I listened to the Gambale vid, and I lost interest pretty quickly. My foot was tapping and I agree it's funky, but it just didn't do it for me. I found the Coltrane more appealing (but is that really jazz fusion?) If I'm not mistaken, that's a version of A Few Of My Favourite Things? A friend of mine more educated than myself played me a version of that many years ago, and I think that's why hearing this one resonated with me more.
It sort of reminds me of modern art (painting), or at least some aspects of it. Some of it I like, some of it I've tried to like, and tried to understand to help me like it, but much of it doesn't get me on that gut level you describe. Literature, for me, is a different matter, though. I've expanded my literary tastes over time, and now appreciate things I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have done a few years ago. I firmly believe that some things require a refining of the palette before they can be appreciated. Does this apply to music too, or is it always 'from the gut'? I dunno.
That's not quite what I was intending to say. The fact that it feels unnatural isn't a sufficient reason not to try it, for sure. Scalpel picking didn't feel natural at first either. The 'tried it briefly' comment was only intending to give context to the fact that, so far, it does indeed feel unnatural. The point I was driving at was that Pebber himself said the technique doesn't work with damping (I'll try and dig up the precise video if you like), and FRaKh said he feels like he's still trying to adopt the technique to work with damping. I'm happy to put the time in if this is the right approach, but only if it's going to get me to where I want to be.
Thanks for the advice :). While I can feel the scalpel coming together, I'm also aware that it'll take a *lot* more practice before it's a solid technique for me. Learning sarod concerns me a little. I've tried very briefly a couple of times, and it feels very unnatural. More importantly, if after seven years you're still not sure if sarod is the right technique for damping/muting, and you have way more technical facility than me, maybe this isn't the right approach for me to take.
Hey, I've been practicing scalpel picking for a month now, and feel like I'm making good progress. Following Pebber's advice, I've kept my wrist still and used only finger motion. I'm presuming now is the time to branch out and introduce some wrist motion. I guess the normal thing to do would be to combine scalpel with sarod. However, I saw one of Pebber's videos the other day that said it's not really practical to combine sarod with right-hand string damping. I like to play with a lot of gain, so I need the string damping both to control noise and as a stylistic effect. What would folk recommend as a technique that can accomodate this and be used in combination with scalpel? Thanks! Cliff
Very cool :). Here's a satch cover I recorded a while ago. Yours is much better :). I was definitely biting off more than I could chew. But, hey, we both have dogs randomly wandering around the in background of our recordings!
"gonna record myself more often shows you where you need to adjust"
Yes, I need to do the same. Computer and guitar rig are in different rooms normally, so it's a bit of a pain to do, hence I don't do it as much as I ought. But when I do, I usually learn I'm not doing as well as I thought :).
Another good thing to try is to reduce the pressure you use with your left-hand fingers. If one finger is pressing down too hard, it can cause another to lift too far from the fretboard when you release it. Try fretting a note and then picking it. Then keep reducing the pressure you're using to fret the note while continually picking. Do this until the note goes dead. You need no more pressure than just a bit more than this to fret the note.
Also, try and play really slowly so you can accurately control your left hand fingers. I tried this for a couple of months last year and it really helped with my floating pinky - still not perfect, but much better than it was previously. Once the pinky has lifted too far off the fretboard, it's too late to fix it - so you have to be consciously aware of it's motion when your training it and ensure it lifts no further than necessary.
I find a good way to judge my timing when I'm trying to play fast is to play it back in slow-motion. If you select to play one of these vides via youtube rather than embedded in the page, then go to the settings tab, you can play back at 0.25 speed. I've just done that with mine, and it's pretty humbling :).
Deltadisco - when I do the same with the first of yours, I can hear what Dlarben is saying - the timing at 120 isn't great, and seems to drift quite a bit in places. You seem to settle into the groove after a little while but, so far as I can tell, once you get above 200bpm, it seems to me like you're mostly playing 3 notes per beat instead of 4.
I think playing recognizable groups of 4 notes rather than random ones might help here :). Also, if I may, it sometimes sounds like your left and right hands aren't quite in synch and the articulation isn't there.
Please take these points in the positive spirit they're intended - you're clearly way ahead of me in terms of technique :). I'd appreciate any criticisms you or others would care to make of my vids also.
Thanks for the advice. I'd heard Pebber say that too.
About a year-and-a-half ago I was playing with like that, with my hand in a loose fist, but as soon as I turned up the gain on the amp I had little control over the string noise, hence the change back to the splayed hand technique.
Anyway, I've just gone back and tried it again, and I find I *can* control the string noise if I adjust the angle of my forearm as it comes across the guitar, making a shallower angle with respect to the neck. I haven't nailed it yet - when I'm playing on the top E string, the bottom E is sometimes undamped and vibrates in sympathy, but I feel like I can make it work. Better yet, this feels like a more comfortable hand position for Sarod-style picking. Before, with my hand completely flat on the strings, I was struggling to make this work.
Got it. I have heard you make that comparison before. I've watched your picking vids a good few times now, but I can be slow to catch on :).
Here's a couple of vids I recorded earlier today. Let me know if you'd rather they were in a different thread. This first is edited bits from a single take. I was playing against 40bpm, first 1 note per beat, going up to 8, spending 2 minutes on each. As the pace picks up, I can see more movement in my forearm. Is this bad? Any and all comments and advice welcome please!
