Improving my flatpicking - advice needed!

[tdlwhite]

another week (or two?) goes by, and I'm still playing this at least an hour or two a day, still working on parts of it, trying to get it up to speed.

I'm now 'able' to play it at a sloppy 90% speed:



That's the last three play-throughs from the end of today's lunchtime session. The good news is that I can play most of it at full speed (and some sections beyond). The bad news is that the same old bits cause me the same old issues.

I'm going to keep at it over the next few weeks to see if I can get some more consistency, and see if I can get the problem areas up to speed. I'll also learn another one of his slower tunes too, just to give myself a more completable goal.

[Glennwillow]

Hi TDL,

I listened to a whole string of Carl Miner performances this morning. They are all so tasty, I just loved them all!

I finally stopped on one of his demos, got a guitar out, and figured out what he was doing. It was very rewarding!

I would say one way to learn to flat pick better is to do just what you have started to do! Learn Carl Miner songs! Man, that guy is so good!!!

- Glenn

[tdlwhite]

Originally Posted by Glennwillow

...
I finally stopped on one of his demos, got a guitar out, and figured out what he was doing. It was very rewarding!

I would say one way to learn to flat pick better is to do just what you have started to do! Learn Carl Miner songs! Man, that guy is so good!!!

- Glenn

And there's so many to choose from! I'm still going with the OM1AT tune in this thread, I've also learned another one reasonably well, and I've got my eye on a couple more (but I've not got the time to learn them for now).

Tom

[815C]

From 5 decades of playing the best advice I can give you is to....

Practice in SLOW MOTION with both hands TOTALLY RELAXED while playing the tune clearly and precisely.

This will train your muscle memory to play with relaxed hands, which will ultimately result in speed. Conversely, if you practice playing a tune with any sloppiness in the performance, you are training your muscle memory to play sloppy.

Your entire body should be relaxed. Don't clench your teeth, curl up your toes in your shoes, etc. while playing.

If you watch a 1st chair violinist in an orchestra ripping up some incredibly fast piece of music, notice how relaxed they are. Most serious classical musicians use The Alexander Technique to train their bodies to be relaxed with playing. Not only will it help your playing to be more fluid, but it will also help to prevent carpel tunnel syndrome, tendonitis, etc. from playing over many decades.

I put the bare minimum of downward pressure on the strings when fretting. Try this...

1. Lay your finger gently on a string (e.g. 1st finger on the 5th fret of the D string). Do not press down at all...just lay your finger on that string/fret.
2. Begin picking the D string about once every second while SLOWLY increasing the downward pressure on the fretted note until it rings our clearly.
3. Notice how little pressure is actually needed to fret the note. Many guitarists will apply much more downward pressure than what is required. This is wasted effort/energy and actually is detrimental to playing fast.

Once you have trained your muscle memory to play, you can really fly at speeds you'd never reach if you practiced fast and sloppy.

Be patient. A year is going to go by whether you are taking a disciplined approach to your playing technique or not. Why not arrive at that date a year from now with much improved technique?

[Retired1]

I'm too lazy to read all the prior posts - this may have already been said - play the sections you have a problem with at a slower speed with the metronome - use the fastest speed you can consistently play them as well as you wish and then raise the speed 5 bpm - work at that speed till you've got it down then again raise the speed - playing sloppily at high speed will perfect your ability to play sloppy at high speed - nothing else - good luck.

[tdlwhite]

Originally Posted by 815C

...
Practice in SLOW MOTION with both hands TOTALLY RELAXED while playing the tune clearly and precisely.
...
Be patient. A year is going to go by whether you are taking a disciplined approach to your playing technique or not. Why not arrive at that date a year from now with much improved technique?

I like the idea of slow and relaxed coupled with the year going by. As much as I want to be able to play this "right now!" - I think the longer-term approach will do me good.

Thanks!

Originally Posted by Retired1

...playing sloppily at high speed will perfect your ability to play sloppy at high speed - nothing else - good luck.

