Struggling to achieve alt picking speed

stratman3142

DannyP said:

Do you guys feel there's such a thing as a personal speed limit though?

I've come to the conclusion I just don't have the "fast-twitch" muscles in my fingers to ever get up to the speeds of a metal player. Anything faster than Jimmy Page has always eluded me.

I think that's just down to my physiology and metabolism - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6172607/

I can appear quick to the layman with techniques like sweeping, legato and banjo-rolling, but I feel ultrafast stuff will always be beyond my capabilities.

I think I'm in a similar boat to you. Those rapidly picked Eric Johnson/Joe Bonamassa, 2 note per string pentatonic patterns have always eluded me, but I can fake them using pull-offs descending, or hammer-ons ascending

I can pick some scaler 3nps stuff pretty fast.  I think I 'swipe' the strings at very high speed (i.e. move parallel rather than slanted). I once slowed down a recording of me playing that first lick in Paul Gilbert's 'Intense Rock' video and I can hear a slight clicking noise  

sjo89

If i just alt pick one string as fast as i can but with beat and rhythm, I can play even 1/16ths at 185bpm for about 6-10 seconds before getting messy. I can go faster but the evenness and rhythm starts to drift. This is way faster than I need to be able to go achieve what i want - the issue is clearly to do with string crossing, hand sync and mentally being able to keep up with my fingers.

hollywoodrox

I find the difficult thing is accenting so I know where I am at faster speeds 

wizbit81

My 2 cents:

What are you actually trying to achieve? Is it to play certain pieces of music? In which case don't bother with exercises just learn those pieces slow and gradually speed them up, as you hit limits you'll work out strategies for getting round it, plus you're learning actual music you like instead of sh*t exercises and so you're liable to work harder and with more commitment.
If it's to build up technique towards a non-specific end then forget it and go work on something you actually want to do.
If it's to build up tech because you want to express yourself at those sorts of tempos then maybe find some licks you like and learn those and steal them, and then start writing some in a similar vein and learn to play your own lines.
Most players who developed high speed picking have strategies for it, like Malmsteen doesn't pick every note, he picks in certain places and hammers/pulls in others in a run where it's convenient. It's only certain people like John McLaughlin who pick everything and have incredible tech for inside, outside, and everything else style picking. For example Frank Gambale uses economy picking pretty much exclusively and so arranges everything where he's going in the same direction as even number of picks on a string, and odd picks if he's changing direction. That's a constraint and a limiting factor but it's essential for him to play like he does.

I'm a lefty who plays right handed and alternate picking was always my biggest issue until one day I decided to sort it by learning some Malmsteen, Dream Theater, and some other stuff. I found limits with my right hand angle, muting, rotation vs side to side, slanting, hand shape etc. and had to adapt to get faster. 

Your basic technique looks fine, I just think it probably needs a few hundred hours practicing Gilbert/Malmsteen/DT/Di Meola/McLaughlin stuff and you'll be there.

Also, remember those guys honed their tech doing this for hundreds if not thousands of hours so it takes a similar amount to play like that yourself. You can't wake up and go, 'you know what I want to run 100m in less than 10 seconds.'

Not suggesting you're doing that btw, just trying to put in perspective that really fast and accurate alternate picking is probably the hardest physical thing on guitar and it's almost like an elite sport in terms of what needs to be done to get there.

octatonic

DannyP said:

Do you guys feel there's such a thing as a personal speed limit though?

I've come to the conclusion I just don't have the "fast-twitch" muscles in my fingers to ever get up to the speeds of a metal player. Anything faster than Jimmy Page has always eluded me.

I think that's just down to my physiology and metabolism - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6172607/

I can appear quick to the layman with techniques like sweeping, legato and banjo-rolling, but I feel ultrafast stuff will always be beyond my capabilities.

I'm just using your post as a launching pad- please don't think I'm criticising you personally, but I do have some points to make on this issue because it comes up a lot with students.

Fast twitch vs slow twitch is a thing but in almost all cases developing a plan and sticking to it is how to crack that problem.