And here's me trying to push it a little too far. I can see here that I have too much wrist motion. In the second part, I can see my upper arm moving too. I think this is sympathetic motion - I don't think it's actually powering the pick. I find as soon as I play faster or more complex stuff, I lose focus on the scalpel picking. Should I just steer clear of this sort of stuff for now?
Pebber advised me to practice pure finger motion for a month. I'm a week-and-a-half into this, and can definitely feel improvement. But I do have a couple of questions: 1) I'm trying to play as slow as possible to nail it. I'm practicing at 40bpm, playing, 1,2,3,4,5,6,7 and 8 notes per beat (never tried 5 and 7 before - pretty tricky at first). But the devil in me wants to see how fast I can push it. Once I get beyond 4 notes per beat at 80bpm or so, I find my wrist just starts moving. My question would be: at what sort of speed would you normally move from pure scalpel to a hybrid scalpel/sarod approach? 2) I mostly play with a lot of gain, but I've been playing this stuff clean so I can better hear what I'm doing. I've been giving each note a sharp attack, but at higher speeds I find I can more or less just glide the pick over the strings and get a decent tone with distortion (it's pretty quiet on a clean setting). Is this legit, or should I always be trying to pick 'deeply' and make a strong attacking sound?
Hey all, I'm new to the forum, so let me introduce myself. My name is Cliff, and I'm a keen amateur guitarist. I started when I was around 19 back in the 80s, but without any real focus on technique. To be honest, I'm pretty uncoordinated, have a poor sense of rhythm, and not much of a sense of pitch. Nevertheless I love playing guitar :). Anyway, as life went on I stopped playing, until about three years ago I took it up again. For the last two years I've been practicing technique pretty extensively (or so I thought until I read how hard people practice on this forum). I guess I practice 1-2 hours a night most nights, and maybe a little more at the weekends. My goals would be able to play some of my favourite tunes from Paige, Van Halen and Randy Rhoads. Maybe play in an amateur band if I felt confident enough. What brought me to this site was curiosity about picking. Sometime last week I saw a vid of a guy playing where he was using his fingers to move the pick, which I'd never seen (or at least noticed) before. I asked him where he'd learnt it, and he said he'd never really given it any thought. Funny how some people just naturally choose a graceful and efficient technique, eh? By coincidence, I stumbled on one of Pebber's videos demonstrating scalpel picking the next day. So for the last two years I've been practicing strict alternate picking with the wrist moving in the plane of the hand. (I did try the Benson technique briefly, but I found it created tension at the base of my thumb, and it made it difficult to damp strings and get pinched harmonics, two things I'm keen on stylistically). Recently I've been trying an exercise that's mean to stress outside picking. The idea is to play a pentatonic (say at the 12th fret) with two notes on the top string, one on the next string down, and then the final 16th of the group on the top string again. Then you move down a string. When you get to the bottom E, you move back up again. What I've found is that I really struggle to cross strings cleanly with the alternate picking technique. I *think* there's a couple of problems here. One is that I'm trying to make as small motions as possible when picking a string, so that I can get speed. The problem is if you use the wrist to both pick an individual string and to move between strings, you're suddenly changing the amount of distance you're moving, and I suspect the note immediately after a string switch is picked with too wide a stroke. The other problem is, because you're picking in the plane of the strings, you have to make some sort of motion to lift the pick clear of the strings when you switch. I haven't managed to pin down exactly what's involved in doing this cleanly. To solve the first of these problems, I thought I'd try using the forearm exclusively for the string switching and the wrist for the small-motion picking. One of the things that seems appealing to me with both scalpel and sarod, or the combination of the two, is that the pick rises above the strings at the end of each stroke, so it's naturally clear if the wrist or forearm wants to change strings. Please correct me if I'm wrong about any of this. Anyway, here's a video of my picking that I recorded on Sunday: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MifSSzGAB6E First up, listening back, I realize it all sounds ropey. I know I suck :) The first segment is me playing standard alternate picking. The second is the same, but trying to use the idea of forearm motion for string changes. I'd practiced this for three weeks, until I finally realized it was never going to work at fast speeds. And it sounds pretty poor at this speed. Next up is my attempt at Sarod. I realize now (I've had a few days to watch more videos and browse the forum more) that I should have started slower. But already I don't think it sounds any worse than the previous two segments. I'd appreciate any feedback on whether this is basically the correct motion. Fourth is my attempt at scalpel. Looking back, I can see the finger motion seems to stop as I get to the bass strings. There's also some wrist motion - I'm not sure if this is side-to-side or Sarod rotational. Finally, I tried to do scalpel picking on a fast lick I was working on. As you can see, it's nearly all forearm work. I was going to ask if this was right, but I think I already know the answer now :). Tonight I've been practicing scalpel+sarod very slowly (1 pick per second) on the same lick, first using up and then using downs strokes. I think I'm closer to the correct technique and will try and record another video soon. One thing I noticed, as I use my fingers to push the pick away from my hand (I'm exaggerating the motions), the pick seems to rotate a little towards 12 o'clock. Likewise, when I pull the pick in, it rotates a little towards 2 or 3 o'clock. Is this correct, or something to be avoided? Anyway, I'd love to hear your thoughts on any of this. (As well as practicing, I occasionally try and play music. Here's me with playing a cover of Santana's Smooth: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koHtTcGGGwQ)
Visitors 0 Members and 14 Guests are online. We welcome our newest member: charlie66 guest counter
549 guests and 1 member have been online today (yesterday: 629) guests / 2) members).
Sat Mar 23, 2013 12:01 am
Visitors
Board Statistics
