Upstroke Vs. Hammering

Elliot

I have been studying Tchavolo and DeBarre videos lately, and I've noticed that, apart from rhythm playing and using the top (and to a lesser extent the bottom) E string, that Tchavolo almost never upstrokes. In fact, it looks like given a possible choice he always downstrokes with a hammer on/off combination just so he can have a good stab at the next string. Debarre seems to do this as well when he is not playing those 32nd (?) bebop runs. I'm wondering if this is true, just how deep this orthodoxy runs - or if maybe I'm just not seeing upstrokes, since this is difficult to spot. But from what I'm observing, it goes even farther than outlined in Gypsy Picking! Of course this gives it more of that bouncy effect, so there is a good reason, but the more I watch, the more fascinated I am.

MichaelHorowitz

I'd say at slower tempos all the quarter notes, and a lot of the 8th notes would be all down. But at faster tempos there's a lot of upstrokes...no doubt about that. All the pick markings in Gypsy Picking are very traditional. There's some small variation among players....but you should worry too much about that. Stick to the basic rules and you'll do fine.

Andreas wrote out some traditional ways to use pull offs and hammer ons in his book Gypsy Fire.

Good luck!

'm

dennis

Michael Horowitz wrote:

I'd say at slower tempos all the quarter notes, and a lot of the 8th notes would be all down. But at faster tempos there's a lot of upstrokes...no doubt about that. All the pick markings in Gypsy Picking are very traditional. There's some small variation among players....but you should worry too much about that. Stick to the basic rules and you'll do fine.

Andreas wrote out some traditional ways to use pull offs and hammer ons in his book Gypsy Fire.

Good luck!

'm

michael, you're losing your touch, your post should've been:

I'd say at slower tempos all the quarter notes, and a lot of the 8th notes would be all down. But at faster tempos there's a lot of upstrokes...no doubt about that. All the pick markings in Gypsy Picking are very traditional. There's some small variation among players....but you should worry too much about that. Stick to the basic rules and you'll do fine.

Andreas wrote out some traditional ways to use pull offs and hammer ons in his book Gypsy Fire.

Good luck!

'm

MichaelHorowitz

Damn....thanks for keeping me on my toes!

emicad

Elliot wrote:

]I have been studying Tchavolo and DeBarre videos lately, and I've noticed that, apart from rhythm playing and using the top (and to a lesser extent the bottom) E string, that Tchavolo almost never upstrokes. In fact, it looks like given a possible choice he always downstrokes with a hammer on/off combination just so he can have a good stab at the next string. Debarre seems to do this as well when he is not playing those 32nd (?) bebop runs. I'm wondering if this is true, just how deep this orthodoxy runs - or if maybe I'm just not seeing upstrokes, since this is difficult to spot. But from what I'm observing, it goes even farther than outlined in Gypsy Picking! Of course this gives it more of that bouncy effect, so there is a good reason, but the more I watch, the more fascinated I am.

Hammer-on is often used simply to replace upstrokes or to avoid consecutive downstrokes. The exaple 1 is the typical traditional triplet pattern and you can see it in the Mike's book. In this case you must to use consecutive downstrokes two times, changing from e to b string and from b to e strings.
In the example 2 you must to use consecutive downstrokes only one time, changing from e to b string, the second time you can see a pull-off replacing an upstroke. In this way the last triplet note becomes an upstroke instead of a downstoke.
You can also use a pull-off on every second note of all the triplets.
I hope it helps