In less than 14 minutes, you've corrected 14 years of bad technique in my playing. Once you explained picking using motion from the thumb versus from the wrist, everything locked in. I've read for years on how people have recommended picking from the wrist and it's never felt comfortable to me. I feel like a world of new territory has just been opened to me. Thank you!
I had all but given up trying to master right hand picking technique (electric/jazz guitar) after more than 50 years. My wrist just wouldn't work properly and after two hours (or more) of practice my arm would start to spasm and I would end up throwing the guitar in the corner in disgust (not literally of course!). Your "hand" technique has done the trick and although I know it will take some time to master, after 50 years it's worth it! Thanks so much !!
I've been playing guitar for 13 years and my right hand was stuck, i was unable to do speed picking, i tried many lessons and exercises, uncluding Rock Discipline (John Petrucci). Last week i saw this video and i did what it says and it worked, right now i'm playing all those Metallica and Trivium solos that i always wanted to play! Thank you very much!!! (i've been practicing like 10 hours per day)
Dude I grew up playing the same stuff (Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax, Dream Theater, etc.) and that's the sound I was always going for so I'm glad it worked for you too. I'll be the first to admit there are a lot of different right hand techniques that people use, but this one worked for me and for a lot of my students - glad to hear it worked for you too.
I have watched a hundred videos on this topic and you have to be one of the best teachers. Thank you for taking the time to share this info for free. Keep up the great work.
i am quite advanced guitar player with alot of speed technique for minorish "classical" playing but i watch al yours videos cuz it's great for developing peacefulness between enjoying guitar and practicing guitar. Love it. Tnx!
I think you're the only person ive seen that explained why the metronome is so important, and really explained to me how to use it effectively. As for picking too hard, yes I have that problem, its terrible, I think my right hand gets nervous and compensates for lack of skill in my left hand. So inevitably I go through 1 set of strings per 2 WEEKS. crazy.. thank you for this lesson, guess i gotta put the rock and roll on hold and back step to this essential lesson. favorited.
Thankyou thats a great video and to the point . Been playing lead for about two years and im left hander who plays right handed so my right hand struggles a bit .I will try this for more consistent playing. 👍
excellent video thank you very much. I've been playing bass and guitar for years and made money as a bassist and guitarist professionally; not to mention making Gold and platinum records; but it goes to show you this instrument has no limits and you can always learn MORE!!! Thank you again
You can make subtle adjustments to the pick for changes in tone and feel as you get better at it. But at first, I would concentrate on just making it sound smooth and easy. Don't worry about the details. In my experience, once you have it down you'll naturally make adjustments as your ear requires them. You won't really have to try or think too much about it.
Dude, why are you doing that? That is totally wrong. 5:43 "the wrist is not making the movement" - wrong! Watch Nuno Bettencourt, Paul Guilbert etc. There are a hundreds of best guitar-pick-players, and they are working with a wrist. Small movements, with much microcontrol, but in it fundamental movement - wrist. Never thumb movement! Or are you deliberately trying to teach beginners the wrong way to ruin their lives so that they lose hundreds of hours of useless labor?
@@IlllIlIIllIll you're taking that instruction out of context completely as it's for control and smoothness, which are vital and keep one from "henpecking" the strings. And, by the way, I grew up playing all the guys you mentioned, and i grew up trying to play using the methods they taught, and they failed me and I lost hundreds of hours of useless labor. This worked for me and has worked for many students, and judging from the bulk of the comments on this video it's been helpful to others as well.
Thanks for sending this out again, I missed it last time. Excellent Explanation and great practice tool, my teacher had told me how to do this, but I needed to hear it again. Thanks Griff!
Great advice !!!! I like learning to increase the right hand first then adding the left. Usually not taught this way. From a slow picker, I see improvements right away !!!
Your videos are great, thanks for sharing the good advice! As far as the jumping back and forth with a higher BPM goes, I found a trick that works well for me. If you're playing 8th notes, do occasional bursts of 16th notes, like for half the bar or whatever's comfortable. You might not be able to consistently play that double speed, but you can manage a short burst of notes - kind of like a short sprint. As you manage to hit them in time, you can do longer and longer bursts without getting tired and missing the timing, and eventually you can play a lot faster than before. Endurance training! With the added bonus (for lazy people like me) that you don't to keep messing with the metronome. I don't know if that's any use to anyone else, but I thought I'd throw it out there
Griff, thanks buddy. I have watched this video several times. You have amazing economy in your picking. I notice when you are moving fast across strings, you don't necessarily always alternate, i.e. Two upstrokes in a row when you change strings. Would love to see a follow up deep dive video on picking quickly across strings and maybe some more on hand motion and pick orientation. This is a real rate limiter for me.
