Alt Picking and rock/metal solo-ing advice needed

Sambostar · November 2013

SCALES AND PATTERNS:

As well as playing little two string picking riffs and small arpegios as mentioned above (Make your own ones up to fit your weaknesses) and practicing working them evenly and cleanly, practicing scales in terms of patterns makes crafting your co ordination a lot more sensical and motivating than straight scales. Much the same way as the Maiden intro mentioned above probably does.

So you know that a scale has 7 intervals then yeah? and then on the 8th you are back to the (1st) root note again, an octave lower or higher right?

OK, so practice an ascending pattern (Say in C major) starting on a E at the 12th fret on the low E string with these intervals:

3-1-2-3, 4-2-3-4, 5-3-4-5, 6-4-5-6, 7,5-6-7, 1-6-7-1, 2-7-1-2, 3-1-2-3.....etc.

You can also just play 1,2,3,4, 2,3,4,5, 3,4,5,6 etc, it's the same pattern but the groups of notes have been shifted about.

Descending you can do the same thing (Eg. In C Major starting on the 10th fret of the B string)

6-1-7-6, 5,7-6-5, 4-6-5-4 etc. Or 1-7-6-5, 7-6-5-4, 6-5-4-3,

So, the beauty of these patterns is that you can apply these basic patterns to anything, you can practice them ALL on one string (Low or high) all the way up or down the board, or from any position on the fretboard across all the strings to practice your picking.

Apply the pattern to a Harmonic minor scale and you sound like Malmsteen or have the descending part in the Vai/Paggini Crossroads movie. They are nice because they have a pulse and sound musical as opposed to straight up and down scales which can sound kind of meaningless and often don't have a pulse.

If you want to get more adventurous do a eight note descending pattern:

1-7-6-5-4-3-4-5, 7-6-5-4-3-2-3-4, 6-5-4-3-2-1-2-3, 5-4-3-2-1-7-1-2, etc.

FINGERINGS:

To make it easier on yourself play scales in positions that are easy to recognise and are familiar to you to start with, although ideally, you want to be able to pick up a scale anyway on the board in a single position, this is why playing on one or two strings helps as it helps you to remember the fret spaces.

So for a 3 octave C major you might want to start with (E) 8-10-12, (A) 8-10-12, (D) 9-10-12, (G) 9-10-12, (B) 10-12-13.

When doing a descending pattern, I would slide down to get into position using my first finger (In the scale above on the G string from 10-9) and doing an ascending pattern where necessary, eg harmonic minor, I would use my third or pinky finger to slide up with to get into position for the next string.

For a four octave A harmonic minor scale I would start out with (E) 5-7-8 (A) 5-7-8 (D) 6-7-9-10 (G) 7-9-10 (B) 9-10-12-13 (E) 10-12-13-16-(17)

Basically playing on one string teaches you longitudinal fret interval recognition. Playing up the strings teaches you how to navigate to be able to easily repeat the thing an octave higher and alot of fast picking stuff is repeated up the octaves, or skips between them.

Finally have a go at this, it's a repeated malmsteen variation of the scale pattern outlined above in D harmonic minor.

E---15-18-17-15--13-17-15-13--15-18-17-15--12-15-13-12--13-17-15-13--10-13-12-10--12-15-13-12--9-12-10-9--10

And this is a killer:

E---18-17-18-15--17-15-17-13--15-13-15-12--13-12-13-10--12-10-12-9-

You can ascend with these as well ^

I am playng this pattern I made up at the moment, it's in C major and just repeats throughout the positions going down the neck, starting in the eighth position ,moving down to the seventh, then the fifth (E 5,7,8, B 5,7,8), the third (E 3-5-7, B 3-5-7) and then the first (E 1-3-5, B 2-3-5) and then moving back up again. It's simple but it's building my strength a bit.

A------------------8---------8-10----8-10-12-10-8-----------------------7------7-8----7-8-10-8-7

E---12-8-10-12---10-12-------12------------------12------10-7-8-10--8-10----10---------------10...etc

Good luck.

