Introduction
Alrighty, we had some requests for some article about legato, both in the forum and by Email. And it makes sense. I was actually planning on writing an article about combining picking with hammer on's and pull off's first, but it makes perfect sense to take a look at those techniques first, because some of us still have problems with those. Or maybe they wanna explore that kinda stuff a bit further.
First of all, what is legato? Legato is kind of an approach to playing, it is like a combination of several techniques: hammer-ons, pull-offs, even taps, slides etc. All those techniques have a different sound than straight alternate picking, so it's a different color we can use.
Legato-playing (if executed well) has some kind of a smooth, fluid sound. Think of it like this: Every melody played by picking exclusively resembles the sound of a piano, while a passage played with hammer on's and pull off's and slides rather resembles instruments like the saxophone.
Some players seem to favor either one of those two "concepts", either straight picking or legato-playing. But once you take a closer look you'll see that many of those can do both, but prefer one of them.
Steve Morse has an incredible picking technique and uses that a whole lot, but he also knows how to play wonderful legato-lines. Also, he uses trills (which are some kind of legato-playing too) to embellish his melodies.
Joe Satriani uses more of the legato-stuff, being able to play runs with hammer ons and pull-offs at about light-speed. But he's proven often enough that he can pick fast too. He just seems to prefer legato-style, and it has become an integral part of his style and sound.
Then there are guys like Greg Howe and Vinnie Moore, who manage to merge both techniques without preferring either one of them.
And sometimes, you don't even realize how much legato a player actually uses. Example: Good ol' Paul Gilbert. He sure is a really fast picker, but often, he combines fast hammer on's and pull offs with fast alternate picking to create very fast runs and patterns. The picked notes kinda add an accent. (This approach of combining legato and picking can i.e. be seen in the short excerpt of "Frenzy" that I posted in the forum).
Now certainly you can pick either one of them, choose one of them which you prefer, but I think it's the best to work on both. Strict alternate picking will help to work on the synchronisation of both hands, while legato helps to work on the strength and accuracy of the left hand.
If you can use both techniques, both strict picking and legato, you can use them to get different sounds, different sonic colors, and different ways to approach a certain lick. Some will sound better if ya pick them, some will sound better (or be easier) if you hammer / pull your way through it.
Let's start with the basics.
By the way, BEFORE we get into it: The licks and exercises I am gonna show you range from the easiest, basic stuff and are supposed to give you an introduction to legato if you are not familiar with it yet, to some very difficult stuff.
Just like picking, it takes a long time and lots of exercising to work on your legato. I am just trying to give you an overview, showing you both the basics and some of the neat things you can do once you work on it.
It's up to you how far you wanna take it, and what you wanna do with it, but maybe those more difficult licks will give you an idea of what you can do with hammer on's and pull off's, and maybe some advanced players among you will find those challenging too.
So, this is not a complete collection or method, just an overview with an introduction and simple exercises and some neckbreaking stuff too.
Let's get to work here !
Hammer-Ons
Ok, the basic concept of hammering-on. Below, there is a basic exercise to get into it. First, we play the C, and then we hammer on to the D. You hammer on with your ring finger. Hammering on in this case means: You let your finger kinda fall onto the string at the 7th fret, thereby sounding the note without picking it. Just whack it onto the string at the 7th fret.
Make sure the note is loud enough. It feels weird and is quite hard in the beginning, cause you tend to hit the other strings accidentally, or maybe you don't hit the string hard enough, so the note is not loud enough.
Try this: Pick the C (5th fret), but don't pick it too hard. Then, hammer on to the D (7th fret) and try to get that 2nd note to be as loud as the previous picked note. Both notes should be about equal in volume.
This is a basic concept that Brett Garsed (who has a killer-legato technique) introduced me to at the GIT. Sometimes you want the picked notes to stand out, as an accent, but to get the full, flowing effect out of your legato-playing, try to make sure that the hammered / pulled notes are as loud as the picked ones. When Brett does it, you really can't determine which note is picked and which is hammered on, you just get one big stream of notes. Sounds great, like a sax.
Now, this concerns both newcomers to the legato-technique, as well as advanced and even pro-players:
1. Whenever you practise and work on legato-stuff check and compare the volume of the picked notes and the ones played legato-style! As I said, sometimes you want the picked notes to stand out, but let's for now try to have them at equal volume. You can later switch between both regarding on what sound you want.
2. Check how much strength you use. Especially in the beginning you tend to whack the notes too hard, using too much strength for the hammer ons and pull-offs. This is natural, and sometimes it's good because it makes the notes ring clearly.
BUT: if you relax your hand and try to limit the use of strength to the required minimum (=enough strength to sound the note, but not too much... just as much as necessary ), you'll save strength, and you'll be able to relax and maybe even speed up more, while getting a smooth even sound.
