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04-26-2015, 02:21 PM #1276destinytot Guest
How I'm anchoring:
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04-26-2015 02:21 PM
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Originally Posted by destinytot
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04-26-2015, 04:25 PM #1278destinytot GuestOriginally Posted by MarkRhodes
To be honest, I don't really find it helpful to think of the picking hand as a single unit. I prefer the image of a tree, with trunk rooted (grounded) and branches waving in the wind - the flop of pick as the flapping of leaves (couldn't resist -sorry!).
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Originally Posted by destinytot
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the pinky-anchor is hidden by the rest of the hand - that's just how it works isn't it
as i said before there is a purely mechanical or physical aspect to anchoring which is crucial. you use your pinky to set your hand in a constant position relative to the strings - and when you do that properly, getting the same contact with the string all the time becomes genuinely possible, and picking problems vanish.
for this physical thing to work the anchor really has to set your hand in (pretty much) exactly the same place relative to the strings - your hand kind of traces an arc from fat low strings to thin high ones - but the arc is always the same and its always the same distance from the strings.
i felt this happening for the first time when it was the BONES in my pinky that were doing the work. you lock up the finger and the bones set and you let the bones of the pinky hold your hand in place (this frees-up your hand its not 'rigid'). you can do this from the first knuckle rather than bending the pad into the pick guard - but if you rest your right hand along side the pick guard so your fingers are running sort of parallel to the pick guard its very hard to get consistent positioning relative to the strings because its not locked bones and joints that are doing the work but moving muscles.
remember - its all about TOTALLY relaxing your picking hand. (being able to use a SUPER light grip is a symptom of being sufficiently relaxed in that hand). but you can't relax your picking hand as you have to if you aren't managing to use your pinky as a proper anchor.
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04-27-2015, 09:27 AM #1281destinytot GuestOriginally Posted by Groyniad
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Originally Posted by Groyniad
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04-27-2015, 10:41 AM #1283destinytot Guest
Do the times when GB's hand doesn't appear to move along the pickguard coincide with his playing of fast phrases?
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I've decided to do another month of coaching with JC. (I'll start after the first of the coming month, May.)
The first time helped and I probably got as much from it as I was able to absorb at the time. Now some things are better but others are at a fork-in-the-road stage and I need some better advice than I'm able to provide myself. One thing I hope to become clearer about is anchoring.
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Originally Posted by MarkRhodes
The anchor issue is an interesting one, there is a degree of anchoring, but the very name anchor can be a bit deceiving as an anchor is a heavy motionless object. But here we have an anchor that not only moves around, but needs to be light and relaxed. The point was driven home for me, again, watching some of Troy's clips in slo-mo. The side of the pinky is a main point of contact but the tips and sides of other fingers too as they graze the pickguard or the strings or under the strings. Even the side of the thumb, in a strumming context and upward pickslanting direction, brushing the string plane. The "mobile anchor" function thus achieved, it would seem, helps the picking hand know where it is most of the time relative to the strings, it's a sort of guiding device.
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JC Stylles' anchor is the middle segment of his pinky. That works pretty well for me. Looks like that's what Benson and Henry Johnson use, too, based on some investigative Googling.
Have been playing with using "arm motion", and I really like it. I find that when the tempos heat up, I naturally start making smaller and smaller motions, but without trying to "cut off" the arm and shoulder like I've always been taught before. I think that's what Tuck Andress was talking about with starting from "gross" motions. One thing I really like is to think of the pick as just an extension of my thumb.
With all the anchoring discussion, I would caution people to not discount the fact that you have to have an actual motion from the arm that moves the pick between strings. If you anchor, don't just crank the wrist awkwardly to try to reach the bass strings. You are going to have to move the arm and slightly move the anchor. You want the hand position and picking motion to be pretty similar no matter which string you're over. Remember Tuck describing it as the needle and arm of a turn table.
You can see Benson's and JC Stylles' hands actually sliding up on the pick guard and making contact with the high-E when they're on the lower strings. If you're doing a super hard anchor and just cranking the wrist back to reach the low-E, it's going to be impossible to play fluidly.
I think Benson has so many different techniques that it's hard to make determinations about the basics from watching him. He uses his arm to crank back and forth really quickly for his wide interval techniques and all the crazy octave displacement stuff he does. It's easier to see the basic setup by watching Perry Hughes, Henry Johnson, etc.
This thread needs more vids and less postulation, though. I'll try to put something up later to show some of the adaptations I've made.
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the idea that the pinky works as a kind of guiding device so that 'the picking hand knows where it is... relative to the strings' is precisely the idea i was challenging above. there may be this sub-conscious dimension to it - but there's also a flat-out non-conscious dimension too - that is, a purely physical dimension. if you use the pinky right, it ensures your picking finger and thumb is almost precisely the same distance away from the strings all the time - and this is why picking improves IMMEDIATELY you get it right and let your hand go.
i was doing drawing and writing with my five year old this morning and he was trying to draw and write with his whole arm suspended above the paper and table - just hanging in the air. it was obviously going to be almost impossible for him to form any decent letters that way. try it.
you could learn to write like this - if you worked very very hard at it. no contact between hand and paper/desk - just holding your arm/wrist above the paper at the right distance to make contact with the pen.
but its much much better to lay your arm on the table and let all the effort go out of it - not just because it stops fatigue (which makes your arm shake after a while) but because it sets up your wrist/fingers to be in the right place relative to the paper...
the fact that players like benson combine all sorts of techniques seamlessly in their mind-boggling playing should not distract us from the essential points - or from the hard-core fundamental technique he uses.
