it seems to me that starting a little easier when I play along with music or metronome.

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#7

Don’t know what others would say but it looks and sounds perfectly fine to me. You might just need to tweak here and there if you feel some string change or string attack feel a bit awkward (like your issue on the lowE), but other than that you have a solid basis on this.

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