Picking Technique

[danjw]

just wondered if anyone had any thoughts on the merits of the various picking styles? for many years i've used what i guess is called economy picking with a bit of sweeping for arpegios. but have recently been working on trying to improve my alternate picking technique as i tend to lose tone and defintion on faster lines.
anyone here use 100% exclusive alternate picking?

[m78w]

I think it's good to have both economy and alternate picking under your fingers so you are always able to use the one that your ears are telling you to use.

MW

[danjw]

i agree, what i'm aiming for is that control. seeing economy movements like mini sweeps.
i'm intruiged to know if anyone has always used alternate, as economy seems to come so much more naturally to me whilst alternate takes a bit of work.

[RyanM]

For jazz, it seems like it would be very difficult to use only alternate picking, I think you would need to be able to sweep/economy pick for those fast arpeggio lines.

[princeplanet]

For jazz, it seems like it would be very difficult to use only alternate picking, I think you would need to be able to sweep/economy pick for those fast arpeggio lines.

Alternate picking 16ths at 320+ bpm is very achievable, but very difficult to do cleanly for certain string jumps as it requires great right hand strength and control. The advantage is being able to control exactly where you wish to place accents. An interesting point seldom discussed: the "elasticity" of say the rhythm of bebop requires any note to be accent-able, yet guitarists are often encoraged early to slur ,hammer and sweep in order to approximate the legato nature of horn lines. I say that if you have excellent pick control, striking every note can still seem legato enough, with the added HUGE advantage of being able emulate the accent rhythms of the great boppers. For example, try a 5 string sweep of any arp. Play it as fast as you are able. Now try to accent the 2nd, 3rd or 4th note. Now alternate pick the same arp. With a little work any note can be accented. Am I the only one to think this is important?

[m78w]

I hope you meant 8th notes, not 16th's, at 320 bpm! That's pretty darned quick.



MW

[gravitas]

I've come to decide that my picking style is a combination of a lot of things... Since I saw Troy Grady's "Cracking the Code" (a documentry on pick technique with guests like Mike Stern, Rusty Cooley, Tommy Emmanuel, Jimmy Bruno, and Steve Morse) I really started analyzing the miniature aspects of technique that I use when I play. I've decided that 90% of the time I'm economy picking, 5% of the time I'm circular picking, and 5% of the time I'm alternate picking. I think Economy picking is a more efficient and versatile method of getting across the strings than alternate, and I use them both accordingly. There is really only one situation I can think of where alternate picking is more accurate than economy.

Given that I use a thumbpick, though, sometimes I just say "frig that" and play with my fingers

[danjw]

: the "elasticity" of say the rhythm of bebop requires any note to be accent-able,

i agree, thats another reason why i'm focusing on my alternate picking. accents are everything when it comes to a truly authentic sound. i've seen books that try to analyse and teach be-bop articulation, which is a bit far i think. when really, as you say the ability to accent any note is much more flexable.

[princeplanet]

I hope you meant 8th notes, not 16th's, at 320 bpm! That's pretty darned quick.



MW

woops, yeah, 8th notes!

[RyanM]

... 5% of the time I'm circular picking, ...

Can you explain what circular picking is?

[Luan]

I use alternate and sweep only, never economic. IMO it'ts not good, you can't be very very clear rhytmically with it as some people think, when you start to play at very high speeds alternate is the best, you can accent where you want in the melody because you have the absolute control of the upstroke and downstroke and you know what it will be depending on how you started and what rhythmic figure you are playing.

[gravitas]

Can you explain what circular picking is?

It's a rotation of the thumb and index finger. Hold your pick so you can see your thumb nail. Now bend your thumb. That's a downstroke. Return your thumb to the original position. That's an upstroke. This action is pretty much the crux of the biscuit. I use it to supplement the rest of my picking... The addition of the circular picking, while a relatively small amount of work, actually doubles the precision and the speed I can work out.

I use alternate and sweep only, never economic. IMO it'ts not good, you can't be very very clear rhytmically with it as some people think, when you start to play at very high speeds alternate is the best, you can accent where you want in the melody because you have the absolute control of the upstroke and downstroke and you know what it will be depending on how you started and what rhythmic figure you are playing.

You would think it would be difficult to accent with a picking technique that's not constant... But once you get used to feeling it, economy is very easy to drop accents with. It's like second sight... I couldn't explain it, it's very tactile

[CC323]

I have learned both sweep and alternate, and I find that alternate is less 'guitaristic' and cliche for creating melodies; I hear very few 'sweeping' players doing interesting lines, because the mechanic is so inherently guitar-sounding (arpeggiated triads and the like). That isn't to say it's useless, but I think of alternate picking as a better 'bread and butter' thing, and sweeping as something to maybe BS a really fast and legato sounding phrase.

I'm also not suggesting that we should ignore the fact that we play guitar. I just think that guitarists are sometimes overly-guitaristic, and let fingers make melodies rather than ears. Not that that's always bad, but the amazing Eric Marienthal (who just did a clinic/concert at my CC!!!) is really awesome at focusing on changes and making melodies in that context. I just wish that guitar was a simpler instrument to master the non-linear melodic concepts on...