Sambostar · November 2013

You see, the problem with picking fast, is that you need to know long passages to actually pick. Ascending triplet scales 1-2-3 patterns soon become boring. So basic fretboard navigation becomes essentially without moving your mouth or looking at what you are doing unless you think inside the box and make recombinations of notes.

Whatever your pattern, no matter how random or bluesy or whatever, Just repeat it up an octave and then another and then another and pick the lot and do the same coming down to begin with.

Sambostar · November 2013

Also practicing just a straight pentatonic, 5-8, 5-7, 5-7, 5-7, 5-8, 5-8 up and down, fast as you can will calibrate your forearm movement. I mean, get it as fast as you can do a trill with your first and third fingers.

viz · November 2013

I'm pretty sure that's the opposite of what Al di Meola does - not saying it's wrong, just interesting.

Sambostar · November 2013

Who is Al di Meola? You mean holding the pick thing and wrist action?

I watched him and he does straighten up his arm more to the vertical and align his wrist angle and angle the pick and he does reign in the wrist swing for very fast continous stuff. It's deceptive as most of his other stuff is half legato or at a slower melody pace, with an emphasis on the different attack of the note and accents.

Course it varies, Zakk wylde is like one extreme and there are others, but by and large, it's a general rule to make it easier.

Marty Friedman being the exception, and these speed freak lecturers who pick by moving their thumbs about:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSaTAGsIBEI

I think the key to holding the pick this way is to be able to change strings fluently at speed easily. Which makes sense because when I fly pick on one string I do the opposite and bend my wrist right over to get a really loud continous stream.

Marty

viz · November 2013

I was thinking about what he says about his rolling wrist - can't find it right now, but check 4:25 - i know that's strumming but he advocates a similar technique for his machine gun picking.

mike_l · November 2013

@Jetfire ; Adrian Smith's solo from Maidens The Wicker Man would be good for you to learn.

Sambostar · November 2013

Yeah, like I said when fly picking I do a similar thing.

Fair enough but if he is advocating that technique for fast picking all up and down the strings, then that is bull, I skimmed four or five of his performances and he definitely does the straighten wrist inline with arm and shake wrist thing for long string changing passages, but if by machine gun picking you mean fly picking on one string, that makes sense. Obviously his arm ain't going to be nearer vertical sitting down with a classical, but his wrist goes in line with his forearm and he shake his wrists with little movements.

This at 2.48:

Sambostar · November 2013

Sorry This at 2:48: I see no flappy wrist actions just a small and rapid shakey flutter..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9cadbYIzhqQ&list=RDBcsVOQ82wLA

Sambostar · November 2013

Sorry if I sound like a Twat, I am one a bit, but this is the technique I was basically trying to explain ^.

viz · November 2013

Yep - you're right! I think maybe what he says and what he does aren't always the same thing!

Sambostar · November 2013

I donno, that is the first time I have heard of him. I guess he was big in the 70's? The bit in your vid above when it faded to an edit after he lost time when his foot tap went wrong...after explaining that his foot tap keeps him in time kind of did it for me. I guess he is more of an artist than a teacher huh. LMFAO.

If he was refering to picking fast on one string AKA Van Halen style that might have been a valid comment. or maybe he's changed his technique a bit or took too much Acid. Who knows.

I much prefer to listen to Malmsteen or Matt Raines, as they are more open and honest about explaining what they do and if they don't understand what they do they say so or better still just watching people play.

I only developed this technique myself because I was stumbling, I set the webcam up and noticed that when I stumbled my thumb was bending, also my thumb was hurting. I did try SRV, but it doesn't work at a million miles an hour.

It's gotta be an all paths eventually lead to Rome kind of thing for the majority of players and I think Marty Friedman has got to be double jointed or something.

