upstroke picking, Romane

BluesBop Harry

Hey Jazzaferri,
As Michael said Gypsy picking is NOT all downstrokes, it's alternate when playing on the same string and downstrokes for string changes in any direction.
All downstrokes are reststrokes.
At slow tempos most players stick with all downstrokes to get better tone.
The in the style of Stochelo Rosenberg DVD has the best shots of this technique that I've seen.
Good luck.

Jazzaferri

Thanks Harry

I bought that one too .... guess I will watch the techie bits rather than just the music

Now having watched and realized there may b e hope yet

What would you experts on rest stroke suggest for pick strokes be on the following sequence at moderately high speed say 1/4 notes at 240 bpm

S4F10 S2F9 S4F10 S2F9

klaatu

At Django in June last year, during his excellent gypsy picking class, someone asked Kruno Spisic if gypsy picking really made a difference. He proceeded to demonstrate with a fast solo played with alternate picking, followed by the same solo with gypsy picking. The difference was dramatic - same speed and precision, but the gypsy version had so much more projection and power. It made a believer out of me. Now if I could only do it! It's a real struggle after decades of NOT playing in that fashion.

Bones

Jazzaferri,

That is similar to the melody of Bossa Dorado alternating between strings 4 and 2. Check out Stochelo video of this tune. All downstrokes I believe.

Jazzaferri

Thanks Bones

I was thinking of notes faster than Dorado.

What I have learned over the past few days is that I have kind of a hybrid style. My up and down stroke angle is very much a la rest stroke except when skipping strings between pick strokes. I am not very concientious about resting on the strings. I haven't paid attention to picking patterns for a lot of years and just played a note as needed in whatever fashion. I spent a lot of hours getting good strong even tone in alternate picking when young. Think tiddly winks motion going down and sorta the reverse coming up but without the bounce that Stochelo describes in his DVD section on his technique.

I mostly use an alternate pick pattern when playing medium and fast pace and strictly alternate on scales at any pace (prolly from early training)

When playing slower 1/4's I often use just downstrokes sometimes resting and sometimes not depending on where my pick is going next.

I have started a course of practice GJ style rest stroke picking ensuring rest strokes changing strings down (slow practice on scles arps and licks that I have ingrained). I am also doing all my slower song practice/jamming with concietiously executed down rest strokes. Hopefully that will over time have an impact. :shock: :roll:

I am going to perform some blind tests on tone once I am able to unconciously be competent at true rest strokes and see if my band mates can tell the difference. I tried last night and couldne't hear any difference but will perservere. I will report back on their impressions.

Hennox my apologies if this is something of a hijack but hopefully some useful info will come from it all. For me it has been a very interesting, eye-opening experience and my sincere thanks to all who have responded and especially to Hennox for providing the impetus for the investigation.

HennoxLane

haha hey np, jazzaferri. It's all very interesting to read!

I guess the main conclusion would be that you COULD play with some hybrid technique, but pure reststrokes just sound better. And I can agree with that, actually!

I'll just keep practicing on those string changes then, hehe. Just until I can't hear that ticking metronome no more, and then some

klaatu

Jazzaferri wrote:

Think tiddly winks motion going down and sorta the reverse coming up ...

That's a great description of the technique (at least the way I understand it). I've finally gotten around to focusing on gypsy picking after a couple of years of being very lazy in this regard, and the motion seems to be more towards the face of the guitar than parallel to it, as in conventional picking. Although I'm not very good at the downstroke on downward arpeggios yet, that motion (with some bounce) seems to facilitate it.

pinkgary

Yeah, digging into the strings, as i used to call it (when playing blues, somehow that doesn't work with reststrokes) is what i find gives me the volume & is also why i need a big action, 'cos the string seems to move more up & down, and less side to side.

The good thing about reststroke, is that doing it right, i.e. with a relaxed hand, means you can carry on pumping out that kind of volume all night. Where if i were digging into the strings B.B. King style, i would have an aching wrist in 5 minutes flat.

BluesBop Harry

Glad to hear you're not giving up Jazzaferri.
When I first began learning how to gypsy pick I remember practicing arpeggios one-note-per-string going up and down... that helped a lot and there's an exercise Dennis shows in a youtube video called the "dutch bounce" or something like that that really speeds up the process and injects swing into your phrasing. It's demonstrated at the end of this video:
I spent 5 years strictly gipsy picking and just recently I started to incorporate other techniques. It's great 'cause I can now use whichever I want at any given time. Gypsy picking does sounds better on an acoustic, it just does... it's not really about volume but more about the full body of the notes, some gypsies play very quietly in fact, it's more about that particular phrasing and tone... Love gypsy picking but it's cool to be able to sweep up and do fast cross picking as well.

Jazzaferri

In rereading the posts in this thread and thinking on the DVD's I am thinking that by keeping my hand relaxed and making the pick stroke a little longer there is greater pick velocity which imparts a really crisp attack.

I don't hear a volume difference in picking my old way but focussing on the bouncier attack that SR describes and keeping a really loose wrist the tone is (wish I were better with words) crisper ..... a little more sustainy .... different overtones obviously.

I wish someone could explain how they jump strings though as I find trying to hit the next string down and then pull it off to continue to the next Physically lower but Pitched higher string to be quite clumsy and much slower than what I do now. I wish there was a close up slow mo of SR's (or any of the other true GJ pickers) right playing taken from the the bridge or something like that.

Thanks for the insightful post Harry..... the You tube ref I found very useful.