i actually alternate pick like you & it came to me naturally ..my thumb also dive down it help me to use the gravity to go down faster but i saw some great guitar player thumb's head parallel to the string . they actually move the picking finger to alternate pick unlike me where i use elbow wrist to alternate pick .so which is more comfortable,economic in the long run
Great player, as others have said it doesn't look like alternate picking, rather economy. A great thing to learn, but confusing if people think it's alternate.
wow man... just wow. yesterday i was struggling with 16th's at70 bpm. but now i can play at 160 bpm?!?!? that thumb tip made this possible.thank you so much.
I'm a guitar player, and i feel compelled to say, that honestly i never thought there existed guitarists who played only downpicks all the time. other than begginers in their first lessons. never thought of alternate picking as a special or a particular technique to any particular style, i understand that there are some styles and some guitarists who wouldn't use, much less master alternate paicking becauses of their particular kind of playing. they don't need it, or they don't want to use in...
Excellent. But can you suggest any exercise to hit exactly the string you want to hit, for example in licks, when you use all the strings, but not one by one? I play the guitar for over 20 years, but sometimes it happens - I hit not RIGHT string... :(
Depends on how you move your wrist. I like to "twist" it instead of moving it up and down. If I move the wrist up and down I will never play fast, but when I twist it, the movement is incredible minimal and I get a hard attack if I want and can play very fast.
Not sure if you've found an answer someplace else, but I'll try to answer your question. Yes, the palm of your right hand should touch the strings BUT only in certain ways to get certain effects. When playing, you can totally keep your palm off the strings, hitting loud, open notes. You can "palm mute" where you place your palm at the edge of the strings/bridge to muffle the sound but keep a note. Those are the basics. Hope I helped.
I'm confused. At one point, you said that the thumb should be the only movement, with no wrist movement. However, at 8:03, your thumb isn't moving and your wrist is doing all the moving. Would you say that there is a point where you kind of change how you pick? I would guess yes and that everyone has a certain speed where the wrist just isn't able to cut it anymore. I think that is where I am at right now...I'm going to try to speed the metronome up a little and focus on the thumb movement. Wish me luck! EDIT: You answered me at 11:58. You didn't talk about it, but you did the slower 16ths notes using your wrist, but when you doubled the speed, you switched to the thumb movement.
Also, it's really more about what drives. When the thumb drives the movement, the wrist will likely follow, but if the wrist drives the movement, the thumb will tend to stay stiff. There is a time and place for that type of motion also (funk strumming chords, for example) but for most people learning to drive the motion with the thumb is the key.
Biggest tip I got out of this video is to play softly. I have two questions. I heard that if you practice just on one string, you wont be as good on the others because there's different resistance. Because of this, I have been practicing 2 minutes on each string to the metronome, but this seems to take a lot longer with speed progression. Another question is what type of pick do you recommend? I have been using the cheap pick that came with my Squier, a medium Fender. It slips out of my hand sometimes and seems to give too much when I'm just picking one string but works okay for strumming.
So im a beginner guitarist and i've never really tried alternate picking but straight away i was able to do alternate picking at 300 bpm (that was as high as my metronome app would go) and then i could do eighth notes at 210 bpm after about 5-10 mins of practise but i dont feel like this exercise had made me any better at alternate picking
There are quite an amount of guitarists who are fast and clean and use a similar motion-as if only their thumbs and indexes make the movement. When you look at it scientifically, the less movement one makes the faster one can go. Whether that is using the wrist or the thumb is up to the guitarist.
Hi Griff, In this video when you demonstrate your box patterns at higher speeds you are actually using a mixture of sweep and alternate. Did you realize you were doing that? :)
I've always picked the same way.. the movement comes from thumb and wrist and not only the wrist.. many people try to move only the wrist without getting to a decent speed
At higher speeds I have to bring in a little bit from farther down my arm, yes. It's not a conscious thing and it isn't something I can turn on or off, or maintain very long. It's really only something I do for tremolo picking. If I play fast scale passages, I don't do that.
In less than 14 minutes, you've corrected 14 years of bad technique in my playing. Once you explained picking using motion from the thumb versus from the wrist, everything locked in. I've read for years on how people have recommended picking from the wrist and it's never felt comfortable to me. I feel like a world of new territory has just been opened to me. Thank you!
Thanks from a 67 year old guitar novice.
I've been trying so hard to find a video for this. Thanks for making this video it really helped a lot.
