Looping Pentatonic DSX Picking Hack You Need To Know
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- Опубликовано: 4 окт 2024
- Tommo's new seminar ( troygrady.com/s... ) is full of essential ideas that make the DSX picking style functional for everyday playing across a wide array of phrases. Here's a great one. As you may know, if you're a DSX player, this means your picking motion traces a diagonal path such that downstrokes "escape" and become your string switch pickstroke. The implications of this are significant. For two-note-per-string phrases like pentatonic lines, you need to ensure that the last pickstroke on each string is a downstroke if you want to play them cleanly and quickly with this type of joint motion. No problem - you can simply start these phrases on upstrokes, and many players do indeed do this. But the positioning of the beat is another question. Downstroke-on-downbeat organization is a nearly universal unwritten rule in picking technique that many players attempt to follow, consciously or otherwise. And starting these phrases on upstrokes would break this. To solve this, you could just shift the timing of the lick so that the upstroke is a pickup, and the second note is the downbeat. But many of us have come to think of "starting on a downstroke" as synonymous with "placing the downstroke on the downbeat", even though this need not always be true. So instead, what Tommo demontrates here is a clever method for having it both ways. You can "start on a downstroke", AND place that downstroke on the downbeat. You can then insert a legato note and switch to upstroke-on-downbeat organization for the rest of the phrase. You can even loop the phrase with a legato note at each end, effectively flipping the lick back to downstroke-on-downbeat orientation again so you can restart it. In between, your brain will be none the wiser! As you work on fooling your brain this way, it can be helpful to make a nice swoopy downstroke on the first pickstroke as a chunking landmark for your motor system. You can see these graceful downstrokes in Tommo's clip here in slow motion, and we have also filmed them in the technique of bluegrass wizard David Grier, who employs them in exactly the same type of situation.
#escape motion #dsxmotion #upwarpickslanting #pickslanting #shredguitar #shred #guitarlesson #guitarlessons #guitarsdaily #riffwars #lickwars #guitarsolo #guitar 
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I start suspecting that I was clickbaited, but I'm not quite sure...
This is not clickbait. This is a real example from a very good lesson on picking technique, with extensive description in the notes of exactly what is being demonstrated, and why it matters. This subject - escape motion - is one that Cracking the Code pioneered. Quality information on it is still not easy to come by, even in the year 2023. Here's an additional free explainer with even more background: troygrady.com/primer/reference/escape-motion-reference/
@@troygrady Great stuff. This is how I settled on holding my pick after trying various ways. I made a huge improvement on my speed and accuracy.
@@petealba707 Just to be clear, the pick or the way it is being held isn't really what's causing the diagonal motion. That flows from using a particular arm position, along with a particular type of joint motion. If you remove the pick entirely, the hand will still be tracing a diagonal path - that's the key. I know that's probably what you meant, just clarifying for anyone reading!
@@troygrady for sure! I've got the diagonal motion going.
@@troygrady hey Troy, it's okay, it was more like a joke comment. It's that you have a lot of short videos in channel with titles like "stuff you need to know" or "essential something for fast picking" and then the content of the video is just fast picking happening, with very little explanation. I know you have courses and other videos with more details, but often the title of your short videos create an expectation of something educational, but ends up as something demonstrational. Which is what joke was about:) but thanks for clarifying!
TROY GRADY I LOVE. YOU SAVED MY LIFE
Really cool. Really great escape technique. I notice he only hits the low E once going up, high e only once, then twice on the low E going down. Going to play around with this later.
The rule is that you always want the string change to occur during a downstroke. The idea of "legato escape" is that if you're going to end on the "wrong" pickstroke - in this case, an upstroke - then you insert one legato note to make the final pickstroke a downstroke. On the way back down the pattern, the second time, you have three notes on the lower string, so you need two picked notes + the hammer to force the downstroke. It sounds mathy but after a while the patterns become muscle memory and you actually improvise this way.
@@troygrady Thanks for the advice, and taking the time! My alternate picking and escapes have become really good over 20 years of playing, but I’ve only recently started really paying attention to exactly how I do it. all this stuff and the cracking the code stuff is priceless. Can only imagine how much better I’d be if all of it was around 20 years ago. Thanks Mr. Grady!