In the beginning, I was really WHACKING those notes. I then watched videos of dudes like Joe Satriani... his hand looks extremely relaxed when he plays, he hardly uses any strength at all even when playing legato.
It might take years to relax that way, to really find that balance, but you can speed up the process if you pay attention to how much strength you really need to use, and to use only that amount.
Even seasoned players might wanna take a look at their legato-playing to see if they can still improve some (relax some)...
OK, let's take the exercise above a bit further now...
Above you see 4 separate exercises, ranging from rather simple, first exercises to a run through a C major scale on all six strings.
Measure 2: This is our first exercise, taken one step further. We play part of an ascending pentatonic scale (C Major Pentatonic), picking the first note on each string, then hammering on to the next. Try applying this to all the pentatonic patterns while keeping an even volume of picked and hammered notes.
Measure 3: Here we play a short sequence out of a pattern of the E Minor Scale (the scale that wouldn't die... inside joke here). Here we need to hammer on 2 notes after we pick the first, then we move to a different string.
Left hand fingering would be: Notes at the 2nd fret are fretted with the index finger, notes at the 4th fret are hammered on with the ring finger, and the notes at the 5th are hammered on with the pinkie. Try different patterns and sequences to get all your fingers to work equally...
Which leads us to measure 4, which is an ascending C Major scale. This is already advanced hammering, and demands a wide stretch on the E6- and A-string. Again, try different patterns and scales to use all possible finger combinations. You may wanna start in the upper areas of the neck, where the stretches aren't as difficult. Later, you can move down.
One thing that I really wanna point out as very important: Use a metronome and start out slow. Make sure all notes are exactly in time. Just like with sweeping, using legato can cause some timing-problems, where i.e. the notes aren't evenly distributed between the beats.
Maybe, if you have a drum computer or sequencer, you wanna program a beat that uses something like a bass drum-sound for the beats (1-2-3-4) and a high hat for the actual sixtuplets we're playing here... so it goes... Bass-Hat-Hat-Hat-Hat-Hat-Bass-Hat-Hat etc, counting the notes you are playing... This will help you to improve your timing.
I did something similar when working on the Moto Perpetuo... I had a stick-noise marking the 1-2-3-4, and a high hat counting 16th-notes. Later, I programmed the whole "Moto Perpetuo" into the sequencer, using a piano-sound, so I was playing it in unison with my sequencer, which made it easier to check my timing.
OK, those were rather "melodic" exercises for our hammer-ons. Get to some chromatic exercises, focussing on the "mechanics" (we had those for picking, too, remember?).
Measure 1: A chromatic exercise, ascending, using the first three fingers. Always pay attention to the pick attack in comparison to the hammered notes, and check your timing.
This exercise is just displayed up to where we get to the D-string, of course you should continue up to the high-E-string. Then, either move the pattern up one fret or play the same thing from the high E back to the low E, THEN move on (High E-string: 1-2-3, B-String 1-2-3 etc.)
Measure 2: Now it's fingers 1,2 and 4 (index, middle, pinkie). Another variation.
Measure 3: 1-3-4, obviously
Measure 4: 1-3-5 Here is where the stretch comes in again.
You certainly can play those exercises in a different position at first, to avoid those wide stretches until you are comfortable with it. Move all those exercises chromatically up the neck and down again, until you really feel comfortable with the technique. Then apply those mechanics to scale patterns again. Use them in a melodic context.
All this is material to help you make up your own exercises. It will take a lot of time to develop accurate and precise hammer-on-technique, but you'll get there. Let me skip to an advanced exercise.
This is one of my trademark-runs, an excerpt of the guitar solo-spot I play live ( i.e. with Perpetuum Overdose ). The key is E minor, and we move through the differen patterns (you can see that most clearly towards the end, when we move up the neck on the B- and E-string).
Take your time with that one, raise the tempo evenly and slowly. Make sure all notes are at an even volume. Once you can nail this one at a slow tempo, speed it up. I think you'll be able to hear that really cool, flowing legato-sound (as opposed to the sound of this played with all alternate picking). Every time you change the string, you pick the first note. Which is a typical thing for this kinda lick. If you feel comfortable with that one, try hammering on the first note...
Pull-Offs and Combinations
Let's get to the opposite, the pull-off...
Here is the basic idea:
This is the opposite of the first hammer-on exercise. You fret the D at the 7th fret, pick it, and quickly remove your ring finger to sound the C (which you previously fretted at the 5th fret). Pull off the finger with some force, maybe moving slightly downwards to have the C ring out clearly. It might take a while, but you'll soon figure out the movement.
Here are the opposites of the hammer-on exercises:
Measure 1: the same thing I described above
Measure 2: Again, we're in the C Major Pentatonic scale, changing strings while pulling off from the first note to the second.
