Alternate or economic picking ?

[for-will-drive-devil]

I recently came back on a guitar site, where I saw a sentence I didn't saw 1 year ago when I started playing guitar : "pick strictly up and down, don't take bad habits of picking 2 times down when blablah..."

So I started to fear from having made wrong since the beginning, but after having take a look at a guitar board, it looks like I'm far from being the only one who does this mistake.

What d'you think about it ?
Maybe it's better anyway to start learning with alternate picking so that rythmics are easier to perform ?
Personnally, I started with playning lot of scales, and economic picking came naturally (its obvious that when you want to go somewhere, you take the shortest way)
But it looks like there are the pro-alternate, pro-economic, and pro-the right picking for the right part.

Opinion ? Experience about that ?
What about the pros ? Like Alexi ? paul Gilbert ? They play economic ? Alternate ?

 

[BodomiC]

Alternate I thinks, I mean up and down one after another, but sometimes, its viser to play some shit in one direction

 

[for-will-drive-devil]

You mean you would play this like that :

.....D.U..D..U..D.U..D.U..D..U.D..U..D..U..D..U..D..U
E||-------------------------------------------10-12-13-||
B||----------------------------------10-12-13----------||
G||--------------------------9-10-12-------------------||
D||------------------9-10-12---------------------------||
A||----------8-10-12-----------------------------------||
E||--8-10-12-------------------------------------------||

...and not like that :

.....D.U..D..D..U.D..D.U..D..D.U..D..D..U..D..D..U..D
E||-------------------------------------------10-12-13-||
B||----------------------------------10-12-13----------||
G||--------------------------9-10-12-------------------||
D||------------------9-10-12---------------------------||
A||----------8-10-12-----------------------------------||
E||--8-10-12-------------------------------------------||

cuz' maybe it's because I learned this way since the beginning, but I find it waaaaaaay faster.

But I also think alternate can give more percision in playing, and particularly for string skipping.
Economic maybe gives control too, you have to take care not to go to fast...

 

[mrweijia]

economy picking in your sense, is strictly for switching between strings. when you do scales, you're encompassing alternate picking aswell

 

[Sympozium]

Economy picking is your Down-Up-Down, Down-Up-Down, or Up-Down-Up, Up-Down-UP.

Alternate is continually Up-Down-Up-Down-Up-Down etc

 

[Yogota]

It depends on if it's needed - for example, there are lotsa ^ ^ ^ _ - Riffs (Up-Up-Up-Down), or the beginning of Enter Sandman: ^ _ ^ _ ^ _ whilst the part where the Distortion kicks in: ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ _ _

 

[Ermz]

There is alot of stuff that can be played rhythmically off-beat and it is natural to assume that you might use 2 downstrokes in conjunction with each other, as opposed to to alternating it. It's also a way to keep the rhytm in a sense, where you might reserve the alternate picking for 16th notes and keep the downstrokes for the syncopation, if you know what I mean.

If everything was to be alternated, sweep picking would be very hard, would it not and Alexi would be a very sad man.

 

[ladyjustice]

I agree with Yogata, it depends...lot of riffs have different style. And actually I wasnt aware till today that picking 2 times down is a bad habit. is that true? i seriously dont think so...

 

[for-will-drive-devil]

Huhu, yeah I'm quite a beginner but I know of course that sweeping would be pretty hard without picking two times in the same direction^^ (it would even not be called sweeping ), and of course I also use alternate picking while using economic picking (picking only down or up on a whole song would be quite... umm... err... burk :/), maybe I haven't been really clear about what I was saying.^^

So here's the page : http://www.cyberfret.com/scales/basic/index.php
And particularly this sentence : "Pick once on every note, but use strict down and up picking. Pick down on the first note, up on the second, down on the 3rd, etc... This is going to take concentration at first. Don't get into a bad habit of picking down 2 times in a row. Strict down and up picking is the key."

This page means I should play a scale like the first one i've posted here. Striclty up & down, all the way, even if it's more logical to play it economicaly. But if it's still playable when doing scales, I find it really hard when playing songs, like the intro riff-solo from bed of razors, or the riff-solo from Kissing the Shadows. Maybe it's simply because I play better with economic than alternate as I've played economic since the beginning, but I often find that stricktly alternate picking makes no sense.

I mean, if this page states not to play economicaly, there must be a reason.
Maybe that the change from alternate to economic comes more naturally than economic to alternate ?

 

[fridaY13th]

Economy picking can be ace (just look at frank gambale) but alternate picking is my favourite and i dont think ill ever learn economy

 

[stoned&drunk]

I use economy picking... I cant do those fast runs with alternate, like Silent Night Bodom night solo, and second guitar solo on Kissing The Shadows.... Fuck the guy who says its something wrong! Ill play the way that feels good!

 

[Brian]

I play almost all downstrokes...maybe thats why I'm not that good

 

[ladyjustice]

as beginner i also prefered downstrokes...cause its very easy..but you will get the habit of upstrokes sooner or later. nothing big about it.

 

[for-will-drive-devil]

I don't know if veteran players think the same, but personnaly when I started guitar I played scales and scales and even more scales, and when you do that, up and down comes naturally (well, I hope^^)

 

[stoned&drunk]

I played scales, but allways when i chage string, ill pick down... But i can still play them quite good i think....

 

[RockBodom]

ive been playing for 6 years, and i started out alternate picking...i never understood why ppl have so much trouble with going up and down ....it always confused me..but oh well..do whats best for you and makes you happy. fuck everyone else

 

[Cat5Messiah]

With me, it varies. I alternate pick mainly, but sometimes I don't. I pick up more than down too, which is something you don't really see everywhere. I don't remember how I started my picking because it was so long ago. I remember I used to never use my pinky as well. If you have been playing as long as me (12 years), it's hard to change the way you learn things. That's why you have to push yourself beyond your limits.

 

[Maili Björklund]

I usually use alt. picking as well... BTW can anybody explain me what exactly sweep picking is? been wondering about that one for quite a time...

 

[Sympozium]

Alternate picking enables you to play much faster, and it sounds much better than all downpicking in most situations. Some riffs sounds better with downpicking.

 

[for-will-drive-devil]

I guess sweep picking is the same than sweeping right ? I'm never sure when it comes to technical words. If so sweeping is when you pick all the strings in the same direction (all down or all up), that's this technic which creates this "wave" sound as in the end of kissing the shadows, or the chorus of you're better off dead. You can reach really high speed with this technic. The video "Serrana" from Paul Gilbert is amazing... Ô_Ô

Just to precise once again, because of Sympozium's post. I wasn't comparing "all downpicking" or "all up-picking", but alternate with economic, which is of course based on alternate, but which limits the movements of the hand to their minimum.

But as I don't know much about rythm playing, or just a bit, it's always cool to have precision about that. I wasn't sure if yes or not "pro" guitarists bother playing all down in some situations or not, and it looks like yes. Now that I think of it, it surely change the sound if you attack the cord towards down or up...