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Long and the short of it:
Things that I wonder about: Is Reg's (from the forum) fundimental technique (the actual motion) that different from Cecil's or let's say Sebastien Giniaux's?
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03-25-2023 03:30 PM
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Originally Posted by bediles
the hardest thing was ensuring the pick didn’t turn (a common problem) so I cheated and used two fingers. So that’s why I don’t call it benson picking.
As far as underhand vs conventional pick grips there's also a number of motion mechanics associated. Seems like Django style players are taught a rotational mechanic similar to putting out a match while the benson pickers all have slightly different mechanics but some are very similar to Django style.
In fact when I was playing acoustic guitar that’s what stopped me going over completely. Couldn’t get the sound with underhand. I don’t know how Giniaux does it. So I was stuck with two techniques. Come the pandemic I decided to do everything trad grip and make myself play that way. But I still reflexively go back to underhand often because it feels so natural.
Nowadays I don’t know what I do mechanics wise. Im not so interested in acoustic projection so I’m moving to a more electric technique that permits muting etc. Probably more rotation, some compound motions. I think I’m transition atm. My picking is great for lines but it doesn’t support me for hybrid stuff that I want to do for counterpoint and so on.
Underhand picking uses perhaps more ‘door knocking.’
There's also the degree of arm supination that could change the motion used for example, Dan Wilson is more supinated than Cecil, his wrist motion may have more flexion/extension than deviation.
I keep bringing this up bc I think the actual movement the wrist or arm makes plays a big role in the ease of technique, relaxation etc and there seems to be a forearm rotational aspect to all these underhand player's forms too which makes me think it's closer to gypsy picking than I previously thought.
Picking one string very fast is a different type of motion to playing an arpeggio for instance. I kind of think of it as learning a series of gestures that work with your body. Arpeggio is one gesture, descending scale is another.
Alternate picking otoh is always the same. So you are rigorously apply a one size fits all solution to everything. Benefit is evenness and grid time (not the be all and end for rhythm all but you can develop a nice pocket.) otoh it creates significant problems that require solving. For instance the body does not naturally like to alternate and will go into spasm - another reason Gypsy pickers might be taught to engage different muscle groups on the down and up strokesLast edited by Christian Miller; 05-26-2023 at 05:20 AM.
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Originally Posted by bediles
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Originally Posted by Christian Miller
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Originally Posted by bediles
But maybe they are the same with their downward pick slant forearm rotation motions. Harder to see face on with Cecil bc he plants his pinkie and ring finger but from the instagram vid looks like he's at least trying to feel that motion. Camera angles down the strings elucidate these moments.
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Originally Posted by Christian Miller
I'm obsessed with picking mechanics ATM
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I checked out some of Cecil's videos including this one below to see where he may or not sweep on ascending arpeggios.
My conclusion is he does it sometimes and not other times. He seems to be inconsistent. If you check out his discussion about playing arpeggios up and scales down in the accompanying video, he sweeps across 2 strings on some of his arpeggios but not others.
Soooo, take from that what you will.
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Originally Posted by setemupjoe
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And not to sidetrack the conversation but another great player using the same right hand technique is Perry Hughes.
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Perry Hughes is quite the player, wow!
For whether Cecil sweeps ascending arps, probably tempo based. Different techniques btw fast and medium tunes but all still in the dwps, ascending economy picking ball park.
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Back in 1982 I got to take a lesson with Jim Hall. I was way too green to take a lot of it in but years later after I developed my own technique and had developed the right hand techniques from Rodney Jones that we're talking about in this thread, I noticed Jim Hall uses the same reverse picking technique. The first time I noticed this it blew my mind. He's the last person I would have thought of to use this.
Check his hand out in this video which was shared on another thread recently.
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Does Benson picking support strict alternate picking?
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Originally Posted by charlieparker
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Originally Posted by charlieparker
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Originally Posted by charlieparker
If it's just the underhand grip then you can alternate pick and escape the strings any way depending on your arm supination or pronation.
But if we're talking the grip, plus the supination of the arm and the pick stroke that creates rest strokes (whatever that may be) then you're probably going to be alternate picking, economy ascending, finding ways to arranging fingerings to be even numbers of notes on a string like the manouche style at least for speedy stuff.
It's outlined here pretty nicely, half way down the page:
DWPS Economy – Cracking the Code
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Originally Posted by bediles
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Originally Posted by charlieparker
The arm/hand doesn't need to be supinated (underhand) to have that Benson pick orientation but at least in electric jazz, they seem to come together as a package amongst the famous guys/gals.
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I tried Benson (or more likely, some underhand variant) for a while when I was more focussed on playing rock. I found it had two drawbacks for me: considerably more difficult to perform right-hand muting (although players such as Santana and Neal Schon seem to manage okay), and lack of pinched harmonics (not so important now I've embarked on my jazz odyssey).
But you don't need the underhand grip to have the pick at an angle and glide across the strings. Angling the pick (rotating around the direction normal to the plane of the strings) is quite common amongst shredders, as I learnt from a Jackson guitar forum :P. And that's what I typically use. I also rest my thumb on the lower string(s) for muting.
But since getting into jazz, all thoughts of optimising my picking have gone, since I lose my way in the form at tempos much slower than when technique becomes a barrier.
Pebber Brown was a big advocate of picking using the key-turning wrist mechanic. Google Pebber Brown Sarod for many examples. But it also has the problem of no right hand muting since the hand floats above the strings. I think it's similar to what Eddie Van Halen uses for his tremolo picking passages.
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Originally Posted by CliffR
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found this masterclass. haven't watched it but thought about the JGF when I stumbled upon it.
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I just checked out the Cecil picking masterclass on his site and can't help but ask a potentially ignorant question - do three note per string scales (with downstrokes on downbeats) simply not work with the rest stroke technique?
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Originally Posted by Will T.
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Originally Posted by Will T.
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I bought Alexander's picking course the other week. He's basically a downward picking-slanting economy player as his primary or base technique, with various exceptions such as cross-picking (which is why some might think he was a purely alternate picker) and occasional upward sweeps, all to mix it up to play his bebop ideas.
I am contemplating adopting his picking mechanic as my primary one. Trouble is - or perhaps it's no trouble... - my existing technique of alternate picking where possible with the downstrokes aligned with the downbeats etc. works pretty well to an extent. I can play Donna Lee at 220 BPM... But things still feel a bit string hoppy. I experimented earlier trying to apply some Gypsy picking ideas to the head of Donna Lee and although it obviously takes a while to get used to something new, I still felt a bit unsure. I mean, I find pure alternate picking 3-notes-per-string scales quicker/easier than economy picking that, for some reason. OTOH I need to get away from string hopping, and so I need to pursue the very basic remedy to that - the rest stroke ... I think I'm just going to have to cultivate more than one picking mechanic, which actually, is exactly what I have been doing... So anyway who knows? I sure as hell don't......
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I've made the decision to go all-in on the downward pick-slanting economy style, and have just spent the best part of an afternoon notating all the pick strokes on the Donna Lee melody in accordance with this picking style. I deviate in one or two places where I might use a swipe or a little bit of cross-picking, but it's ok to deviate a bit like Cecil Alexander does and in any case not all (for example) Gypsy jazz guitarists will start a new string with a downstroke, they'll occasionally use a swipe. And yeah, going to avoid improvising much for a while, until I get my head and hands around these mechanics. Just playing a scale with this isn't too head-scratching but the thought of 'translating' so to speak various scale patterns and exercises from pure alternate picking (or string-hopping lol) into this style will take some work. Assembling a vocabulary from the ground up, too...
Enharmonics
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