A lot of non-scientific discourse happens on guitar forums regarding FT vs ST and it is usually given as an excuse at to why someone can't do *x*. People also misunderstand the role of each. It isn't 'fast twitch' = 'fast playing'.

Here are some facts:

Slow twitch (type I) fibres produce less force and are slower to produce maximal tension but are better for a stabilisation and control.

There are two different types of fast twitch muscle fibres.
Type IIA and Type IIB (or IIX).
They are both used for fast, powerful movements, but Type IIB are the most powerful.
Type A is essentially somewhere between Type I and Type IIB.

We all have a mixture of these fibres.
Non athletes have about a 50/50 balance.
Power athletes (sprinters. weightlifters) have around 70-75% Type II.
Endurance athletes (marathon runners) have around 70-80% Type I.
Fast twitch fibres decline with age.
You can train to mitigate some of the genetic disadvantages of having more of one type or the other but not all of them.

---- end of facts, now onto my opinion and observations as a tutor.

Some people are naturally better sprinters than weight lifters but all professional sprinters train with weights and can probably out lift almost every person on the site.

Genetics do limit the maximum performance of an individual but for that to be quantified you have to compare two individuals with identical training, diet etc and then compare their performance.
This is essentially impossible with guitar playing.

When playing guitar fast you use utilising a mixture of fast and slow twitch muscle fibres.
There is a need for stability and control as well as a degree of speed and power.
Speed and power without control is not useful, and fast guitar playing is mostly about synchronisation between two hands, not about the speed or power of one hand.

In most cases a lack of speed is down to technique, not a lack of fast twitch muscle fibres.

At the highest athletic levels of ability (in competitive sports) the differences between athlete's times are down to milliseconds. With guitar almost anyone can get to a high level of ability with the right application of a good plan*. (More on that later)

The pick you use (thickness, shape), how you hold the pick, the amount of travel the pick needs to cover and then the amount of drill practice work you put in will far exceed any issues of a lack of fast twitch muscle fibres.

Alternate picking actually isn't my main technique.
There are loads of better players out there with that technique than me.
Why?
Because I found what I liked the sound of was a mixture of legato, hybrid (pick and fingers) and sweep picking.
I worked much harder on those techniques than I did on alternate picking and over time they became my home base for technique where with alternate picking I always feel like it is more effort.

When I drill my alt picking for a couple of weeks I get better at it and it is less effort.
It is still more effort than those other techniques because I have 30+ years of habit to back me up.
If I stop playing for a couple of weeks I still have 80% ish of my technique, especially legato and hybrid.
My alt picking goes to shit very quickly.

I'm an advocate for working on the stuff you are worst at most of the time.
The is where ' the right application of a good plan' comes in.

Almost every guitarist i have ever met who say that 'x' technique something they cannot do because of physiology or genetics is making the mistake of practicing things they are already good at more than things they are not good at.

 It is as simple as that.
Alternate picking is harder for some people than others.
I don't deny that.

But with the diligent application to the problem over the course of a couple of months you can massively lift your alt picking game. The problem is that for people who have already a degree of skill on the guitar in other areas it can be psychologically difficult for them to have to 'step backwards' in terms of technique.

Switching from 16th notes at 120BPM alternate to 130bpm might take a week or so to do.
But if you can already shred the ass of the guitar at 160bpm using legato, sweeping and hybrid... why bother with alternate?

That mindset is why people give up on alternate picking.

And maybe it doesn't matter.

It never bothered Holdsworth- he legatoed his way into being a musical giant never really tackling alternate picking.
Do you need to?
I don't know.

But if you want to then know that you can, you just have to do it.
Your fast twitch muscle fibres, or lack thereof, are not holding you back.

sjo89

wizbit81 said:

My 2 cents:

What are you actually trying to achieve? Is it to play certain pieces of music? In which case don't bother with exercises just learn those pieces slow and gradually speed them up, as you hit limits you'll work out strategies for getting round it, plus you're learning actual music you like instead of sh*t exercises and so you're liable to work harder and with more commitment.
If it's to build up technique towards a non-specific end then forget it and go work on something you actually want to do.
If it's to build up tech because you want to express yourself at those sorts of tempos then maybe find some licks you like and learn those and steal them, and then start writing some in a similar vein and learn to play your own lines.
Most players who developed high speed picking have strategies for it, like Malmsteen doesn't pick every note, he picks in certain places and hammers/pulls in others in a run where it's convenient. It's only certain people like John McLaughlin who pick everything and have incredible tech for inside, outside, and everything else style picking. For example Frank Gambale uses economy picking pretty much exclusively and so arranges everything where he's going in the same direction as even number of picks on a string, and odd picks if he's changing direction. That's a constraint and a limiting factor but it's essential for him to play like he does.

