Hi all, as the title suggests...
I've never had a face to face guitar lesson, and so while teaching myself, I've developed naturally the economy picking technique, it just seemed natural; going to the next string in the 'easiest/quickest' way.
However, now, after years of economy picking (about 6-7 years) I'd like to force myself into using strict alternate picking.
Has anyone got any advice? When I look for alternate picking lessons on the web, they all tend to assume that you're a beginner who only uses downstrokes, there's nothing out there that helps me in trying to force myself to alternate pick.
The problem I have is when I try to consciously alternate pick, I always make the mistake of subconsciously slipping back to economy, and I can't seem to stop myself.
Is it just down to practice? Keep forcing alternate until I no longer economy pick? It just seems like it's never going to happen...
And to people who use both techniques, how do you separate them? What stops you slipping into using one when you wanted to use the other?
Any lessons/exercises/articles highly appreciated.
Thanks.
Comments
Not everything, just where it's appropriate, it makes a lot of sense when playing scales for example, if you're playing 3 note per string scales, if you economy pick you tend to get a more triplet type sound, but when you alternate pick you tend to get a more strict 4/4 16ths pattern, so I guess this is a good example of where you'd want to use either method depending on the sound you want.
I agree with most of what others have written here.
Your economy picking will be a great asset to you, and it's definitely worth running through a few exercises (perhaps with more of an effort to accent the right notes), to keep this in your picking arsenal.
Paul Gilberts video's are awesome as are Vinnie Moore's, Eric Johnson's and Steve Morse. But for the deepest analysis and best explanations of how Alternate picking works (as well as how you can incorporate it into your Economy picking), Troy Grady's "Cracking the code" is fantastic.
Once you have a solid grounding in Alternate picking too, you can decide which technique to use for which passages you play depending on what is easiest or what sounds best. Don't forget the Legato too. Good luck.
My legato, economy picking and alternate picking are so mixed together now that it'd be hard to pick them apart.
I came up with a way of playing the first two notes down - up, then hammering on the third, then repeating for the next string. It avoids the change of direction you get with strict alternate picking and ends each string on an upstroke (so the pick is free to change string easily).
I thought I was a genius until I watched "Cracking the Code" and realised Yngwie and Paul Gilbert had been doing something similar for years.
Yeah, the first series, he dragged out the info way too much for my liking. The season 2 stuff is much better, sticks to the point a bit more and the graphic depictions make the concepts easier to understand. He also has a Masters in Mechanics seminar where he dissects a top players technique to see how they achieve seemingly impossible feats of picking.
If anything it has increased my use of Economy picking. I look a little more closely at how I chose to play certain runs too. The end goal for me is to be able to seamlessly switch between all of the available picking techniques to suit what I'm playing. I might get there one day.