george benson picking muting

**Shadow of the Sun** · 09-03-2011, 12:29 PM

For me, personally, resting the side of the hand or the wrist on the pickguard is unweildy and uncomfortable; I drape my unused fingers over the pickguard and do the Benson style picking that way.

Personally, if I can make an observation, I think the real beauty of Benson's picking style is the ease in which you can use rest strokes- they happen automatically; you don't need to stop the motion with your muscles, the string does it for you, which really relaxes things and makes picking a lot more fun.

**setemupjoe** · 09-03-2011, 01:08 PM

There's a few things to make clear with the Benson picking method. First is how you hold the pick. The traditional method is holding the pick between the pad of the thumb and the side of the forefinger. With the different hand angle of the Benson technique you will now be holding the pick between the pad of your thumb and the pad of your forefinger. This seems more natural to me because you naturally apply pressure with the pad of your finger, not the side of your finger. Now you're squeezing the pick between two fingers more naturally. You can't really exert pressure with the side of your forefinger. He's a photo to illustrate.

The second point is how you rest your hand. While holding your guitar in your lap, look down at the pickguard. Cup your hand in a natural relaxed way and place it lightly on the pickguard so you should be looking at your cupped palm.

Now as you pick each string you'll notice that you're hand is forced to play rest strokes. That is the pick moves over the string you're picking and comes to rest on the string below it. This movement is key to the Benson technique and gives you much better control over your picking. Also notice your pick is at an angle to the string of around 45 degrees. This gives a softer tone as you strike the string and also makes it easier to pick each note.
Hope this helps.

**orasnon** · 09-03-2011, 01:30 PM

Originally Posted by Philco

1 The slice of the pick
2 The movement really comes from the elbow not the wrist. This gives you incredible and predictable control. So you are not moving /rotating you hand from the wrist.
If I did a pentatonic scale.......in the rock box pattern.......2 notes per string from high E to low E you would see that my pick and hand move in a dead straight line from the high string to the lo. There is NO arc of the wrist and change of pick direction. The pick hits the string at exactly the same angle as it moves from high to low. Predictable, controllable. No changing angle.

Notice how when most players do that lick they get to the bottom string and kind of flourish or emphasise that last stroke harder than the rest. That's because their wrist is rotating as they go down the strings and when they reach the bass string it pivots off. Even a good floating picker has to work on that.
Not with this technique. You just get there the same angle as when you started except your arm from the elbow has done the pivot and your wrist adjusts so that the pick angle stays the same.
That's where the economy comes from.
The slice offers less resistance and you have simplified the whole wrist and pick angle situation.

I don't know how else to describe it.

Great explication. Thanks!!

If I may as a couple more questions, please: 1) is the rest stroke only employed when ascending a scale (ie, going from low to high strings); or is also used going down?. 2) Is it strict alternate picking? Thanks!!!

**setemupjoe** · 09-03-2011, 04:21 PM

I'm sure different people will have different answers to that so I can only speak for myself. The pick motion is dictated by your hand position so when you pick down it naturally falls onto the next string. Picking up doesn't have that same sense of gravity that the down pick does so you're not hitting that adjacent string with as much force but the motion is similar to the downstroke.
Alternate picking or sweeping may be up to the individual but what I was taught was to sweep going from low string to high and alternate picking from high string to low. Sometimes for effect I will sweep a line going from high to low but generally I follow that rule.

**Jazzpunk** · 09-03-2011, 05:47 PM

Any Benson converts care to post some playing examples? Be cool to see/hear the 'silver bullet' technique you've acquired in action!

**kid deluxe** · 09-03-2011, 05:47 PM

great thread!
here is a viedeo I found on youtube:

**setemupjoe** · 09-03-2011, 09:09 PM

Yeah, that's Rodney Jones, my old teacher. Great clip.

**Philco** · 09-03-2011, 10:20 PM

Originally Posted by setemupjoe

There's a few things to make clear with the Benson picking method. First is how you hold the pick. The traditional method is holding the pick between the pad of the thumb and the side of the forefinger. With the different hand angle of the Benson technique you will now be holding the pick between the pad of your thumb and the pad of your forefinger. This seems more natural to me because you naturally apply pressure with the pad of your finger, not the side of your finger. Now you're squeezing the pick between two fingers more naturally. You can't really exert pressure with the side of your forefinger. He's a photo to illustrate.

The second point is how you rest your hand. While holding your guitar in your lap, look down at the pickguard. Cup your hand in a natural relaxed way and place it lightly on the pickguard so you should be looking at your cupped palm.

Now as you pick each string you'll notice that you're hand is forced to play rest strokes. That is the pick moves over the string you're picking and comes to rest on the string below it. This movement is key to the Benson technique and gives you much better control over your picking. Also notice your pick is at an angle to the string of around 45 degrees. This gives a softer tone as you strike the string and also makes it easier to pick each note.
Hope this helps.

That's exactly how my hand position looks.
But riddle me this...........if Mr Benson holds his pick thusly...........and I think he does...........why is he able to bring his wrist over the bridge.
My wrist and your wrist aren't going over the bridge.
His hand goes over the bridge and the pick ends up about 1/2" before the first pick up.
Is he shorter in stature perhaps? Meaning shorter arms.
I'm 6'1 and my hand is so large that if I rest it on the bridge then the pick is at the last fret of the guitar.
So I have to curl my wrist around or "cup my hand" as in your photo meaning I can't really mute over the bridge.
I'm not 100% sure that he is doing that.
I cannot maintain the angle of the pick unless I curl my wrist and as soon as I lose that angle then the benefits of the technique disappear.