I'm a lefty who plays right handed and alternate picking was always my biggest issue until one day I decided to sort it by learning some Malmsteen, Dream Theater, and some other stuff. I found limits with my right hand angle, muting, rotation vs side to side, slanting, hand shape etc. and had to adapt to get faster. 

Your basic technique looks fine, I just think it probably needs a few hundred hours practicing Gilbert/Malmsteen/DT/Di Meola/McLaughlin stuff and you'll be there.

Also, remember those guys honed their tech doing this for hundreds if not thousands of hours so it takes a similar amount to play like that yourself. You can't wake up and go, 'you know what I want to run 100m in less than 10 seconds.'

Not suggesting you're doing that btw, just trying to put in perspective that really fast and accurate alternate picking is probably the hardest physical thing on guitar and it's almost like an elite sport in terms of what needs to be done to get there.

I'm essentially trying to develop my ability to play flashy repetitive licks to drop in and out of solos - much in the style of Sam Coulson - it's not anything sophisticated or harmonically complicated and I want to do it just because it looks fun and I like the way it sounds. 

digitalkettle

sjo89 said:

wizbit81 said:

My 2 cents:

What are you actually trying to achieve? Is it to play certain pieces of music? In which case don't bother with exercises just learn those pieces slow and gradually speed them up, as you hit limits you'll work out strategies for getting round it, plus you're learning actual music you like instead of sh*t exercises and so you're liable to work harder and with more commitment.
If it's to build up technique towards a non-specific end then forget it and go work on something you actually want to do.
If it's to build up tech because you want to express yourself at those sorts of tempos then maybe find some licks you like and learn those and steal them, and then start writing some in a similar vein and learn to play your own lines.
Most players who developed high speed picking have strategies for it, like Malmsteen doesn't pick every note, he picks in certain places and hammers/pulls in others in a run where it's convenient. It's only certain people like John McLaughlin who pick everything and have incredible tech for inside, outside, and everything else style picking. For example Frank Gambale uses economy picking pretty much exclusively and so arranges everything where he's going in the same direction as even number of picks on a string, and odd picks if he's changing direction. That's a constraint and a limiting factor but it's essential for him to play like he does.

I'm a lefty who plays right handed and alternate picking was always my biggest issue until one day I decided to sort it by learning some Malmsteen, Dream Theater, and some other stuff. I found limits with my right hand angle, muting, rotation vs side to side, slanting, hand shape etc. and had to adapt to get faster. 

Your basic technique looks fine, I just think it probably needs a few hundred hours practicing Gilbert/Malmsteen/DT/Di Meola/McLaughlin stuff and you'll be there.

Also, remember those guys honed their tech doing this for hundreds if not thousands of hours so it takes a similar amount to play like that yourself. You can't wake up and go, 'you know what I want to run 100m in less than 10 seconds.'

Not suggesting you're doing that btw, just trying to put in perspective that really fast and accurate alternate picking is probably the hardest physical thing on guitar and it's almost like an elite sport in terms of what needs to be done to get there.

I'm essentially trying to develop my ability to play flashy repetitive licks to drop in and out of solos - much in the style of Sam Coulson - it's not anything sophisticated or harmonically complicated and I want to do it just because it looks fun and I like the way it sounds. 