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Originally Posted by m_d
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Originally Posted by Groyniad
As for keeping the pick almost precisely the same distance away from the strings all the time, I think this is what most people who have played seriously for a while do. They may have bad habits but they will be consistent about them. For example, when I played with a Jazz III pick and only let a smidgen of the tip show, I was staying very close to the strings all the time. (Otherwise, I would have missed 'em altogether!) But my picking was clunky, not smooth. Earlier, when I (like many a self-taught player of my era) anchored the heel of my palm on the bridge, that kept my pick the same distance from the strings all the time. In retrospect, I think it was too close! But it was very consistent.
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Originally Posted by ecj
I agree about the sliding thing too. It's easy to see George doing that some in the 'picking study' video.
I welcome more vids / photos too.
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mark - of course we have all learned to keep our hands very nearly the same distance from the strings
its all in the 'very nearly'
if you use a part of you as what we're calling an 'anchor' - and the way you do it allows the physical dimension of the whole thing take over from the conscious one - your hand will be kept at effectively the SAME distance from the strings moment to moment and every time you pick up the guitar. and that - together with the total relaxation of the picking hand - is what makes the magic start to happen.
i'll do a vid about this if people really are interested. pictures allow for multiple interpretations just like words though.
(and whether its better to bend the pinky IN the way and use the first knuckle as the anchor point or to bend it OUT the way and use the pad or side of the pad is largely about how long your fingers are. if you've got longer than average fingers (benson, wilson and maybe jc too - don't know) then you want the anchoring device to be shorter to get an appropriate distancing from the strings.)Last edited by Groyniad; 04-28-2015 at 11:29 AM.
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I'd be interested in a video, Groyniad.
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[QUOTE=Groyniad;525286]
if you use a part of you as what we're calling an 'anchor' - and the way you do it allows the physical dimension of the whole thing take over from the conscious one - your hand will be kept at effectively the SAME distance from the strings moment to moment and every time you pick up the guitar. and that - together with the total relaxation of the picking hand - is what makes the magic start to happen.
i'll do a vid about this if people really are interested. pictures allow for multiple interpretations just like words though.
QUOTE]
Yes, I'd be interested in such a video.
I still don't know what you mean by a person anchoring but not at the same distance from the strings. Anchoring with the heel of the palm on the bridge---an example I used---was always the same. Not 'very nearly' the same but the same. The bridge was always in the same place and the heel of my palm was always on the same place on the bridge.
I want to be clear. I agree that anchoring is crucial to this technique. It's just that I don't think it unusual that anchoring here keeps one's hand in the same place. I think that's a feature of anchoring, like a feature of gripping the pick is that you don't drop it when you play.Last edited by MarkRhodes; 05-01-2015 at 09:06 AM. Reason: clarity
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Originally Posted by ecj
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Originally Posted by Groyniad
Last edited by m_d; 05-01-2015 at 07:48 AM.
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Originally Posted by MarkRhodes
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When I anchor with my pinkie, when I'm moving from high strings to low strings and vice-versa, I keep my pinkie in the same place even though my hand is moving higher and lower, being moved by the elbow.
Not sure if that's true to the "ideal" of the Benson technique, but I think it works for me.
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Another question: how hard do you strike the strings (when playing single note jazz lines)?
I remember reading an interview with Ritchie Blackmore (-Deep Purple) when I was young. In it, he said that he used very light strings and had developed a very light touch. He played through big Marshall amps and was very loud, but he said his touch on the strings was very light. I think he said he used banjo strings early on. Or perhaps James Burton (-Ronnie Hawkins, Ricky Nelson, Elvis) had done this and in emulating him, Ritchie developed a light touch. With slinky strings one can easily bend them too far, going beyond the pitch sought and sounding awful.
Naturally, we archtop jazz players aren't playing super slinky strings. We don't have to worry that if we press a string too hard it will change pitch undesirably. But we are electric players who use amps and get our volume from them. (Herb Ellis once said that his guitars didn't sound good when played without an amp---that as a rule, laminate guitars don't sound good 'acoustic' but that that isn't a problem. It was a warning to novices: when you're trying one out in a store, you have to plug it in because the way it sounds unplugged is not such an electric guitar's 'natural' sound.) Herb stressed keeping picking motions small as possible.
I think that when JC Stylles talks about their being little difference between upstrokes and downstrokes (in terms of sound produced) with this technique that his downstrokes are not hard.
What do others think of this?
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I can play either hard or soft with this technique.
When I'm playing with hard picking, it's striking through to rest on the higher string, or "above" the lower string on an upstroke.
When I'm playing with a soft picking technique, I don't even try to "pick" the strings. I try to "brush" them.
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Originally Posted by Shadow of the Sun
Ham Radio
Yesterday, 05:39 PM in Everything Else