Introduction
Hi there,
and welcome to "Why Not Do Both? / Legato Part II". As the second half of the title might suggest, legato is not the only thing I wanna talk about this time. Also, it's not the regular "Part II", where I just add some more difficult licks, building on the first part.
Instead, I want to show you a different approach to the legato-technique, especially hammer-on's. As you might know by now, I used to study with Brett Garsed at the GIT. Brett really is a master of the legato-technique... it's amazing what kind of stuff he comes up with.
One of the things I always liked about his legato-playing is that it's very smooth and fluid. Sometimes, it's pretty much impossible to figure out which note is picked and which is hammered on, or when he is going from one string to another. It's almost like a piano, a long flow of notes, not sounding choppy at all.
And this is where Brett's hammer-on-technique enters the equation. Before I get into details, I want to point something out: This article is not supposed to tell you to change anything about your technique. I rather try to make some suggestions, show you stuff you can check out. If you feel like this stuff does not work for you at all, that's perfectly fine.
If you already have a decent amount of playing technique, and if you're happy with your technique and the sounds you can get with it, this might not be of interest for you. But maybe you wanna check out the stuff I am gonna show you next.
OK. Let's look at our "regular" legato-style, the techniques most of us are familiar with:
Bar 1: You have the hammer-on, where you hammer one of your l.h. fingers onto the fretboard to sound a note.
Bar 2: And you have the pull-off, where you yank a finger away from the string, usually slightly off to the side, to sound another note (the next one you're either fretting with another finger, or an open string)
For ascending on one string, we usually use hammer-on's, and pull off's when we go down again, right? That's the good ol' Van Halen / Page-style hammer on / pull off-stuff we usually use (especially rock-players)
Now, that works fine. It can be used for high speeds, if done right it really gets a good tone out of the string (notes loud enough). At first we usually use too much strength, especially for the pull-offs, really yanking the string when doing a pull-off. The more we use it, the more we play, the lighter our touch gets, and after a while, we use less strength... if you're lucky, it's just the right amount of strength you need to make the notes ring, without using TOO MUCH strength.
Now, when I first listened to guys like Brett Garsed, I was absolutely amazed by his smooth legato-tone. When he was doing one of his long legato-runs over several strings, it was really hard to tell when he actually skipped from one string to the next. It's was a nice sound, very "fluid". Back then I thought it was just a matter of the gear, tone and the fact that Brett has been playing for so long.
(Turn the page...)
Garsed-style legato
I was wrong. Once I took lessons with him at the GIT, I was introduced to a different approach to legato-runs... I call it the "all-hammer"-approach.
See, two things will get you some choppy notes when doing legato runs: the notes you pick when you skip from one string to the next, and usually, the pull-off are a bit too... well... prominent.
Brett is using a different approach. First of all, he doesn't pick very hard, so the picked notes are at about the volume of the legato ones.
And, here's the cool thing: When descending on a string, he often is not using pull-off's, he uses HAMMER ON'S !!!
Confused?
Well, look at the next TAB. This is a basic, chromatic legato-exercise, using all four fingers of the left hand. You pick the first note (G#), hammer on to A, hammer on to A#, hammer on to B. Then, you pull off back to the A#, pull-off to A, pull off to G#
Now here is what Brett would do:
See? He hammers the notes A-A#-B, just like in the other example. When he goes back to A#, he doesn't pull-off from B to A#. Instead, he slightly raises his pinkie (which fretted the B) and hammers on the A# with his ring-finger. The pinkie is lifted off carefully, so it's not doing a pull-off. It simply stops fretting the B and leaves the string without making a noise. Then, the ring finger is being raised, and the middle finger hammers on the A. ET CETERA !
Do ya understand what I am trying to explain?
As I mentioned several times before, I thought that my legato-technique was pretty good already when I went to the GIT the first time. Well, until I saw and heard Brett play.
And I actually tried this "all hammering"-approach. It was EXTREMELY tough to avoid pull-offs and do those "backward hammer on's" instead.
Why did I do that? Nope, Brett didn't force me. He pointed out several times that if I couldn't adjust to it or if I really felt it wasn't for me, I didn't have to do it. But the sound and efficiency he got out of it really appealed to me, and I always like to try out new stuff. Sometimes it's a dead-end street to do so, but hey, maybe you'll find something new that's perfect for you, and might help you to take a big leap forward. If it doesn't, you might have lost some time, but at least you tried it.
Anyway, as I said, it was tough getting used to this, but I noticed some things about it:
1. The sound actually was smoother, more fluid. After I adjusted to the technique a bit, most of the notes were at exactly the same volume. Once I started to pick less hard when changing strings, it was hard to determine when I was going from one string to the next. It sounded like one long, flowing run, like those fast, smooth seamless piano-runs I like so much.