...and it could come in handy for this situation:
https://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/251347/someone-hands-you-a-guitar-and-says-play-something/p1
Someone hands you a guitar...you drop a 5 minute Zakk Wylde face-melter

Lewy

digitalkettle said:

Someone hands you a guitar...you drop a 5 minute Zakk Wylde face-melter

Which let's face it is what everyone fantasises about when they first get a guitar....

digitalkettle

Lewy said:

digitalkettle said:

Someone hands you a guitar...you drop a 5 minute Zakk Wylde face-melter

Which let's face it is what everyone fantasises about when they first get a guitar....

Probably all stemming from Back to the Future.

Lewy

sjo89 said:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZBt8kqADAY&ab_channel=golfboy1989

So I filmed myself working on this 2NPS stuff. Have to say I'm amazed at how much my wrist and forearm are moving about at speed. You can also here how as I speed up my wrist drops and starts to mute B string.

What I'm seeing in this video is that when you're starting slowly and speeding up, you're not using the same motion for the slow as you're using for the fast. There's little or no elbow at the beginning of your ramp up, and a visible amount once you're up to speed. I've made a satisfying amount of progress by making sure that when I'm going slow to get my coordination together, I'm using my quick motion slowed down, not my slow motion.

wizbit81

sjo89 said:

wizbit81 said:

My 2 cents:

What are you actually trying to achieve? Is it to play certain pieces of music? In which case don't bother with exercises just learn those pieces slow and gradually speed them up, as you hit limits you'll work out strategies for getting round it, plus you're learning actual music you like instead of sh*t exercises and so you're liable to work harder and with more commitment.
If it's to build up technique towards a non-specific end then forget it and go work on something you actually want to do.
If it's to build up tech because you want to express yourself at those sorts of tempos then maybe find some licks you like and learn those and steal them, and then start writing some in a similar vein and learn to play your own lines.
Most players who developed high speed picking have strategies for it, like Malmsteen doesn't pick every note, he picks in certain places and hammers/pulls in others in a run where it's convenient. It's only certain people like John McLaughlin who pick everything and have incredible tech for inside, outside, and everything else style picking. For example Frank Gambale uses economy picking pretty much exclusively and so arranges everything where he's going in the same direction as even number of picks on a string, and odd picks if he's changing direction. That's a constraint and a limiting factor but it's essential for him to play like he does.

I'm a lefty who plays right handed and alternate picking was always my biggest issue until one day I decided to sort it by learning some Malmsteen, Dream Theater, and some other stuff. I found limits with my right hand angle, muting, rotation vs side to side, slanting, hand shape etc. and had to adapt to get faster. 

Your basic technique looks fine, I just think it probably needs a few hundred hours practicing Gilbert/Malmsteen/DT/Di Meola/McLaughlin stuff and you'll be there.

Also, remember those guys honed their tech doing this for hundreds if not thousands of hours so it takes a similar amount to play like that yourself. You can't wake up and go, 'you know what I want to run 100m in less than 10 seconds.'

Not suggesting you're doing that btw, just trying to put in perspective that really fast and accurate alternate picking is probably the hardest physical thing on guitar and it's almost like an elite sport in terms of what needs to be done to get there.

I'm essentially trying to develop my ability to play flashy repetitive licks to drop in and out of solos - much in the style of Sam Coulson - it's not anything sophisticated or harmonically complicated and I want to do it just because it looks fun and I like the way it sounds. 

Ok, so I wouldn't personally bother then. 
Reason....there's plenty of flash stuff you can do that's loads easier and will impress an audience just as much. Sweep, tap, legato, left hand hammer, play with your teeth, play behind your head, use open string pull-off licks, whammy bar tricks, hamonic tricks like the lizard down the throat thing etc etc.
You could learn a bunch of those in the time it would take you to get your alternate properly nailed down. It's just a really hard thing to do properly with no shortcuts.