I had all but given up trying to master right hand picking technique (electric/jazz guitar) after more than 50 years. My wrist just wouldn't work properly and after two hours (or more) of practice my arm would start to spasm and I would end up throwing the guitar in the corner in disgust (not literally of course!). Your "hand" technique has done the trick and although I know it will take some time to master, after 50 years it's worth it! Thanks so much !!
How you getting on with it now?
I've been playing guitar for 13 years and my right hand was stuck, i was unable to do speed picking, i tried many lessons and exercises, uncluding Rock Discipline (John Petrucci). Last week i saw this video and i did what it says and it worked, right now i'm playing all those Metallica and Trivium solos that i always wanted to play! Thank you very much!!! (i've been practicing like 10 hours per day)
Dude I grew up playing the same stuff (Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax, Dream Theater, etc.) and that's the sound I was always going for so I'm glad it worked for you too. I'll be the first to admit there are a lot of different right hand techniques that people use, but this one worked for me and for a lot of my students - glad to hear it worked for you too.
I have watched a hundred videos on this topic and you have to be one of the best teachers. Thank you for taking the time to share this info for free. Keep up the great work.
Thanks from a 66 year old experienced guitarist trying to improve his technique. Very helpful!
i am quite advanced guitar player with alot of speed technique for minorish "classical" playing but i watch al yours videos cuz it's great for developing peacefulness between enjoying guitar and practicing guitar. Love it. Tnx!
This is, by far, the best video I have seen on this subject. Amazing job, Griff! Glad I found you.
Anyone else go like holy shit at 1:10 ?
Oh hell yeah! His down picking is fast too
Oh hell yeah! His down picking is fast too
he is using economy picking thats why it can go so fast
Thanks to you I can play twice as fast with just a few months of practicing.
I wish my guitar teacher back in the days were as good as you.
this guy is literally the best teacher
Very helpful video, I was oblivious to the fact that holding two fingers on the backside of the pick could be obstructive
I think you're the only person ive seen that explained why the metronome is so important, and really explained to me how to use it effectively. As for picking too hard, yes I have that problem, its terrible, I think my right hand gets nervous and compensates for lack of skill in my left hand. So inevitably I go through 1 set of strings per 2 WEEKS. crazy.. thank you for this lesson, guess i gotta put the rock and roll on hold and back step to this essential lesson. favorited.
Thankyou thats a great video and to the point . Been playing lead for about two years and im left hander who plays right handed so my right hand struggles a bit .I will try this for more consistent playing. 👍
that is an awesome lesson, well covered and how to transition to eighth and sixteenth notes is gold. great exercises too, cheers Griff.
Same thing for me, 10+ years of trying to shred using the wrist. This video changed it all in 2 minutes.
excellent video thank you very much. I've been playing bass and guitar for years and made money as a bassist and guitarist professionally; not to mention making Gold and platinum records; but it goes to show you this instrument has no limits and you can always learn MORE!!! Thank you again
You can make subtle adjustments to the pick for changes in tone and feel as you get better at it. But at first, I would concentrate on just making it sound smooth and easy. Don't worry about the details. In my experience, once you have it down you'll naturally make adjustments as your ear requires them. You won't really have to try or think too much about it.
Dude, why are you doing that? That is totally wrong.
5:43 "the wrist is not making the movement" - wrong!
Watch Nuno Bettencourt, Paul Guilbert etc. There are a hundreds of best guitar-pick-players, and they are working with a wrist.
Small movements, with much microcontrol, but in it fundamental movement - wrist.
Never thumb movement!
Or are you deliberately trying to teach beginners the wrong way to ruin their lives so that they lose hundreds of hours of useless labor?
@@IlllIlIIllIll you're taking that instruction out of context completely as it's for control and smoothness, which are vital and keep one from "henpecking" the strings. And, by the way, I grew up playing all the guys you mentioned, and i grew up trying to play using the methods they taught, and they failed me and I lost hundreds of hours of useless labor. This worked for me and has worked for many students, and judging from the bulk of the comments on this video it's been helpful to others as well.
Thanks for sending this out again, I missed it last time. Excellent Explanation and great practice tool, my teacher had told me how to do this, but I needed to hear it again. Thanks Griff!
Today in thanksgiving day I’m thankful that I found this video.
You're a great teacher. I really appreciate and enjoy your lessons!
this guy is a good teacher.
Damn. Thank god for you and this video.
Thanks for the two fingers tip, I just couldn't figure why it was so slow on my side, I never realised I might have been holding the pick wrong way :)
Great advice !!!! I like learning to increase the right hand first then adding the left. Usually not taught this way. From a slow picker, I see improvements right away !!!