2. Speaking of the piano, it was a lot like piano-technique. The movement was the same when ascending and descending, which made a lot of sense to me.
3. It seemed to me as if this was a bit more accurate, required less muting, since there were no pull-off's anymore, which sometimes caused some noise when I pulled off too hard or far and accidentially hit the adjacent string.
4. One very important thing: Just like with the "alternate picking vs. economy picking"-discussion, I found out that "regular ho/po vs. all ho" is not an "either or"-thing. To quote Mick Goodrick: "My students often ask me "Should I play it this way or that way?" I always reply "Why not do both?"
Well, that applies here too. The all-ho-technique has a certain sound, certain advantages, and if you can use both that technique and regular ho's / po's, you have two different approaches and "colors" in your trickbag. You can pick which one works better for the lick you wanna play, which one is more appropiate regarding sound and feel.
More examples / AP vs EP
OK, here are a few more exercises for that technique. Basic legato-exercises, which, in this case, should be played with all ho's. When we have a descending line on one string, the hammer-ons are indicated with smaller bows above the TAB, called "hammer on from nowhere". This is because the program (Powertab) is not yet able to display this the right way.
Did I just mention economy picking? Yeah, I did. Well, as a GIT-grad, I sure had my fair share of working on that technique. Just a quick reminder: economy picking is a different approach to the picking-technique. It's something like the missing link between alternate picking and sweep picking.
Look at the two examples below:
The first two bars show parts of the major scale (3 Notes Per String), played ascending (bar 1), and descending (bar 2). This is played with strict alternate-picking (d-u-d-u-d-u)
Now, when you use economy picking, you'd play it the way it's pictured here:
As you can see, you have two consecutive downstrokes (bar 1, ascending) or upstrokes (bar 2, descending) when going from one string to another. This movement is more economical (hence the name), and is similar in approach to sweep-picking.
These days, quite a lot of players use this technique, and like it. I actually do prefer strict alternate picking, since that is the way I worked on most before and after the GIT. But I can understand the advantage of economy picking, and I occasionally use that technique too. It works great for examples like the one above (or the Frank Gambale-ish lick pictured below)...
Problems occur if you start adding or taking away notes. If you i.e. have 3 notes on one string, 2 on the next, 3 on the next, 4 on the one after that, economy picking might not work anymore. Alternate picking is more "sturdy" that way. After you got used to it, it hardly matters anymore if you take away notes or add some.
Now, just like the legato- stuff I talked about, there is no "either-or" here. I have heard big discussions about which of the two is better, economy- or alternate picking.
Well, why not DO BOTH? I know it's a challenge to get used to BOTH approaches. But wouldn't it be great to have a choice. To use either one of those techniques, depending on what kind of lick you're playing, or what kind of sound you want.
Remember the Steve Morse-articles I wrote? Steve plays triad-arps (one note per string) with all alternate-picking. First of all, because he's used to playing that way, 2. because he wanted that very defined PICKING-tone, instead of sweeping it, 3. because he considers it more accurate, timing-wise.
Lately, I have heard that John Petrucci sometimes plays those kinda arps the same way. It depends on the sound you want, and what feels good for you. If you want that ALTERNATE PICKING-sound, you should use alternate-picking. If you want it really really fast or rather "flowing", you might decide that sweep-picking gets you closer to the results you want.
I think it's silly to limit yourself to either "AP" or "EP", or "h.o./p.o." or "all h.o.'s"
I think it's so much more rewarding and logical to use both techniques, and pick which one you use. I know, that takes a lot of work (for someone who has used strict AP for a long time, it might be tough to get used to EP all of a sudden. For some, it's not...)
Many good players try to find different ways of playing a melody, regarding the phrasing they use... dynamics, bends, legato-stuff, timing, etc. Or they have a plethora of different sounds to choose from, to be able to make different passages sound different too.
Well, then why not learn different ways of playing something regarding the TECHNIQUE, and trying either one of them to see which one works best.
Conclusion
To sum this up, maybe the "all h.o."-technique is a revolution for you. Maybe you try it and hate it. But at least try it. There are many ways to play something, and trying out new ways sure does not hurt.
Each of the techniques described above has certain advantages and disadvantages, but if used for the right lick, or at the right time, they might be a better solution than their respective "counterpart".
So, maybe it's worth the effort to i.e. work on BOTH AP and EP... it sure will make you a more well-rounded player, in my opinion.
Try it...
HERE'S THE POWERTAB WITH ALL THE EXAMPLES FROM THIS ARTICLE: LEGATO 2