On low E and high E do a hammer on/ pull off to make sure you always move to the next string after a down stroke
Yes! Forcing the downstroke through legato.
I've started adding some economy picking into my alternate picking lines. Specifically if an odd numbered line then crossing to the next string set would be better suited to be economy picked. I like the idea of the one-off hammer on to keep your escapes going in the right direction.
Exactly! Individual legato notes or sweep pickstrokes are the two big hacks for this type of picking motion - add as necessary to force the escape pickstroke.
that is what hess calls directional picking or I'm wrong?
Fwiw, I know some Jazz and Brazilian players that default to downstrokes on upbeats because it gives the upbeats more weight and presence which is good for those styles of music
As a DSX player it's not clear to me what's your suggestion regarding learning a song written by a USX player. For instance, If I want to learnsome Eric Johnson song, full of two-notes-per-string phrases, should I try to match and learn his USX motion? Or it's better to adapt the song to my DSX motion, basically inverting the starting stroke of each lick?
In other words, should we embrace our "natural" motion or it's better to do some effort to adapt to a new one?
Interesting that the hypothenar is lifted off the strings entirely and the thumb contacts the strings
I left an important thing out of my comment. I can't find it now. I meant : are there any , Cracking The Code , episodes addressing doing DOWNSTROKES with the edge of the pick that is CLOSEST to the wrist , & UPSTROKES with the pick edge that's FARTHEST from the wrist. That is NOT how I usually play , or most people, (I think).
perhaps experiment when practicing starting using upstrokes sometimes and also downstrokes. Feel the interaction between that and various pick widths to get the best tone.
My technique is exactly the same as his, so I will keep on practicing. Both of my hands look exactly the same as his when I play 😮
Thank you for this perfect look... but Can you post a complete cycle at the slower speed?
Thanks for this. Great tip and video.
No worries!
I hear something similar in the song ‘Black Cat’ by Cacophony (Becker, Friedman) around the 1:30 mark.
Good catch! That's a very Marty-style line, and Marty's technique is USX, which is the inverse of what we're seeing in this example. Here's an explainer ( troygrady.com/primer/reference/escape-motion-reference/usx-motion/ ). So you could do a very similar thing as in this example, but you'd use pulloffs instead of hammers at the top to turn it around, and you might use a single downstroke sweep at the bottom turn it around once again.
Do you have a short video explajning this technique in under 5 mins?
Is the hack to do Hammer ons and pull offs?
Slowing the video down, It appears that some of his notes are hammer on, or am I mistaken?
Yes exactly! The idea is to make sure the final note on every string is a downstroke, which makes the string changes easier and faster and the pick doesn't get stuck. This type of picking motion requires this formula. Not all do, but this one does. It's called DSX motion and you can read more about it here ( troygrady.com/primer/reference/escape-motion-reference/dsx-motion/ ). So the idea is, if the final pickstroke is an upstroke, then you insert a legato note so the last pickstroke can be a downstroke instead!
Will there be another 'The Magnet' Kickstarter any time soon? I really wanna get my hands on one!
I’m still waiting for the Brandon Ellis video. Any chance this will be out this year?
Can you do George lynchs picking technique
Can someone explain, wouldnt it be more efficient to instead of escaping the string on the downstroke when you want go to the next string, actually keeping the pick in and doing another downstroke on the next string in a fluide motion, so it becomes sort of a 2 string sweep pick when you switch string?
Check out Frank Gambale for this, is a form of economy picking 👍
You can thats economy picking somewhat similar to string sweeps(arpeggios). Another thing that may help is starting scales on an upstroke vs downstrokes which will help you feel what you are playing which will make you pay attention to the tone quality. Pick width also matters for fretting hand memory. If your hands are weaker a thicker pick may be better for efficiency when picking however a thinner pick will offer a mild delay to the note being sounded which perceptually may help the fretting hand to better remember notes in muscle memory. I was using heavy picks for 20 yrs unknowingly frustrating my progress as i didnt need the stiffness of a 1.5 mm pick. Now i use max 1.0 mm and thats heavy enough.
@@5zazen Thanks, but how is starting with an upstroke making me pay attention to the tone /feel what im playing more?
