When did you first learn how to sweep pick?

[Dead Undead]

I love mystical potato head groove. That style sounds awesome, but I haven't seen him use it anywhere else. He doesn't sweep much, crushing day has a bit of it I think (and it's blistering).

As I said, I don't like sweeping, but it is hard to argue with another tool in your toolbox. I am most natural when hybrid picking.

Mystical Potato Head Groove Thing is easily one of my favourite tunes by Professor Satchafunkilus. That and Searching.

I've really started to develop my hybrid picking via pentatonic licks, and it's one of my favourite techniques. Really fun to use.
Legato feels most natural to me though.
I noticed that I can sweep descending almost perfectly, but ascending I just get all BLARGHFLARGH.

 

[Infamous Impact]

I learned sweeos at two years. Worst nightmare.

 

[Shadowspecced]

by my second serious year of playing I could sweep pick. The whole idea went out of style for me personally about 5 minutes after I got it pretty clean

 

[heilarkyguitar]

It took me 2 months after i got serious about. That was about 2 years ago. I mainly use sweeps w/ riffs i write as acsents not solos persa...

 

[Zenerith]

I learnt to sweep-pick by watching Jonas Brother's instructional videos =)
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But seriously, i had been playing for 2-3 years and suddenly desided that i want to learn sweep picking. I found a guitar teacher in my hometown and asked him to teach me..after 3 months of practising he told me that sweep picking was my best area of expertise x) i hope he didn't just mean that i sucked at everything else xD
Sorry my bad english

 

[Maniacal]

When I was 15 I had a few lessons with a guy who was obsessed with Jason Becker, so it was one of the first things I learned to play. I dont think it was a good thing though.

I could play Altitudes but when asked to play an A minor 7 chord........

 

[Tomo009]

Well I started about a year ago, so about 2 years after I started.

I still really suck at it though, it takes a long warm up to do decent 5 string sweeps at 180 BPM and I totally fall apart after that, which is annoying as 180 is as slow as I go with most of my playing unless it's some sort of slow groove thing.

I also seem incapable of 3 string sweeps. Not sure why, but no matter how much I slow down and focus on it, hitting that 3rd string on the way down is so hard for me.

It is also quite dependent on the day for me, some days I have real trouble with the down picked sections. It seems much harder to synchronize my hands in that direction.

I really like the sound, I wouldn't base an entire section around it. People who complain about sweeps and call them the easy way out clearly never tried it themselves, so difficult to master. There isn't much emphasis per note, but I like the whole smooth wave of sound it makes. However I usually just use it as a way to quickly move from the top to the bottom and slightly less often, the bottom to the top of the fretboard (simply because I suck at that direction)

 

[Dead Undead]

To hell with sweeps, economy picking is where it's at!

 

[BlackSomber]

again same here being new to seven string I got one after like a year of playing guitar and was like wtf do I do with this. Haha. So I sold it but just recently got a new one after I started listening to a lot of bands who use them and I love it.

lol..ive only been playing for a year and i really desire seven strings...though i dont own one, i play the ones they have at the music store...its kinda like learning how to play guitar all over again, but i simplly like darker tones, so tis worth it to me...


To OP, like i stated earlier, i have only one years worth of exp (wich for some can be alot, but i didnt do much my first year) i find learning to sweep pick hard tho...really hard...anytips of how to ease it up?

 

[TomParenteau]

I've been playing electric for 30-some years. I can alternate pick as fast as anyone you know, but I have never been able to sweep worth a shit. And I want to sweep!

I can't get the individual muting right, unless I already need to change the position of that finger. Also, I am dependent on a massive amount of gain, so that really makes the muting difficult.

 

[USMarine75]

When I found out about Jason Becker...
When I stopped? When I found out about Petrucci.

When I stopped... Before I started... I watched Vinnie Moore and Jason Becker and said that's not possible.

When I started... 2 years later when I accepted being 10% of Becker was good enough for me.

When I stopped... when I saw Yngwie and realized what a douche-nozzle he is.

When I started again... when I realized I can't play almost anything written after 2005 without it.

 

[Dead Undead]

When I found out about Jason Becker...
When I stopped? When I found out about Petrucci.

I love Jason Becker's sweep picking. It just sounds the best to me. Dunno what I like bout it, just do.

 

[cakewalkgg]

started - 20 years ago or so after watching a Paul Gilbert video .. the cheesy one with him doing the magic tricks.. lol and I have to admit, i have a dvd version of it still.

I didnt develop great technique right away and then started kind of just doing the blur sweeps.. not really a musical rythm to them.. Then I kind of stopped doing it.. and then over a few years time, I started using them more in an arpeggio form where they are in time and have some musical meaning.

 

[Vidge]

Started practicing sweeping 2002-2003, after maybe a 1 1/2 or 2 years of playing guitar. It began with some of Marty Friedmans solos in Megadeth, but eventually it was Jason Becker as the main sweeping influence.

 

[Psychobuddy]

When I found out about Jason Becker...
When I stopped? When I found out about Jason Becker

Fix'd...for me I guess.

 

[RichIKE]

I actually picked up on it a few months ago, one day it just clicked. I had already been sweeping on bass(I am mainly a bassist) and decided to try it on guitar. I'm not very good or clean yet and don't know a lot of shapes (only on major and minor over three strings) but I'm progressing and once I get some more practice time I'll be killer. (i hope haha)

 

[Cabinet]

I started learning it maybe my first year or two with a teacher. Of course that's all I focussed on when I first learned how to do it, but I never got really good at it. I'm way more into string skipping arpeggios now.