"piano" tapping

[Bande]

Hi!

I saw a video on metacafe.com of a guy playing amazing things on the guitar. One thing he was playing was a tapping technique, where he was tapping with both of his hands, but he placed his left hand on the fretboard from above, not from below (the whole thing looks like when someone plays the piano).

Here is the link to the video, if you also want to see:
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/44026/all_the_guitar_tricks_possible/

(the tapping part is around the second half of the video)

I have a question about this technique:

When i try to play something with this tapping technique the problem is that when I release my finger fro mthe fret, the open string sounds in. I would be able to play this two-hand tapping thing, if e.g a piece of paper or a T.P would be put under the first fret, in order the stop the open string sounding.

But this guy doesn't have anything under the strings, and for him, the open strings doesn't make any noise, and his playing is very very clean.

He MUST be muting those strings somehow (otherwise the open strings would make the sound) but I don't know how.

If you know how to execute that technique, please reply!

Cheers

[Shredmaniac]

He may be muting the strings with his left hand pinkie, using the remaining three fingers of the left hand and his right hand to tap. Have you tried that approach?

[Bande]

So you say he mutes all strings with the pinkie likeone does palm muting?

[Shredmaniac]

First of all I do not know for sure, it was just a suggestion =) If I had to play a polyphonic tapping piece I would definitely dampen the strings with a piece of cloth or tape. I often do that when recording standard position pieces too ^^

And I was more thinking about the left hand pinkie being placed across the strings that need to be muted, kind of like a "low-pressure" barre.

The other possibility is that is right hand plays strings that were previously fretted by his right hand. Since the left hand mostly plays the bass part in your example it is not necessary to mute them (the left hand has more strength and the bass strings more tension). Playing notes with the right hand on the same strings (while the left hand is still in place) could provide the dampening needed.

Again, I watched the video quickly.

Hope this helps,

Pierre

[Diabolet]

Just check out Stanley jordans master session/starlicks video and you'll see how they go about 'the touch technique' in detail. Also they tend to use stringdampners and a filed down fret and impossibly low action. There guitars are set up like that for that style of playing only.

Heres another video of one of those guitarisits.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbZe45eicDE&search=double%20neck

On his website he goes in to good detail with exercises about how to play in that fasion, also theres a link to stanleys website aswell.
http://adam.fulara.com/e.php?g=articles