Jason Becker was amazing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHownON8heE

mike_l · November 2013

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=C0Y3aEXb6qk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=t9My61NJTxo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=C_fqkNglmGA

viz · November 2013

Sambostar said:

I donno, that is the first time I have heard of him. I guess he was big in the 70's? The bit in your vid above when it faded to an edit after he lost time when his foot tap went wrong...after explaining that his foot tap keeps him in time kind of did it for me. I guess he is more of an artist than a teacher huh. LMFAO.
If he was refering to picking fast on one string AKA Van Halen style that might have been a valid comment. or maybe he's changed his technique a bit or took too much Acid. Who knows.

Yep he was big in the 70's, 80's, 90's, 2000s, and still is! But the jazzers and the malmsteeners don't collide that often so a lot haven't heard of him. But if you can tune your ear to the fusion / world style, it will open you to a whole new world of possibilities - I love his music. I remember the day I was first introduced to him, someone said something very similar to me so I gave him a go and see where it got me! - http://i865.photobucket.com/albums/ab217/Vizzage/Mobile Uploads/image_zps4914cf40.jpg

Sambostar · November 2013

I like Classical players and some Spanish, I will check him out, although I get to feeling like he is a bit of a Santana....

Steve Morse has a 7" thumb and first finger, I have short thumbs and thick knuckles and fingers.

I now play with the side of my finger against the joint of my thumb with my fingers relaxed and not in a tight fist, I don't experience pain in my finger or a wobbly finger movement. I still get thumb pain from time to time, but at present I have this anyway from holding the throttle full bore and the vibes with chainsaw/polesaw/hedgecutter work I do all day and relative to the rest of the pain I feel in the rest of my body on a regular basis these days, it is insignificant. My picking hand thumb muscle is twice the size of my left hand. I try and relax as much as possible and can only speed pick when relaxed but I still get pain in my thumb from time to time playing, but I can't see how I can improve that, or if the pain is actually from work and comes out when playing guitar. I could never play with my hand in a fist like that though and sometimes like to flail my little pinky about with my right hand.

However you do it, whatever your fingers are like, I think the general point is that you make tiny movements with your wrist and don't move your thumb or finger at the knuckle. Although I have seen people pick purely from their fingers, by reflexing their thumb joint and first finger joint and there is a name for that technique, it seems mad to me and is most commonly not advocated.

viz · November 2013

Yeah i can't do that themb knuckle method at all. Al di Meola is deff not a bit of a Santana, not at all! Really he isn't. He's a totally different kettle of fish.

thisisguitar · November 2013

Jetfire said:

So has anyone used a song or riff to help with alt picking? Is there a section from a tune which is awesome to help actually utilise alt picking?

You could do worse than the instrumental run at 7m10s into Scarred by Dream Theater. Also 2m38s into Pull Me Under is another good one (I have those couple of pages of tab with a couple of corrections in the last bar, if you want to PM me your email I'll send them to you).

thisisguitar · November 2013

Al Di Meola, Paco De Lucia and John McLauglin

As Al was mentioned I thought I should draw attention to this ridiculous piece of live performance :-)

McLaughlin is in the full show later on… Friday Night In San Francisco

Catthan · December 2013

There are obviously many ways to practice alt. picking, with 3 note per string patterns being a much used work out. Then using other patterns to help maintain the accuracy of each technique and then building one's own licks based on those is the next step and it's all good and tested. But I think that's only part of the process. Playing everything in patterns which basicaly rely on muscle memory is restricting after a while. Look at Guthrie Govan; he can pick anything anywhere if he likes and that helps as his licks contain chromaticism, trils in adjacent strings etc. So the trick and the way to get more out of practicing imho is NOT to practice in patterns. It is good in the beginning for strengh and coordination but there's not much value in it if all your licks are permuations of patterns that facilitate good use of muscle memory. So, my view is to practice scales using patterns and shapes and then play them without the patterns. Take a scale and play it across the neck using alt. picking only. shapes and patterns are only part of the picture.

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Alt Picking and rock/metal solo-ing advice needed

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