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these are the top three worst alternate
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picking mistakes and how to fix them but
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here's the thing I'm not going to give
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you some boring
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[Music]
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exercises because look you can find that
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anywhere on the internet and that's not
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what you need what you need are
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exercises that specifically solve
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mistakes that you're making in your
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alternate picking and look if you still
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aren't able to play as fast or clean as
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you want with alternate picking I
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guarantee you're making at least one of
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these three mistakes mistake number one
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how can I expect to alternate pick fast
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and clean across all six strings if I
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can't even do it on one single string
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with a metronome I figured this out a
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few years ago when I was trying to learn
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this Paul Gilbert Style
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run and for the life of me I couldn't
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play it to speed so I started to break
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it down and I said okay this is triplets
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and it lasts for five clicks five beats
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of the metronome 1 2 3 4 5 but can I
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even play triplets fast and clean on one
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single string across five beats 1 2 3 4
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5 I realized that the first mistake that
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I was making is I hadn't developed
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coordination on one single string so I
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developed the exercise that I'm going to
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give you right now and it's and you can
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do this with any exercise essentially
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what you do is you take the exercise
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that you're working on in this case for
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me it was the Paul Gilbert exercise and
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you want to take the same amount of
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Beats that you're going to be covering
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in the actual exercise and just do that
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with you know a few notes on one single
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string and I can pick any notes but I
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just basically need to work on my
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synchronization my speed my cleanliness
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staying relaxed all of these details are
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super important to focus on on one
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single string first mistake number two I
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took a lesson from this
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[Music]
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guy I also interviewed John petruci and
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Andy Wood and I obsessively studied Troy
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Grady's material and the data is Crystal
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Clear guys if you suck at alternate
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picking this is the mistake you're
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making you do not understand the art of
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string transitioning string
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transitioning is where I'm alternate
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picking on one string and then my pick
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makes its way to another string and I
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continue alternate picking and I might
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go back to this string if I'm in a
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string transition scenario where I'm
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going from the a string to the D string
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there are only two ways that my pick can
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make that transition either I'll be
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doing a downstroke on the A and then an
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upstroke on the D or I'll be doing an
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upstroke on the A and A downstroke on
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the D and let me tell you why this is
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important because the way that I angle
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my pick on the first scenario going down
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and then up is completely different than
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the way that I would angle my pick going
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up and then down so if I'm doing an
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alternate picking sequence and my last
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pick stroke on the a is a downstroke and
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then I have to do an upstroke on the D
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here's what needs to happen my pick
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needs to be angled slightly upward this
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way I'm going to exaggerate it for you
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but it needs to be slightly angled
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upward this way so that after I do my
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downstroke on the a the tip of my pick
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can fly over and just barely go over and
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almost graze the D string before I do an
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upstroke on that D string so it should
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look like this down and then up if I had
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my pick just straight and I didn't angle
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it any particular way obviously my pick
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would just go straight into the D string
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I would do a downstroke here and it
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would just run into that D string now
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how am I going to be angling my pick if
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I did an upstroke on the A and then a
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downstroke on the D so if I'm alternate
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picking here on the A and then my last
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pick stroke in the sequence is an
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upstroke what I then have to do is I
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have to slightly angle my pick downward
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okay I'm exaggerating it for you I
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wouldn't do it this much but I have to
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slightly angle it downward so that my
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pick will miss the a string as it goes
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to the D string so if I'm going down up
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down up I have to slightly angle it
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downward so that my pick misses that a
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string as it goes to the D and the
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opposite is true if I'm going from
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instead of the a to the D if I'm going
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from the D string to the a string after
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a downstroke then what I'm going to have
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to do is I'm going to have to angle my
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pick a little bit upwards so that after
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I do this downstroke my pick will miss
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the D string on its way to the a string
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so it would look like this downstroke
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slightly angle it up misses up into the
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a now if I was doing an upstroke and
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then going down on the a string what it
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would look like is this I would have to
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do an upstroke and I would have to angle
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my pick slightly downward so that my
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pick would miss the a string before it
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does downstroke on the a string again if
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I kept my pick just flat I would go up
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and then I would run into that a string
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now it doesn't matter what type of
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alternate picking sequence you're doing
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you have to pay attention to what's
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happening with your pick at each string
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transition point so if I'm doing a
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simple three note per string like
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this I have to pay attention to the
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first string transition first and I have
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to master that so what's happening here
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well well I'm going three pick Strokes
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down up down so after this last
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downstroke here I have to make sure my
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pick is angled slightly upward so that
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it misses the D string before I go up
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into the D string so it looks like this
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down up down pick flies over the D
