Technique that most changed your playing

BluesboyMitch

just wondering if there was a certain technique that took your playing to the next level?

Roland

Learning to play a bass line on the lower strings whilst comping partial chords on the others. Before that I played chords, and I played single lines, but never the twain did meet. Since then I play a lot of partial chords, and often think in chord shapes when soloing

Rocker

Never got to the 'next level'. Finding it hard enough to keep at the level I am at now....

JezWynd

Using my nails to strike the strings. Had to grow them first having been a compulsive biter for years. Much easier getting tonal variation off the strings.

viz

Whammy warble and super locrian over the dominant.

nocasternoproblem

Good left hand Vibrato, and then learning to slow it down. Makes you sound like you know what you're doing...

EricTheWeary

Getting an earlier level better maybe - working on the basics of funk which then apply across to blues, reggae,etc, thus turning me into a semi useful rivvum player which impresses me more these days than my tuneless pentatonic widdling.

PolarityMan

The palm mute

digitalscream

For me, it was two - legato and tapping, and then the consequent technique of hammer-ons from nowhere. Just about everything I do with lead work is based on those principles, mainly because my right-hand issues mean I can't pick particularly fast.

mgaw

alternate bass picking with thumb whilst playing chords and lead bits a la Merle Travis....Travis picking they call it:) learnt on acoustic took ages now invaluable on electric too...also frailing like a banjo but on guitar

Danny1969

Learning how to actually practice, by that I mean taking something I CAN'T do and working on it slowly and methodically until I can ..... as opposed to noodling stuff I can already do for 1\2 hour which most people think of as practice

djspecialist

Danny1969 said:

Learning how to actually practice, by that I mean taking something I CAN'T do and working on it slowly and methodically until I can ..... as opposed to noodling stuff I can already do for 1\2 hour which most people think of as practice

You just described exactly my problem.  I tend to sit down and re-hash songs (or fragments of them) which I already know.  I therefore don't focus on developing my skills, which leads to stagnation.

Can you give some examples of things you work on in a productive practice session?  When deciding what to practice, do you follow a plan (either made by yourself, or by a tutor), or do you follow your instinct?

Gulliver

Hybrid picking - it's not something I think about, but at some point I just started using other fingers on my right hand while picking, and I even find it difficult to just pick things now, hybrid picking is so much easier and convenient.

I also economy pick a lot - not a conscious decision, just me being... economical I suppose!

Gassage

Not looking at the Classifieds and looking at my playing instead

(still work in progress)

Danny1969

djspecialist said:

Danny1969 said:

Learning how to actually practice, by that I mean taking something I CAN'T do and working on it slowly and methodically until I can ..... as opposed to noodling stuff I can already do for 1\2 hour which most people think of as practice

You just described exactly my problem.  I tend to sit down and re-hash songs (or fragments of them) which I already know.  I therefore don't focus on developing my skills, which leads to stagnation.

Can you give some examples of things you work on in a productive practice session?  When deciding what to practice, do you follow a plan (either made by yourself, or by a tutor), or do you follow your instinct?

At the mo there's a few things I'm working on that I think will enhance my playing, things I've seen other people do that make me envious ..... That's the carrot for me, there's no plan other than wanting to be able to do the tricks other players incorporate into their playing  .. Like I wanted to be able to do that "Harping" effect that people like Tommy Emanuel do, so I started slowly getting the harmonics on their own in a chord shape and now I'm incorporating the non harped strings octaves in that shape that produce the effect ... it's still slow and a world away from the level it needs to be but every practice session it gets a little better and that's the point .... persistence and patience lead to reward 

 

frankus

ditching cyclic picking.

GuyBoden

Playing 10 hours a day.

PolarityMan

Danny1969 said:

djspecialist said:

Danny1969 said:

Learning how to actually practice, by that I mean taking something I CAN'T do and working on it slowly and methodically until I can ..... as opposed to noodling stuff I can already do for 1\2 hour which most people think of as practice

You just described exactly my problem.  I tend to sit down and re-hash songs (or fragments of them) which I already know.  I therefore don't focus on developing my skills, which leads to stagnation.

Can you give some examples of things you work on in a productive practice session?  When deciding what to practice, do you follow a plan (either made by yourself, or by a tutor), or do you follow your instinct?

At the mo there's a few things I'm working on that I think will enhance my playing, things I've seen other people do that make me envious ..... That's the carrot for me, there's no plan other than wanting to be able to do the tricks other players incorporate into their playing  .. Like I wanted to be able to do that "Harping" effect that people like Tommy Emanuel do, so I started slowly getting the harmonics on their own in a chord shape and now I'm incorporating the non harped strings octaves in that shape that produce the effect ... it's still slow and a world away from the level it needs to be but every practice session it gets a little better and that's the point .... persistence and patience lead to reward 

 

I love that technique, I used it on one song on our first EP and spent fucking hours re-recording this one part over and over again Since I never managed to pull it off cleanly live I just dropped it and now I cant do it at all again

Teetonetal

Left hand muting. It's amazing what a difference this makes...

mike_l

Concentrate on alternate picking, without worrying about what my left (fretting) hand was doing.

Tightened my picking up nicely, and made my fretting much lighter as an extra.

Literally using a 2-4-5-4 (fret) then 4-5-7-5, then 5-7-9-7 to a metronome made everything better.

thomasross20

Roland said:

Learning to play a bass line on the lower strings whilst comping partial chords on the others. Before that I played chords, and I played single lines, but never the twain did meet. Since then I play a lot of partial chords, and often think in chord shapes when soloing

@Roland would love to see a video of this