Just watched some short clips of Coulson, looks pretty simple stuff, just a little quick, you can get that down with just mild metronome practice every day for a little while. 

sjo89

wizbit81 said:

sjo89 said:

wizbit81 said:

My 2 cents:

What are you actually trying to achieve? Is it to play certain pieces of music? In which case don't bother with exercises just learn those pieces slow and gradually speed them up, as you hit limits you'll work out strategies for getting round it, plus you're learning actual music you like instead of sh*t exercises and so you're liable to work harder and with more commitment.
If it's to build up technique towards a non-specific end then forget it and go work on something you actually want to do.
If it's to build up tech because you want to express yourself at those sorts of tempos then maybe find some licks you like and learn those and steal them, and then start writing some in a similar vein and learn to play your own lines.
Most players who developed high speed picking have strategies for it, like Malmsteen doesn't pick every note, he picks in certain places and hammers/pulls in others in a run where it's convenient. It's only certain people like John McLaughlin who pick everything and have incredible tech for inside, outside, and everything else style picking. For example Frank Gambale uses economy picking pretty much exclusively and so arranges everything where he's going in the same direction as even number of picks on a string, and odd picks if he's changing direction. That's a constraint and a limiting factor but it's essential for him to play like he does.

I'm a lefty who plays right handed and alternate picking was always my biggest issue until one day I decided to sort it by learning some Malmsteen, Dream Theater, and some other stuff. I found limits with my right hand angle, muting, rotation vs side to side, slanting, hand shape etc. and had to adapt to get faster. 

Your basic technique looks fine, I just think it probably needs a few hundred hours practicing Gilbert/Malmsteen/DT/Di Meola/McLaughlin stuff and you'll be there.

Also, remember those guys honed their tech doing this for hundreds if not thousands of hours so it takes a similar amount to play like that yourself. You can't wake up and go, 'you know what I want to run 100m in less than 10 seconds.'

Not suggesting you're doing that btw, just trying to put in perspective that really fast and accurate alternate picking is probably the hardest physical thing on guitar and it's almost like an elite sport in terms of what needs to be done to get there.

I'm essentially trying to develop my ability to play flashy repetitive licks to drop in and out of solos - much in the style of Sam Coulson - it's not anything sophisticated or harmonically complicated and I want to do it just because it looks fun and I like the way it sounds. 

Ok, so I wouldn't personally bother then. 
Reason....there's plenty of flash stuff you can do that's loads easier and will impress an audience just as much. Sweep, tap, legato, left hand hammer, play with your teeth, play behind your head, use open string pull-off licks, whammy bar tricks, hamonic tricks like the lizard down the throat thing etc etc.
You could learn a bunch of those in the time it would take you to get your alternate properly nailed down. It's just a really hard thing to do properly with no shortcuts.

Just watched some short clips of Coulson, looks pretty simple stuff, just a little quick, you can get that down with just mild metronome practice every day for a little while. 

That's kind of the point i.e. its simple (at medium tempo), and sounds kinda naff unless doing at high speed accurately, but it means you don't have to really think hard in the moment, you just blast off through the pentatonics.

As for learning other stuff, I am doing that too i.e. licks with lots of slurs in etc. - I just want to get this down too. And I'm under no illusions there's any musical merit to this.

Lewy

sjo89 said:

As for learning other stuff, I am doing that too i.e. licks with lots of slurs in etc. - I just want to get this down too. And I'm under no illusions there's any musical merit to this.

If you can picture how you can use it to express yourself then there is musical merit to it. I actually think that this particular thing - alternate picked pentatonics across adjacent strings - does have a distinct colour and energy that a listener could pick up on. 

digitalkettle

Lewy said:

sjo89 said:

As for learning other stuff, I am doing that too i.e. licks with lots of slurs in etc. - I just want to get this down too. And I'm under no illusions there's any musical merit to this.

If you can picture how you can use it to express yourself then there is musical merit to it. I actually think that this particular thing - alternate picked pentatonics across adjacent strings - does have a distinct colour and energy that a listener could pick up on. 

Yeah, nothing sounds like that aggressive pattern.

Anyway, I mess around with looping, recording, jamming, gigging, etc. all the time...sometimes it's just nice to treat something like this as a puzzle (beats a sudoku).

DLM

How about giving this a pop:

Lewy

DLM said:

How about giving this a pop:

That's an interesting nuance on the downward pickslanting idea - the detail being that both downstrokes start from the same point (i.e. the apex of the triange), which means the bass-side downstroke has a steeper angle than the treble-side one. Might be worth playing around with that and seeing how it feels...

digitalkettle

Lewy said:

DLM said:

How about giving this a pop:
...