Measure 3: E Minor scale, pulling off two notes per string
Measure 4: Our C Major scale, descending this time.
I don't think that I have to describe a lot here... those are the "mirror images" of the hammer on-exercises on the previous page.
You might have guessed it, here are the chromatic exercises...
Again, all this should inspire you to make up your own exercises and sequences for pull-offs. Work on both hammer-on's and pull-off's till it feels natural to play that way, then follow me as I get to the fun-part, combining both...
Combining HO & PO
As you might have guessed by now, hammer on's and pull-off's usually are used in combination. That way, you can create fast repeating licks, very "fluid" runs and sequences etc.
One of the most popular solos using that technique (repeating patterns using HO & PO) would be the legendary guitar-break of Led Zeppelin's "Heartbreaker". That solo also inspired Eddie Van Halen quite a bit to work on his tapping technique (we'll get to tapping another time). For shred-freaks, check out Joe Satriani's "Echoes".
Here we go... the first exercise / lick is a very typical Joe Satriani-sequence.
First, we play it on the high E-String. And yes, this is the legato-version of a typical, basic Yngwie / PG-picking lick. In measure 2 I moved the whole thing to the B-string (I left out the HO / PO- indicators, I think they should be obvious by now). Key is E Major. Try to get this to flow evenly, with all notes in time, evenly distributed. Then move on to Satch-signature lick no.2:
Here, we move from string to string in the key of Emajor, using the simple sequence above. Try that with different patterns too! Once you notice that there is a problem, isolate it. Try to get your hammer-on and pull-off techniques to an equal level.
Here is one of my trademark-licks / sequences, also from my solo-spot:
The key again is E minor, and here we are playing in the lower areas of the neck. Note the timing: 5 notes per beat. Try it slow, then speed it up. Of course, you should try to move further up the neck in the key of E minor. If you need some hints about where to move (pattern-wise) check the fast ascending run at the end of the previous page...
Another cool thing you can do (again: this is just an introduction and overview, there are billions of things you can work on, I'm just giving you an idea here) is string skipping.
Key of E Major:
This really might be easier to play with legato than it would be with alternate picking. Once you feel comfortable with it, try it an octave lower. I picked up this kinda lick from guys like Greg Howe and Brett Garsed (Garsed incorporates some huge leaps in those kinda licks, skipping i.e. from the B- to the LOW E-String!)
OK, here is a variation of a lick I played in my song "Pay By The Note" (can be listened to at my website). This basically is in the key of F Major. I here play fast pull-off's, with the second one pulling off to the open string (Nuno Bettencourt-style).
In measure two I incorporate the note C#, which gives it a nice, mean sound, too. This one sounds really difficult, but once you feel comfortable with fast pull-off's, it gets quite easy, since the lick incorporates open strings.
Ok, here is
THE CHOP-BUILDING NECK-BREAKING LICK FOR TODAY
( proceed only if you dare... )
That one might look familiar to some of you. It is based on the m11-arp that I discussed with Thorsten Koehne in "Shred Talk". He played a really cool sweeping-solo based on that arp during that conversation. I love the sound of the m11-Arp. Two of my songs are based on it. I think the guy who turned both Thorsten and me on to that chord would be... Joe Satriani. And guess what, the exercise above is an exercise by the Satch.
He used something similar in "The Mystical Potatoe Head Groove Thing". The exercise above is from a short etude he once recorded for a guitar mag. It was called "The Power Cosmic" (on "Engines Of Creation", which was recorded years later, there also is a tune called "The Power Cosmic Pt.2", and something similar to the thing above can be heard in there).
Anyway, this exercise is not for the faint hearted, and should be approached very CAREFULLY and SLOWLY. Can ya say "tendonitis" ?
There are some WIDE stretches in here, and the toughest part is that none of these notes are picked. All of them are hammered on with the left hand (you might wanna use your left hand or something like a sock or a bandana to mute the strings at the 1st fret)!!!
When I first heard "Power Cosmic" I thought he was sweeping it, and that at about light-speed.
This exercise is not really something you HAVE to do, but it's a chop-builder for the left hand, working on the strength and coordination of the fingers of your left hand. Please be careful... start in the upper areas of the neck to get used to the chord shape. Playing that Am11 in the first measure is tough because it has some huge stretches.
Conclusion
Mmkay, that was my introduction (and overview) to legato-style. Of course there is more to discuss (legato-slides, tapping etc.) but regarding hammer-ons and pull-offs, this should give you a good idea of how to do it and maybe what to do with it.
I also am planning on an article of combining picking with legato-stuff, which makes sense after I wrote so much about both topics. Stay tuned for that, coming to iBreatheMusic soon...
HAPPY PICKING...uhmmmm... Happy Hammering... uhhhhh.. Happy Pulling ? Ah, what the heck, KEEP ON PLAYING !