Your videos are great, thanks for sharing the good advice!
As far as the jumping back and forth with a higher BPM goes, I found a trick that works well for me. If you're playing 8th notes, do occasional bursts of 16th notes, like for half the bar or whatever's comfortable. You might not be able to consistently play that double speed, but you can manage a short burst of notes - kind of like a short sprint.
As you manage to hit them in time, you can do longer and longer bursts without getting tired and missing the timing, and eventually you can play a lot faster than before. Endurance training! With the added bonus (for lazy people like me) that you don't to keep messing with the metronome. I don't know if that's any use to anyone else, but I thought I'd throw it out there
I found this video lesson on alternate picking to be Very helpful. Thank you and greetings from Ireland.
Very good tuition Man! I'm working on those picking techniques now.!
exatcly exactly exatcly exactly!!!!!!!!!!!!!
movement of the thumb opened a new world for me.. i've been playing guitar for 10 years though...
You pick twice as fast as me just down-picking...
Thanks a lot. I'm moving to an oud and these tips should prove really helpful. My left hand is working OK, but my picking is weak.
Griff, thanks buddy. I have watched this video several times. You have amazing economy in your picking. I notice when you are moving fast across strings, you don't necessarily always alternate, i.e. Two upstrokes in a row when you change strings. Would love to see a follow up deep dive video on picking quickly across strings and maybe some more on hand motion and pick orientation. This is a real rate limiter for me.
Didn't know Joe Flacco was so good at guitar.
The Damn Beast but is he an elite quarterback?
The Damn Beast this is the greatest comment ever
i actually alternate pick like you & it came to me naturally ..my thumb also dive down it help me to use the gravity to go down faster but i saw some great guitar player thumb's head parallel to the string . they actually move the picking finger to alternate pick unlike me where i use elbow wrist to alternate pick .so which is more comfortable,economic in the long run
The best lesson on the web but where is part 2 ?
Great lesson! This is a great lesson to also teach how to count your beats
Thanks for being a great teacher
Thank you very much good sir! Thanks a lot, it's sooo easy now, I just needed this little push and a whole new wolrd opens :)
Fantastic video, I'd like to thank this teacher for the good advices!!! (I must admit that my right thumb is in trouble right now)
Great player, as others have said it doesn't look like alternate picking, rather economy. A great thing to learn, but confusing if people think it's alternate.
short and sweet 'thanks'
wow man... just wow. yesterday i was struggling with 16th's at70 bpm. but now i can play at 160 bpm?!?!? that thumb tip made this possible.thank you so much.
man, I have played guitar for more than 5 years, and my right hand picking still sucks. Hope this exercise helps.
Excellent explanation at 5:41 - thanks!
I'm a master at morse code picking, I freakin' suck.
trustobey1016
Same here... Thought I finally got it... But apparently I was just going through the string like crazy
.-.. -- .- ---
being a slide guiarist ( Indian classical)it is useful about fingering with the thumb&first finger up & down(relax )
Thanx man,I hv been doing this since a long time,n this ensures me I hv been practicing right,I managed to go upto 90 beats in 5 subeats,
Griff,
Are you using an extra down or upstroke when you cross strings or strictly alternate picking?
I totally agree... I also feel much more comfortable with the thumb motion :)
Just a note. When he's doing the fast 3 note per string scale up and down, he's using economy picking.
I noticed that as well.
Cheating bastard!
I'm a guitar player, and i feel compelled to say, that honestly i never thought there existed guitarists who played only downpicks all the time. other than begginers in their first lessons. never thought of alternate picking as a special or a particular technique to any particular style, i understand that there are some styles and some guitarists who wouldn't use, much less master alternate paicking becauses of their particular kind of playing. they don't need it, or they don't want to use in...
Wish I saw this sooner. Thanks
Pebber brown has a great vid for this. It helped me out alot too.
Excellent. But can you suggest any exercise to hit exactly the string you want to hit, for example in licks, when you use all the strings, but not one by one? I play the guitar for over 20 years, but sometimes it happens - I hit not RIGHT string... :(
Depends on how you move your wrist. I like to "twist" it instead of moving it up and down. If I move the wrist up and down I will never play fast, but when I twist it, the movement is incredible minimal and I get a hard attack if I want and can play very fast.
I got past guitar basics in a month, I'm still stuck on intermediate level because I keep having trouble with alternate picking.
great, really useful and simple advices...that is what a beginner needs!
Thanks for the lesson...I think it makes a lot of sense and I'm going to try to do it.
A good lesson and a lot of help.thanks a lot.