What I'm getting at is that this technique is going to be different in regard to the individuals physiology.............and it will differ from guitar to guitar.
My Tele is better for the hand position than my GB10 for example.

Great photos by the way.

**Philco** · 09-03-2011, 10:23 PM

Oh I see that Rodney's wrist is right on the bridge.
Man I cannot do that. I would have to break my wrist or chop a bit of my hand off!

**Philco** · 09-04-2011, 12:30 AM

Originally Posted by Richb

Ok. another caveat:

Every single player that uses this hand position seems to sound - more or less - like George. Which is a bad thing , in my book.
There are scores of guys who do it, and they even adopt the RH position in their unabashed attempts to ape GB.....

And I say again, you can get the GB thing without using that position. Think Oberg, Bireli etc etc.

Well Rodney plays a lot of GB licks.
Sheryl Bailey sounds like herself.
Adam Rogers sounds like himself.

I think more in the spirit of......."why not question the method that was given to you"
Who is to say that there is only one correct method?
Pat Metheney has one of the most different techniques I've ever seen. Works for him.
Kurt Rosenwinkel has a very non standard style and it works for him.

It's great when people question the norm.
A lot of players want to sound like GB. So they adopt the technique to do it.
If that's what they want then so be it.
You are not going to automatically sound like GB if you adopt the technique.
You will sound like you..........but more in control.
Oberg's favorite guitar player?.......you guessed it, GB.

Personally I listen to more sax players than guitarists and this technique has made covering some of those non guitaristic things a lot easier.

It's just a technique. It's not the "Sound like George" technique.
If you play his licks and use that technique then you're gonna sound like him.
Not such a great idea in my book but we all have a choice.

**setemupjoe** · 09-04-2011, 01:28 AM

Originally Posted by Richb

Ok. another caveat:

Every single player that uses this hand position seems to sound - more or less - like George. Which is a bad thing , in my book.
There are scores of guys who do it, and they even adopt the RH position in their unabashed attempts to ape GB.....

And I say again, you can get the GB thing without using that position. Think Oberg, Bireli etc etc.

I didn't adopt this right hand technique to be a George Benson clone and I don't think I sound all that much like him although I am a big fan. I changed over to this technique because I'd hit a wall in my playing and I couldn't seem to get any further technically the way I was playing. When I sat down with Rodney Jones and watched what he was doing the thing that floored me most was the control, precision and laid back groove. I just thought, "That's what I've been looking for!"
Mark Whitfield and Norman Brown both sound very much like Benson to me, but neither use this right hand style. Russell Malone, Sheryl Bailey, Rodney Jones don't sound so much like Benson in my mind but they do use this right hand style.
The thing is, no one here is ramming the Benson technique down anyone's throat. We're all just talking from our own personal experience and it seems some of us have had positive results from changing over. If I can help someone like I was helped to find some answers, then great.

**Philco** · 09-04-2011, 08:51 PM

Originally Posted by Richb

I still ask, are you "Benson-tech-users" comfortable w/ the fact you can't mute properly, probably can't use OD sounds, and can't hybrid pick? Seems like an awfully large trade-off simply to gain a certain relaxation/velocity which is clearly achievable thru more common hand positions?

Yes I have an empty feeling, like I'm missing out on something.

Oh wait........I forgot I can play both ways

**setemupjoe** · 09-04-2011, 09:40 PM

Originally Posted by Richb

Fair enough, but it can't be argued that the majority of guys using this position are GB soundalikes - or attempting to be.....but you are right, there are cats who use a more standard RH who are unashamedly aping GB, like Oberg, Norman B, Serge Krieff, et al.
And then there are a few who use the GB position and are going for their own sound, like David Gilmore, and a few others, but even in these players, I can always clearly hear the Benson thing in their sound.....which should be something an artist should be trying to get as far away from as possible, imo.

I think there's a distinction to be made between having influences in your playing and ripping off someone else's style. We all pay homage to someone. We all have a little Charlie Christian in our playing. No one can play octaves without giving a nod to Wes. Peter Bernstein sounded sooo much like Grant Green in his younger years. Benson himself came out of Grant Green, Charlie Christian and Wes. And you can hear that in his playing. But I wouldn't say he was mimicking any of them. I can hear Jim Hall in Pat Metheny's playing. With Birelli it's Django. We all take the influences of the guitarists we admire most and build on that. I think it's a mistake to think we have to eradicate any vestige of our influences.
I'm proud to wear my influences but I agree I don't want to sound like a clone of anyone.

**Shadow of the Sun** · 09-04-2011, 10:41 PM

I honestly don't have any difficulty playing with distortion or muting while picking in the Benson style (which is, frankly, just how I naturally pick; holding the pick the normal way is uncomfortable for me). I can comfortably palm mute and pick Benson style without any problems, except perhaps a slightly slower speed, but that's it.

**orasnon** · 09-05-2011, 02:49 PM

Great thread, thanks for sharing knowledge and opinions.

It's amazing how a "simple' technique can provoke so much discussion

**bay221** · 01-07-2013, 02:29 AM

It was always hard to find players using the "Benson technique" I first learned this picking style in 1976 from a Italian guitarist from Cleveland OH,Ralph Russo, who explained that it was an old European style of plectrum playing. That led me to look to players from other parts of the world for some examples of this playing style... The Puerto Rican cuatro players seem to be using this style a lot!
Here's a video example. I'll post some other players later.