Thanks! Looks like I'm going back to slow. If only there was a short cut to just being better and cleaner and mebbe look cool too. (read the last three word with heavy irony pls - I'm happy with my blue tshirts)

Tom

[tdlwhite]

Alright. After another 6 weeks of practise, I'm able to play it (with plenty of mistakes!) at full speed:



Now, there's quite a few parts that I still need to iron out. What has helped over the last few weeks has been focussing on some of the up/down runs but also playing a lot of 'rolls' which force me to play inside-inside string changes as part of a three-string-three-note roll. I've been doing these 'rolls' a lot, starting slow and working them faster. I think that once I've got them licked, the piece should get a little easier to play without so many mistakes.

Ah well, I'm getting there...

[Voxbox30]

Aw man. That’s so good.

[tdlwhite]

Originally Posted by Voxbox30

Aw man. That’s so good.

Thanks voxbox!

[tdlwhite]

alright, I'm onto another coupla Carl tunes now. Here's the second one I've picked -- a drop-D beauty with a touch of hybrid-picking. I haven't tried hybrid before (pick plus fingers of right hand), but this piece had such a small amount of it, I figured I'd give it a go -- and it felt okay! The hard parts here are playing clean, timing, couple of runs (my nemesis) and string-squeaks.



Really enjoyed learning this one. I worked it out while procrastinating on another of Car's tunes, and I haven't given it enough play-time yet, but I managed to squeeze in a few minutes for recording today, so gave it a go.

chain: Larrivee OM-40 into NT5s into Scarlett 4i4 into Reaper.

[tdlwhite]

I've been working on this one for a while (I got distracted by that drop-D one for a bit, but now I'm back on this).

It's got a great, and fast, run which is actually okay to play at 100% - but it's got all these arpeggios that are picked down-up-down-up-down and they are very hard for me to speed up.

I'm at about 80% now -- here's a quick recording (only had a few mins to do this, so there's plenty of mess-ups):



It's gonna take a lot of practise to get this one up to speed. I'm kinda alternating between a fixed wrist approach and a little wrist turn. But I've also tried with slighter exaggerated up-strokes to keep the pick clear of the strings.

Plenty more things to try on this!

Tom

[SprintBob]

Congrats Tom, great thread that was informative and reinforcing. It was cool to follow your progress. I'd tend to agree with 815C on just working on relaxation, focus, and getting that perfect muscle memory at slower tempo and raise it up slowly. I need to get much more disciplined at that in my fingerstyle journey.

I don't know if this might help but I enjoyed Michael Watts approach that he uses to make his practice sessions the most productive when he is getting ready for a concert. The latter part of the video is useful on the parameters he focuses on in his practice sessions.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaByw9M4sd0

[tdlwhite]

Originally Posted by SprintBob

... I'd tend to agree with 815C on just working on relaxation, focus, and getting that perfect muscle memory at slower tempo and raise it up slowly....

Thanks SprintBob!
I totally agree with getting it perfect and raising it slowly. Only thing is that sometimes I hit a bit where my slow technique doesn't quite work at faster tempos. This could be because I rush too much and wanna to fast too soon!

[tdlwhite]

Here's Carl's tune from the Lowden S35 vid. It's DADGAD, and my playing is its usual sloppy self!



ugh - this one is deceptively hard. The down-up-down -> up-down-up picking pattern isn't too bad across three consecutive strings, but when I have to skip a string it creates sloppy errors - especially on up-pick to the low D string.

I reckon about three more years of slow practice and I could get this cleaner.

BUT - the good news is that my electric guitar picking is improving!

[KevWind]

I don't even play that style of flat picking and there already has been great advice .
So I will only offer a much more general observation from my experience
I would really take 815 C advice to heart and definitely incorporate slowmotion into your practice .

I will suggest that playing in slow motion is harder to keep in good timing But once done well and consistently will ultimately result in much more fluid playing at any speed

As a famous Horse Whisperer type trainer once said. "The Faster you want it,,the slower you go"