Excellent lesson !
Awesome lesson, Griff. Thank you.
Thank you! Crystal clear lesson, very helpful!
Thank you for doing this lesson! Just what I need!
This is outstanding.
Not sure if you've found an answer someplace else, but I'll try to answer your question. Yes, the palm of your right hand should touch the strings BUT only in certain ways to get certain effects. When playing, you can totally keep your palm off the strings, hitting loud, open notes. You can "palm mute" where you place your palm at the edge of the strings/bridge to muffle the sound but keep a note. Those are the basics. Hope I helped.
Excellent lesson. Thank you sir!
I'm confused. At one point, you said that the thumb should be the only movement, with no wrist movement. However, at 8:03, your thumb isn't moving and your wrist is doing all the moving. Would you say that there is a point where you kind of change how you pick? I would guess yes and that everyone has a certain speed where the wrist just isn't able to cut it anymore. I think that is where I am at right now...I'm going to try to speed the metronome up a little and focus on the thumb movement. Wish me luck!
EDIT: You answered me at 11:58. You didn't talk about it, but you did the slower 16ths notes using your wrist, but when you doubled the speed, you switched to the thumb movement.
Also, it's really more about what drives. When the thumb drives the movement, the wrist will likely follow, but if the wrist drives the movement, the thumb will tend to stay stiff. There is a time and place for that type of motion also (funk strumming chords, for example) but for most people learning to drive the motion with the thumb is the key.
ohhh man really learned me a awesome techniques i found my so many faults ,,yahh and overcoming ,,thnx for video man.
..
Biggest tip I got out of this video is to play softly. I have two questions. I heard that if you practice just on one string, you wont be as good on the others because there's different resistance. Because of this, I have been practicing 2 minutes on each string to the metronome, but this seems to take a lot longer with speed progression. Another question is what type of pick do you recommend? I have been using the cheap pick that came with my Squier, a medium Fender. It slips out of my hand sometimes and seems to give too much when I'm just picking one string but works okay for strumming.
Thank you
I still have problem with the pick
But my right hand t was damaged I practice the pick more
Great lesson
thanks alot i am a beginner i have after practicing 3 hr i have improve a lot.
nice job sir ;) can you make a video of 3ple notes with metronome picking and scales?? thanks
Weird. I've never seen your videos before. That's a shame, because you're a great teacher! I'm definitely going to watch more of your videos :)
So im a beginner guitarist and i've never really tried alternate picking but straight away i was able to do alternate picking at 300 bpm (that was as high as my metronome app would go) and then i could do eighth notes at 210 bpm after about 5-10 mins of practise but i dont feel like this exercise had made me any better at alternate picking
Thanks..good ideas..its more help me to improve my speed for arternate picking
Now to get my left hand to keep up :)
Awesome lesson!!
There are quite an amount of guitarists who are fast and clean and use a similar motion-as if only their thumbs and indexes make the movement.
When you look at it scientifically, the less movement one makes the faster one can go. Whether that is using the wrist or the thumb is up to the guitarist.
Thank u so much. i finally improved my picking technique
I like this guy. Very helpful, I'm just starting out but have the fire!
You are amazing! thanks for these practical techniques!!
Ramping up to where you can't do it and trying to power through is a one way ticket to Slop City.
This helped me so much dude. Thanks!
Hi Griff, In this video when you demonstrate your box patterns at higher speeds you are actually using a mixture of sweep and alternate. Did you realize you were doing that? :)
Thank you! Great lesson helped a lot
5:01 james hetfield right hand technique
trasakas he mostly plays aggressive rhythms with power chords all with down-picking . So he might be an exception
Solid lesson. Thank you. This is worth at least $25 alone.
Excellent! Thank you for the tips
Thanks so much for this. It really is helping.
I've always picked the same way.. the movement comes from thumb and wrist and not only the wrist..
many people try to move only the wrist without getting to a decent speed
had the same problem Thanks for the vid
Great video! At 3:20 you change your picking technique a little. It looks like you’re playing a little bit from the elbow. Can you elaborate on that?
At higher speeds I have to bring in a little bit from farther down my arm, yes. It's not a conscious thing and it isn't something I can turn on or off, or maintain very long. It's really only something I do for tremolo picking. If I play fast scale passages, I don't do that.
@@bluesguitarunleashed Thanks for the quick reply!
Thank you so much for making and sharing this video.
Regards
that was very helpful, thanks!
Great stuff, !! But is that a custom shop Prosonic amp ?
Thanks! Very helpful.
Morse Code guitar picking...yup, that's me. 😔
clear and helpful