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| H O ME AR T GALL ERY TAB ULAT URE MUS IC COR NER FOR UM SEA TTLE CA LIF ORNI A LON DO N PAG E O F TH E WEIRD BO OKS GU IT ARS SUN SE T GALLERY WAV ES LES SONS |
| Hi, I'm GoodNite_AmyLee... i'm here to teach you the "ethics", if you will, of guitar playing. I'm going to look at alternate picking today and hopefully many of you will understand how it's done, properly.
So let's start off with a definition. The definition of alternate picking refers to the picking of notes on the guitar upwards and downwards. For example, when you play a scale, you pick the strings using an upstroke followed by a downstroke, upstroke, downstroke, upstroke, downstroke and so on. These can be identified in Tab notation as a ^ or a v or a D (down) or a U (Up..) - you get the point... To get used to picking up and down you should practice the following picking just a single string. Don't try to be all impressive when you start learning this for the first time - I cannot tell you the formula for success, but I can tell you the formula for failure, which is, to try and impress everyone.. Start slowly first and then gradually build up speed... Let's look at some excercises which are great for beginners. These can also be used by the advanced player as a warm up. v^v^v etc... ||-------------------------------------------------6-7-8-9-----------------| ||---------------------------------------5-6-7-8---------------------------| ||-----------------------------4-5-6-7-------------------------------------| ||-------------------3-4-5-6-----------------------------------------------| ||----------2-3-4-5--------------------------------------------------------| ||1-2-3-4------------------------------------------------------------------| This excercise requires the use of your 4th finger - that's right, your pinky finger. Even if you are a beginner and haven't learnt to gain independance from your third and fourth fingers, I suggest you carry on with this excersie and start early. You can thank me later when you become rich and famous If you're looking for more of a challange, go down the scale and see what happens. Going down is a little trickier than going up. Hopefully, your speed will increase naturally and by then, you'd have learnt this pretty well. TIP: If your last finger starts to hurt, stop immediately and try when it gets better. For beginners, the use of the 4th finger takes sometime to get used to. Start by using your first finger for the first note, the second finger for your second note, the third finger for your third note and your fourth finger for your fourth note. Now, let's look at some proper scales for you to learn with alternate picking. Let's look at a G major scale, sixth string root. v^v^v etc... ||---------------------------------------2-3--------------------------------------| ||---------------------------------3-5--------------------------------------------| ||-------------------------2-4-5-------------------------------------------------| ||----------------2-4-5----------------------------------------------------------| ||-------2-3-5-------------------------------------------------------------------| ||-3-5----------------------------------------------------------------------------| ^ If anyone know's how to equal the tab out, please tell me before I explode... tip: - Use your second and fourth finger to play the first two notes of the scale [G and A] - Use your first, second and fourth fingers to play the first three notes on the A string [B, ,C, D] - Use your first, third and fourth fingers to play the first three notes on the D string. This is the same for the G string. [E, F#, G] [A, B, C] - Use your second and fourth fingers to play the first two notes of the B string [D, E] - Use your first and second fingers to play the last two notes of the scale. [F#, G] Well, all the best... [G. A, B, C, D, E, F#, G, A, B, C, D, E, F#, G] Let's go apply some advanced techniques when playing the g major scale. v^v^v etc... ||----------------------------------------2-3~3p2---------------------------------------------| ||----------------------------------3h5-------------5p3---------------------------------------| ||------------------------2p'-4-5------------------------5p4p2-----------------------------| ||---------------2-4p'-5-----------------------------------------5p4p2---------------------| ||------2p'-3-5----------------------------------------------------------5p3p2-------------| ||-3-5---------------------------------------------------------------------------5p3-----------| Legend: p' - Pinch Harmonic p - pulloff h - Hammer ~ - Vibrato |