@@BenjoCoversIt may be that you can put more pressure on your index finger than you usually do. I have been doing this, and it seems to help with upstrokes. The index finger is very sensitive. Try applying a bit more pressure and awareness to your index finger and see how this feels.
Nice 😁
Where can I buy the guitar magnet and how many bucks is it $$$.
What about sweep picking fast
Kind of! There's no way to sweep two notes on a string if you're going in a straight line, BUT you * could * add a single upstroke sweep at the top of the phrase to turn it around, sweeping from the high E to the B. This would take care of your upstroke string change and allow the B string to start on an upstroke, maintaining your U-D sequence on each string.
Khalid Rapids
Couple things: Fingers of picking hand shouldnt drag on the guitar. Also, practice starting scales on an upstroke or downstroke which will affect the tone as the force to the string may vary slightly between the two. Additionally by varying pick starting up or down this may help remembering scale passages. 0.88 mm pick? Awesome. A great width to have a slight delay so the fretting can keep up and remember.
And then there is Steve Morse…
We don't talk about him :-D Joking of course, the guy is awesome and Troy has a full-length interview with him.
Doesn’t get more clear than that
You don't have to start wth a downstroke on the downbeat. Just start with an upstroke. There's no law of the universe that decrees it.
Upstroke is the new downstroke.
That's certainly one option. But some people have their improvisational vocabulary committed to muscle memory so that all the patterned chunks terminate on upstrokes. This facilitates the mixing and matching / connections of one pattern to another in an automatic way where they don't have to think about it.
I start a lot of my ascending runs on an upstroke because it makes the first stroke on the next string a downstroke and keeps me in-between the strings. It is the inverse of starting a descending run on a downstroke 👍
@@troygrady Thinking is the key to improving. By changing things perhaps there is more risk of mistakes, yet improved tone and muscle memory may result.
@@FionnMcc exactly what ive learned yesterday after decades of playing
I can’t do that
With practice you can. I had been picking differently for 20 years before I switched. It felt very awkward at first but I trusted the process and was able to break through.
Maybe you can't do that yet. Maybe one day you will.
Well, I'm tricked
?
Technique is super important, but it only deals with the ‘how.’ People seem to want to be able to shred and play ‘intimidation licks’ but the far more important thing is to develop your sense of intervals, poetry, lyricism, even within a fast, continuous line. You may have too much picking chops for your own good, because playing very fast before you are musically ready will set you off in the wrong direction. Play good notes, play cool thoughtful lines and not just idiotic, ghastly, blazing scales or arpeggios. Technique is fairly easy w just a tiny bit of dedicated practice. It’s the note choices, the mental side of things that is the real artistic challenge of music. You’ll only have problems if you allow yourself to get locked into a bunch of ‘virtuosic licks.’ Anyway, not to get technical now, but the true forgotten meaning of the word ‘virtuoso,’ was someone who can make his instrument sound so expressive that it mimics a human voice. The faster you play, the more difficult it is to stay melodically in control during improvisation.
I understand your point, it depends on your goals if you want technique or theory.
My point is basically that you shouldn’t get in the habit of playing faster than you can think. The mental part should override the technical part, not vice versa. Otherwise you get dumb sequences of notes. Let’s play melodic material, not scales. I grew up a shredder kid in the 80s, lots of chops, but then it was a rude awakening later when I got into the jazz big band. My ample shred chops did not help and in fact were a hindrance as I had to learn to be a lot more thoughtful and improvise of changes. I still like fast lines, but now we’re getting to a point where it’s becoming clear that shredding is not that difficult, and seemingly everyone can rip scales and arpeggios…but far fewer can at least think like jazz musicians and do a bit more to give nice angles and contours to their lines. No one is impressed by shredding any more, it’s too common now.
Think of the beginning of any Holdsworth solo, he always starts off extremely sparse, playing several very long sustained notes, and you can hear him feeling his way through, consciously choosing each note. Then he gradually starts to flow, reaching higher note rates later, but his fast playing and his slow playing are essentially the same process, just at different speeds. His brain is always engaged and he seems to put more effort into the compositional side of linear improvisation than he cares about techniques. Anybody can play fast scales, but hardly anyone can play good lines.