Mailbag: Picking / Smoothing It Out
(19 Oct 02)
Combining Picking and Legato
Did you read my conversation with Thorsten ("Shred Talk!"), and did you check out the licks and soundfiles that belong to the article? If not, you might wanna do so.
Cuz the first few licks are the perfect examples for what I wanna talk about now. Thorsten played a four note per string-picking sequence, first with all alternate picking, then mixing up alternate picking with hammer on's and pull offs to get a smoother sound.
That is what we wanna look at now. I wrote a bunch of stuff about picking, and I wrote an article about legato (hammer ons, pull offs...) too, so we have already talked about the basics.
Now, let's see what we can do with this. This will be our next step. Combining those two techniques can really result in a smooth, flowing sound, maybe even enabling us to speed up a bit.
I mentioned Paul Gilbert a lot in my picking articles. He actually uses a lot of those picking / hammering / pulling-combinations, while also using only either one of them sometimes.
Before we start: make sure you are familiar with the techniques and feel comfortable with them. Those are our basic building blocks, and before we start getting into anything else, we wanna make sure we can do both without problems.
OK, let's take a look at our first exercise:
Those are three basic exercises demonstrating the approach I wanna show to you. As you see, you're using mainly pull offs on the high E-String, and strict alternate picking on the B-String.
The very first note on the high E-String is picked also, with an upstroke. That way, we start the picking on the B-string with a downstroke, which I guess is the most natural thing to do.
Pay attention:
Make sure all notes are exactly in time. Sometimes you might tend to rush on the pulled notes, in comparison dragging on the picked notes. Make sure the timing-s right. It might help to count those 6 notes as triplets instead, setting the metronome to twice the speed (if you i.e. play those sixtuplets at 60 bpm, see them as triplets and set your metronome to 120 bpm. Every beat will be at the beginning of each three note-sequence)
I think that, once you get used to this approach, you can here what I was talking about earlier. This sounds a bit different than it would if you'd pick each note. The combination of pulling-off and picking puts some kind of an emphasis on the picked notes. The pulled-off notes sound rather smooth, while the picked notes sound kinda agressive (Did I mention... PICK HARD!). This is something you'll hear guys like Paul Gilbert do a lot.
In the second sequence, we just skip to the B- and G-string. We also have to slightly change positions... get used to it, the licks at the end of this article will have some killer position-changes which will make the one in bar 2 look easy as pie.
Now before we go on to the next exercises... please make sure you can play those basic exercises accurately, in time and at a decent speed (it's up to you to decide which one is a decent speed for you... you know your limits and top-speeds better than I do, hopefully)
Don't betray yourself, be honest... make i.e. sure that you really pick and hear each note. Make sure you really do. You will have a hard time learning it right once you start to speed up the following licks...
Here we go...
Do you kinda see now what I meant when I mentioned the position changes in the upcoming licks. OK, what's happening here is: we're moving down the B- and E-string in the key of E-Minor. After each sixtuplet, we're changing the position and pattern.
That is why it is important that you work on the first three exercises a lot. It is necessary to become completely comfortable with the "pick the first note, pull off to the next two, pick all notes on the B-String"-part.
You shouldn't have to really think about it anymore. As long as you have to, stick with the basic exercises above. As soon as you don't have to anymore, you can work on the second exercise (also try it in different keys), where you'll have to really focus on your left hand. If you don't have to think about what you're doing with your right, it will be easier (D'UH !!!)
Here's the next one:
This is very similar to the one above, only we're starting on the C this time.
You'll most likely have to work on those kinda licks for a while, so that's why I am showing you several of them...
OK, now I just trust you and hope you are familiar with the technique and have been spending a lot of time practicing the licks above before you start reading this next part.
And I KNOW you are waiting for another killer-Paul Gilbert-lick, right? (Or is it just me?!?!)
Here it comes... I posted this one at the forum before. It is actually one of my all time favorite licks, cuz it really made me pay attention to both the stretch pentatonic and the picking / legato-combination.
It is the first solo-lick of the outro of "Rock N'Roll Over", from the first Mr. Big album (titled "Mr. Big"... D'Uh!).
This one definitely is a chopbuilder, so take your time. Start out very slowly. Get used to the patterns and position-switching. The key here actually is Gmin / Bb Major, and the lick's based on the pentatonic scale.
That means, we have wild stretches, huge interval leaps and we'll even need string-skipping. So, set your metronome to a really slow tempo and try to play through the whole thing a lot of times very slowly, making sure that each notes sounds good, memorizing the patterns.
It really took me a while to nail this one, and I can tell you: you have to start out slow and pay attention to the accuracy, cuz it will sound like crap if you just try to play it at high-speed immediately. Try to avoid sloppy notes and noise.
By the way, does this kinda remind you of the intro to "Colorado Bulldog"? Go figure...
Anyway, here is the ascending version (which does not occur in the song, but I made one up, cuz I like the sound of it and really spend a lot of time with this kinda stuff)
Just to give you some more stuff to work on, here's pretty much the same thing in E Minor:
Work on all this till you can play something similar in different keys. It might take a while till you can "see" the patterns, but once you get used to this way of Picking/hammering/pulling in combination with those wacky huge interval runs, you might find some cool things to add to your repertoire.
Turn da page !
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