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string up into the D string if my pick
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was at a downward angle or even a
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neutral angle it would run into the D
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string and that's what's causing you to
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sound sloppy it would be like
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this so I would sit there and I I would
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work on mastering that string transition
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for as long as I need to like
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[Music]
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this I don't need to work on anything
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else until I master
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that and I'm doing this with the
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metronome that's crucial now the next
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string transition I have to pick up
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where I left off this is extremely
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important the last pick stroke that I
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left off on was an upstroke so if I'm
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doing three note per string I'm going to
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go up down up and then I transition to
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the G string now the last stroke of this
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D string is an upstroke so what I have
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to do is I have to make sure my pick is
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angled slightly downward so it misses
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the D string on the way to the G string
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like this up down up like that if I had
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my pick at an upward angle still or if I
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had my pick at a neutral angle I would
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hit the D string on the way to the G
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string like
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this right and that's what's causing you
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to sound sloppy so in isolation I need
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to work work on that I need to go up
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down up and then make sure my pick goes
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slightly like this before I go to the G
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string up down up
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[Music]
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down and then once I mastered that
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string transition then I do both string
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transitions
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together and I'm going to exaggerate the
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pick angles here but it's going to look
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like
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this and
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then you're not going to do the pick
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angles that that huge but in fact you
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want to do them as small as possible but
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the point is is the angle of the pick is
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going to be changing for each of those
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string transitions so I have to master
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them one at a time and then I have to
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put them together so again mistake
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number two is that you don't understand
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string transitioning and even more
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specifically you're not mastering one
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string transition at a time so your
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exercise is simply this it's one of the
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best exercises to work on mastering one
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string transition at a time is to take
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this three note per string
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sequence and you master one string
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transition at a time like I showed you
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in the closeup and then you put them all
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together mistake number three you hear
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it all the time and it's that you have
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to start slow and gradually increase the
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speed and do not get me wrong that's a
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huge part of it but that is definitely
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not the whole picture there's no way a
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worldclass sprinter could become a
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worldclass sprinter if they don't train
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their fast twitch muscle fibers and
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that's the mistake you're making you're
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only going from slow gradually to fast
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you have to start implementing something
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called speed bursts and I got this from
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John Puchi he told me that he does this
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at the end of his practice every day now
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the idea with speed bursts is their
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bursts they short bursts so we're not
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doing the whole exercise we're really
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pushing our limit with speed and we are
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taking just a few notes so if I was
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doing this three note per string thing
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that I showed
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you and I'm really wanting to push the
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speed what I'll do is I'll start with
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six or seven notes
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first and you know what sometimes I'll
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even start on just one single string
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like going back to the first mistake to
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train speed I'll say okay can I do this
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on one single string first just maybe
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six or seven
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[Music]
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notes and then from there I'll add in a
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string transition now adding in a string
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transition won't work unless you've done
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your proper heavy lifting you know at a
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very slow speed first where you've
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really understood what happening with
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your pick at a particular string
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transition at a slower speed first but
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at the end of my practice every day I'm
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doing this I'm taking something I'm
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working on and I'm really pushing the
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speed and again the whole point of this
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is to train my fast twitch muscle fibers
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so here's your exercise to combat this
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mistake it's to take this three note per
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string thing and it's to start with a
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very few amount of notes maybe just on
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one single string
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first turn on a Metro
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turn it up gradually until you really
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feel like you're pushing the speed and
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see if you can just do a few notes at a
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time if you start feeling comfortable
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then you can add just literally one
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single note on the first uh on the next
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string and then as you feel more
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comfortable you can slowly add one or
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two notes at a time you do this every
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day at the end of your practice so just
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a recap the three mistakes are number
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one you're not developing proper speed
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and coordination on one single string
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first and to practice every day you put
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on your metronome and you simply
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practice things like synchronization
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relaxation playing in time on one single
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string first mistake number two you
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don't understand string transitioning
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and more importantly you're not
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practicing one string transition at a
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time so the exercise is to take this
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three note per string exercise and to
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practice one string transition at a Time
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Master One String transition at a time
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and then combine it together mistake
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number three you're only practicing slow
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gradually to fast you need to take this
00:11:00
three note pering exercise and you need
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to do speed burst at the end of your
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practice every single day and look if
00:11:06
you want a deeper dive on how to
00:11:08
effectively practice this sort of thing
00:11:10
click this video right here
