So for example, downstroke on 3rd string, upstroke on 4th string...multiple times at speed.
The context is acoustic flatpicking so it's not simply a case of switching things up and playing the 3rd with an upstroke and the 4th with a downstroke as that will break the feel. I'm also limited in terms of how lightly I can play because I need to generate acoustic volume and move 13-56 strings.
I'm all good with concepts like "start slow and building up gradually", "use a metronome", "aim for evenness" etc. it's a given that they will apply here too.
I'm thinking more of any mechanical, pick angle type tips .... anything you rock johnnies do or think about that I can nick and adapt to bluegrass?
Any thoughts welcome!
LC
Comments
Assuming you are holding your pick in the normal fashion, you will need to use pickslanting to get over the strings at speed after the upstroke on the 4th string you need to change your picking angle. It really depends if you're a downward pickslanter or an upwards pick slanter to begin with. Tell me that and I can tell you what to do next.
Also, for bluegrass, this is a must-see from the same YouTube guy!
I definitely gravitate naturally towards downward pick slanting, I guess because of the heavy emphasis on the rest stroke in flatpicking (especially bluegrass rhythm playing) and also the style gets is pulse from the downbeat being played with a downstoke, so it's "downstroke heavy" and a downward pick slant gets the best acoustic downstroke tone. It didn't occur to me to neutralise or even reverse it for certain moves..... It doesn't present a problem at moderate bluegrass tempos (say, 16th notes at 90 - 110 bpm) but it's when things get faster that I'm hitting glitches.
Thinking about how and what I play when I'm playing single note stuff, I'd say 85% of it involves changing string after 1 or 2 notes. Very rarely would I play 3 notes on a string. So that neutral positioning that Carl Miner uses would probably be worth cultivating.
Appreciate you pointing me to this info!
Grady goes into more detail on that style of picking (the music played is rather different, but the pick mechanics are very similar) in this video:
OK, so you're a downward pick slanter and you want to play a downstroke on the G and upstroke on the D, right?
The easiest way, and the way all the fast pickers tend to do this, is by rotating your pick after the down stroke to an upward pick slanting position and hitting the upstroke on the D with an upward pick slanting upstroke! After that upstroke on the D you're gonna want to rotate your pick to be downward slanting again for the downstroke.
The pattern is -
Downstroke - rotate pick up
Upstroke - rotate pick down
It's the rotation of the pick that will help you get over the strings.
However, sometimes players don't rotate the pick at all and use a technique which Troy Grady calls swiping. Troy analyses an Al Di Meola lick in which he is hitting an open string because he isn't bothering to change his pick slant.
In your case, if you wanted to swipe, you would choose a single way to angle your pick (up or down) and hit the downstroke on the G string and when dragging the pick to hitting the upstroke on the D the pick may graze the G string and sound it. It's just a case of muting the G string so you don't really hear it, although there will be a bit of noise from it.
This helps me understand the difficulty I'm having which is manifesting itself in passages where I have to play a big downstroke on the G, embellish with a quick upstroke on the D, and then hit another big downstroke on the G. What happens is that when I try at tempo I either "swing and miss" at the upstroke or more bizarrely seem to get stuck on the string....it's like the pick becomes magnetically stuck to the D string and just stays there, stalling the flow.
If I hit the upstroke with an upward slant, then I'm picking into the strings...reducing the chance of missing and also the slant will mean the pick can't get "hung up" on the string.
Then as you say, I'll need to rotate again for the downstroke back on the G.
Blimey...there's quite a lot going on there.......
You try starting the lick on an upstroke and see if that works better.
The starting on an upstroke is a no no for me....gotta be a downstroke on a downbeat for the right feel with bluegrass/flatpicking. There are odd exceptions (Tony Rice broke the rule a lot), but not in the case of the pieces that have got me working on this glitch.
Thanks again for the input.
As an aside, I've been playing about a month (but played bass guitar for ages - with fingers not picking) so I'm new to picking too, I looked at my picking style and it seems that I'm naturally/instinctively rotating my hand to angle the pick so as to transit cleanly to the next string as relevant, during up-down picking. If I speed up and up, my left hand technique goes awry before my right hand, which was a surprise given 1) the 30 years bass playing and 2) that I'm left handed - when I played drums (right handed) it was clear that my left hand was better at stuff (if that makes sense).
mattias does something strange with his picking when he goes into a fast run, like he uses a completely different angle or changes grip or something. I haven't been able to work it out yet.