That's an interesting nuance on the downward pickslanting idea - the detail being that both downstrokes start from the same point (i.e. the apex of the triange), which means the bass-side downstroke has a steeper angle than the treble-side one. Might be worth playing around with that and seeing how it feels...

I always thought Zakk's approach was kind of brute force...and I think you'd need that level of movement for this to scale up for runs beyond 2 or 3 strings (which is the Zakk thing, right: rapid patterns over 2 or 3 strings?). Is there any right-hand tracking at all?

octatonic

digitalkettle said:

Lewy said:

DLM said:

How about giving this a pop:
...

That's an interesting nuance on the downward pickslanting idea - the detail being that both downstrokes start from the same point (i.e. the apex of the triange), which means the bass-side downstroke has a steeper angle than the treble-side one. Might be worth playing around with that and seeing how it feels...

I always thought Zakk's approach was kind of brute force...and I think you'd need that level of movement for this to scale up for runs beyond 2 or 3 strings (which is the Zakk thing, right: rapid patterns over 2 or 3 strings?). Is there any right-hand tracking at all?

So I speed pick like in the video above, although my fingers don't touch the guitar body, it is purely a slightly turned out wrist and creating two triangles.
I didn't know it was Zakk Wylde's technique because I've not really looked at his playing much.

Having a look at this solo I can see what you mean by brute force- it is sloppier than I thought he'd be though, although I guess that is the vibe.



The trick for a lot of people is getting over the speed hump.
You get it to something like 16ths at 120bpm with a good degree of control but going faster feels like you hit the limit of what you can do.
There are usually two ways of doing it.

1. Increase tempo at 5 bpm a week.
2. Make it sloppy but fast and tighten it up later.

1 is the slowest way but a lot of people like 2 because it can give the impression of 'faster gains'.
If that sounds like you then do this.

Pick a 3 note pattern on one string, either 124, 134 or 123.
Pick as fast as you can on one string and then try to get your fingers to match the speed of the pick.
It will sound sloppy as hell but then the goal is to get the two hands in sync, so you can slow it down a bit until then get in sync and then speed up again until it flies apart. Repeat ... forever.

I favour a third way which is essentially both 1 and 2.
I play mostly under (like 70-90%) of  maximum tempo and then have brief bursts playing as fast as I can.
These burst sessions are short- under 20 seconds and I do them every 5-10 mins a practice session (I play in 30-60 minute blocks usually).

digitalkettle

octatonic said:

digitalkettle said:

Lewy said:

DLM said:

How about giving this a pop:
...

That's an interesting nuance on the downward pickslanting idea - the detail being that both downstrokes start from the same point (i.e. the apex of the triange), which means the bass-side downstroke has a steeper angle than the treble-side one. Might be worth playing around with that and seeing how it feels...

I always thought Zakk's approach was kind of brute force...and I think you'd need that level of movement for this to scale up for runs beyond 2 or 3 strings (which is the Zakk thing, right: rapid patterns over 2 or 3 strings?). Is there any right-hand tracking at all?

So I speed pick like in the video above, although my fingers don't touch the guitar body, it is purely a slightly turned out wrist and creating two triangles.
I didn't know it was Zakk Wylde's technique because I've not really looked at his playing much.

Having a look at this solo I can see what you mean by brute force- it is sloppier than I thought he'd be though, although I guess that is the vibe.


...

Wow...I need a sit down after that

On the big runs, I can see that he's tracking across the strings as well as using the big elbow movement for actual attack...had to be!

Lewy

Just as a little addition to this - I'm really finding that with any alternate picked pentatonics that stray beyond 2 adjacent strings (i.e. they move further up or down the pentatonic shape across three or more strings) I'm getting much better results playing the same thing using 3 note per string pentatonic patterns. Especially things like the classic Eric Johnson cascade. The left hand is more challenging but I'm getting more speed that way for sure, I suspect because of reduced picking hand tracking needed and less reliance on fretting hand mini-barres for sequences that aren't just straight up and down. Maybe worth a look if you haven't before.