inadvertent pullofs

[bfm612]

I've always been a sloppy player and so I've been trying to pay better attention to getting better, cleaner tones. One problem I've been trying to solve is avoiding inadvertent pulloffs particularly when playing moderately fast and particularly when starting from a fretted note and moving onto picking an open string on a different string.

Here's the opening lick from Nickel Creek's "21st of May". The back half of that lick with all the chromatic notes tends to give me problems since I am not fretting the guitar anywhere when I'm playing those open strings. When I play the open D string (I put it between asterisks), I tend to get an open A as well because I'm maybe not very cleanly leaving the A string and accidentally brushing against it or pulling off as my finger leaves the string from picking that prior note.

[Intro]

e|--3/5-3----------------------------------------------------------------------|
B|--------5p3----1-----1-----------------------------------------0-1-----------|
G|-----------------2-0----2-0-------------------------------0-1-2--------------|
D|---------------------------2-1-0-----------------*0*-1-2---------------------|
A|-----------------------------------------0-1-2-3-----------------------------|
E|---------------------------------0-1-2-3-------------------------------------|

Is that the typical issue? Or am I instead supposed to be muting the A string somehow as I play the open D string? This lick is fast enough for me, so I need to put in a lot of work to make it cleaner. Any tips?

[Howard Emerson]

Originally Posted by bfm612

I've always been a sloppy player and so I've been trying to pay better attention to getting better, cleaner tones. One problem I've been trying to solve is avoiding inadvertent pulloffs particularly when playing moderately fast and particularly when starting from a fretted note and moving onto picking an open string on a different string.

Here's the opening lick from Nickel Creek's "21st of May". The back half of that lick with all the chromatic notes tends to give me problems since I am not fretting the guitar anywhere when I'm playing those open strings. When I play the open D string (I put it between asterisks), I tend to get an open A as well because I'm maybe not very cleanly leaving the A string and accidentally brushing against it or pulling off as my finger leaves the string from picking that prior note.

[Intro]

e|--3/5-3----------------------------------------------------------------------|
B|--------5p3----1-----1-----------------------------------------0-1-----------|
G|-----------------2-0----2-0-------------------------------0-1-2--------------|
D|---------------------------2-1-0-----------------*0*-1-2---------------------|
A|-----------------------------------------0-1-2-3-----------------------------|
E|---------------------------------0-1-2-3-------------------------------------|

Is that the typical issue? Or am I instead supposed to be muting the A string somehow as I play the open D string? This lick is fast enough for me, so I need to put in a lot of work to make it cleaner. Any tips?

I believe you answered your own question when you asked: "...or am I instead supposed to be muting the A string somehow as I play the open D string?"

The answer is yes, and the 'how' is however it can be done. I'll assume this is flat picking, but unwanted notes are unwanted notes no matter what style.

I don't read tab, but I'll assume from what I'm looking at that the last note on the A string is the 3rd fret (C, if not capoed). I would just leave your fretting finger on that note a nanosecond longer to avoid the open A string ringing as you attack the D string.

The other thing is that you may be doing a better job than you think, but you're hyperfocusing on it so much you're not listening as well as you could.

After you have the phrase really well in hands, video record yourself from a bunch of angles to explore the muting possibilities.

An amazing Canadian slide player, Kevin Breit, flatpicks, and unless I'd actually seen him I would not believe what he was doing with muting. He uses the side of his picking hand thumb, and other parts of the hand (while holding the flatpick) to mute extraneous notes.

Where there's a will there's an heir..........

Best,
Howard Emerson

[ljguitar]

Originally Posted by bfm612

I've always been a sloppy player and so I've been trying to pay better attention to getting better, cleaner tones. One problem I've been trying to solve is avoiding inadvertent pulloffs particularly when playing moderately fast and particularly when starting from a fretted note and moving onto picking an open string on a different string.

Hi bfm

A technique I teach finger stylers is to lean a fretting finger back a touch (lessen the angle) so the pad of the finger mutes the string adjacent to it (above it in pitch).

It doesn't take much, and is deliberate, not sloppy, and very useful.

Mutes can come from fingers at either end of the sound-producing chain. I sometimes also mute notes with individual fingers on my plucking hand.

A lot of us associate muting with using the side of the palm of the picking/plucking/strumming hand at the bridge. But muting can be much more specific by using finger tips.

[bfm612]

Thank you both. These tips are clear and not too overwhelming, but will probably still take some time for me to get comfortable with. I'll have to figure out what works better or how to shift techniques depending on speed.

[Howard Emerson]

Originally Posted by bfm612

Thank you both. These tips are clear and not too overwhelming, but will probably still take some time for me to get comfortable with. I'll have to figure out what works better or how to shift techniques depending on speed.

The sooner you put a video camera on yourself, the sooner the coin will drop. If there's too much red-light fever, of course, a simple large mirror will often suffice!

Not that you asked, but here's a little youtube video that one of my students made when we worked on the first 2 bars of a bottleneck piece I wrote. If you can ignore my cat, Loki, the right-hand muting technique that I explain to the student is very, very involved, but when I taught myself how to do it it made perfect sense.......until I had to break it down, verbally!!



Regards,
Howard Emerson

[Gitfiddlemann]

Nice little lesson on slide and string muting. Thanks for posting Howard.
I saw too that Loki has a friend or sibling! Happy cats in that house....
And I don't think I've ever seen a bottleneck slide that large. You must have made it from a Magnum bottle.

[rick-slo]

From that picking run looks to me there would be more effort required to prevent some of the other notes from ringing beyond
their time value than the point indicated where just easing up on the third fret of the A string when going to the open D string
would probably be enough. Questionable whether muting every note after being played in a quick run is usually necessary anyway.