Anyway, I hope that inspires someone!

Take care,
Chris

[Shadow of the Sun]

One of the fastest guitarists ever plays with exclusive alternate picking. That said, Al DiMeola is a bit of a freak, but he's amazing at what he does.

...I play fingerstyle, so it doesn't matter to me.

[Joe Dalton]

Thats not true about sweeping, Frank Gambale for example can pull of great licks with sweeping.

Picking is pretty much just what works for you, as long as you do it well. I get some people thinking economy isn't as suited rhythmically, but likewise we can name tons of examples that prove that statement false. Same with alternate picking not being as fast, it's all nonsense because people sometimes fail to see there is more than one road to Rome

[m78w]

I saw Alan Holdsworth in Chicago last night and he threw the kitchen sink at his right hand. He used his fingers only, alternate picking, hybrid picking(much more than I expected), sweep picking, economy picking and combinations of any/all of these. So it seems that using one or the other may be less benificial than using a combination of several approaches.

MW

[P_Jay]

My picking has always been very poor in my opinion although it seems to get better, slowly since using one exercise from this site and combining it with an exercise I came across on the net awhile ago. The guy was teaching about economy picking which by the way I can't do, but he said set the clock to a comfortable speed for 1/8 notes and play down the strings using downstrokes and up the strings using up strokes. I now practice this with the two note/across the strings/up the neck warm-up. The guy also said the choice of economy/alternate will fall naturally with the accenting. I also saw Joe Pass say on a video tutorial the stronger stroke is the downstroke. BTW how does Barney Kessel do his super quick arpeggios? Economy picking? Yet they're so complexly accented.

[Luan]

I saw Alan Holdsworth in Chicago last night and he threw the kitchen sink at his right hand. He used his fingers only, alternate picking, hybrid picking(much more than I expected), sweep picking, economy picking and combinations of any/all of these. So it seems that using one or the other may be less benificial than using a combination of several approaches.

MW

Well if this discussion includes religion topics (talking about god) it's a totally different thing.

[CC323]

Thats not true about sweeping, Frank Gambale for example can pull of great licks with sweeping.

Picking is pretty much just what works for you, as long as you do it well. I get some people thinking economy isn't as suited rhythmically, but likewise we can name tons of examples that prove that statement false. Same with alternate picking not being as fast, it's all nonsense because people sometimes fail to see there is more than one road to Rome

However awesome frank's lines may be, they are still supplemented by alternate picking, because economy picking/sweeping are only suitable for one note per string patterns (until you add slurs or alternate picking into the mix). Straight arpeggios and/or 4ths aren't exactly hyper-musical in my opinion. Not that they can't be awesome, but unless you add slurs (like Gambale), you're pretty much limited to that without a bunch of huge jumps that'd probably be more accurately played with alternate picking... but anyway...

Holdsworth is pretty amazing. I saw him at Yoshi's(SF) last November. I can't believe he uses .08 gauge strings though... sheesh.

Take care,
Chris

[Luan]

If you play triplets with straight alternate picking, you know you have the accents first on the downstroke and then on the upstroke every 3. for 16th notes you have the accent every 4 notes on the upstroke if you started it there, or in the downstroke if you started on a down. It's so structured once you master the technique, that you can be sure of how you will gonna pick every note.

[CC323]

Although you're actually more free to choose which notes to accent, you're right about the most 'natural' feeling accents for alternate picking. It's all good though. I wish I could pull of the Paco de Lucia thing... holy crap that guy's insanely fast with 2 fingernails...

[fast1]

so paco de lucia's speed.... is that from hard work or purely talent?

[franco6719]

so paco de lucia's speed.... is that from hard work or purely talent?

Ah, there was another thread about this. No one can say for sure, but I am strongly convinced that it's about 90% hard work, if not more. Talent, IMHO, is in the content and the feel of what he is playing, rather than sheer speed and acurracy which come from INTENSITY and YEARS of concentrated practice.

[gravitas]

However awesome frank's lines may be, they are still supplemented by alternate picking, because economy picking/sweeping are only suitable for one note per string patterns (until you add slurs or alternate picking into the mix). Straight arpeggios and/or 4ths aren't exactly hyper-musical in my opinion. Not that they can't be awesome, but unless you add slurs (like Gambale), you're pretty much limited to that without a bunch of huge jumps that'd probably be more accurately played with alternate picking... but anyway...

Holdsworth is pretty amazing. I saw him at Yoshi's(SF) last November. I can't believe he uses .08 gauge strings though... sheesh.

Take care,
Chris

It's actually astonishingly easy to pull off two, three, or four note per string patterns with economy. It's not all sweeps, guys

[Luan]

Although you're actually more free to choose which notes to accent, you're right about the most 'natural' feeling accents for alternate picking. It's all good though. I wish I could pull of the Paco de Lucia thing... holy crap that guy's insanely fast with 2 fingernails...

Actually, with 3