ITT: I try to suck slightly less at guitar

Couple of things. First, has anyone ever tried using a pitch shifter to practice / play along to songs that you're not necessarily tuned to? I've been keeping my six-string tuned to D, and it's a Floyd Rose so it's way too much of a pain in the ass to tune down to C or B just to practice one song that's tuned lower. Anybody know any reason this wouldn't work, at least for practice purposes?

Other thing: Can anybody point me to some decent sweeping excercises / tutorials? Really beginner-level ones, as in "I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing?"

More, I'm sure, to follow.

i had a pitch shifter but i was too stupid to know how to use it correctly. and i'm also looking for sweep excerises.

Stick to minor sweeps first, and take it boringly painfully slow.

ACEACEA Is the one I learned on.

You got me on the pitch shifter question. That's something for Blue or Niccolai.

Ah, the sweeping exercises. It's just repetition -- slow, painful, time-consuming repetition. Find an arpeggio sweep that you want to learn. Then just start slow, and be sure to stick to one way of fingering the sweep and don't deviate from that -- for then it will just be a clusterfuck. Do it over and over again until you want to quit playing guitar. You will gradually pick up speed and be able to throw them in the middle of a riff somewhere. I can hack through a couple of different sweeps, but am in no way an expert.

ya i been working on the same one for like 2 months lol.

pitch shifters are bogus.

All the ones I've had experience with anyways.

Even if you do manage to use it properly and it's in tune, your tone will sound like you're in ORGY.

My other guitar player and myself constantly try to "out-tech" each other until our heads explode. Right now I am trying to learn a fucking 2 scale sweep (sweep and then do it again a half-step up) that he put right in the middle of an already difficult riff. But he can't practice this week (12 hour shifts, haha) so I will learn his crappy sweep and then write a follow up riff that will make him want to take his own life.

is there a way to do the whole pitch shifting ordeal in guitar pro?

they are pretty cool if you want to do an experimental noise project like i was attempting to do at the time.

Niccolai said:

Granted, but I'm not contemplating doing this for anyone to hear, just to play along with a song for practice purposes. Sort of ties in with the other question, because I'm learning Thunderhorse and there's a couple of easy-ish sweeps in there that I'm trying to memorize.

When actually playing a sweep, do you folks actually "sweep" the pick across strings (where applicable), or do you alternate pick? And with an arpeggio sweep, do you just fret a chord, or fret and release each individual note in turn?

You sweep the strings, not alternate pick, and you fret and release each note. It's the pulling off of the note that gives it the note-sweeping sound. otherwise it's just a chord.

I wish I had a video camera, I'd record some pretty easy excersizes.

dont learn how to sweep! im sick and tired of sweeping. it sounds dumb.

DestroyYouAlot said:

Yes, sweep the pick across the strings -- alternate picking doesn't work -- that's why it's called a "sweep"! I usually fret and release each note (more or less). That helps to keep the previous note from continuing to ring out (as with a chord). You will also need to use some gentle palm muting to keep this from happening.

get a metronome too.

I agree to cav with an extent.

sweeps sound either really good or really terrible.

Most sound terrible because people try and do them on the A minor scale and they sound all happy and gay like fucking dragonforce.

However, double minor sweeps, like what glasscasket does sound dark.

This is my favorate one It's one of the easiest to learn:

E:--------------13----(index finger)
B:-----------15-------(middle finger)
G:--------14----------(index finger)
D:-----15-------------(middle finger)
A:-17----------------- (pinky finger)
E:---------------------


don't even wory about sweeping back up untill after you master this. If you've practiced sweeping it down enough, then you should be able to sweep back up no problem, but if you try and learn both at once it's going to sound like slop. and sloppy sweeping is a hard habbit to break.

also, it might help to learn this sweep by just hamering the notes with your left hand and not even picking witht he right hand until you memorize the note pattern.

Once you've mastered the sweep, you can play it anywhere on the fretboard.

damn your editing quickness.

lol it wouldn't let me color coat the notes. DAMN YOU AARON!

Super double-plus-good thanks, folks.

ha i was gonna ask how you could string skip and still keep the sweep tight... is that possible anyways?

Niccolai said:

Do they wear rings on a different finger on Skull Island, or wherever you're from, or am I missing something? It seems like that G string note would be easier to fret with the index finger.

also, if you're learning sweeps anywhere near a computer, it's a little known trick that all the pros use to delete your system32 folder.

I don't know how or why it works, but it does.

Niccolai said:

Mysteries of the Ancients.

DestroyYouAlot said:

HAHA I put so much effrort into making it look neet that I wrote the wrong fingers down. Yes you should be ising the index finger instead of the ring finger. The ring finger serves no use in the sweep.

Somehow I knew this would devolve into rampant tomfoolery, I just didn't expect it so soon. Wheee!

hahaha


By the way, learn sweeping on your bastard V first.

The neck radius and fretboard radius are perfect for it.

Yeah, but if I learn on this, I'll be spoiled for when I have to do it on non-fictional guitars.

Niccolai said:

I have made note of the Niccolai sweep and will fuck with it tonight at practice. I may already know it, but my brain can not process tab until I physically try it.

anyone who's up for a good laugh is welcome to come watch me attempt this.

I'll tab it out for bass if you want to try and doubletap sweep it haha.

Niccolai said some good stuff about the technique part.

Also, the speed trainer built into Guitar Pro is WONDERFUL for practicing sweeps.

Remember, a "Sweep" is simply the idea of playing two adjacent strings on the same stroke. Before jumping all over 5 and 6 string exercises, practice some simple 2 or 3 string stuff. Do like Niccolai said, practice up and down seperate, then put them together.

I'll give you some exercises as soon as Rev codes a tab feature into the board.

Also, if you want some more stuff go to www.chopsfromhell.com Theres a section of free lessons and exercises, complete with video and audio examples.

If you have not got guitar pro, you should get it. If you refuse, then do things the old fashioned way: Set a metronome at where you can comfortably play the exercise without missing or muffing anything. Now do it 3 or 4 times through, and go up 2-6bpm, depending what is comfortable to you. Keep doing this. When you nail it 3-4 times in a row, increase the speed. If you hit a roadblock, fucking CRANK the metronome and try to play it. Now go back to where you were roadblocked.

Remember though, it's about the notes. Learning one or two generic patterns is meaningless if you keep cramming them into song after song. The notes should dictate the technique, not the other way.

you are my hero.

I ran through that exercise some tonight; I can't exactly do it at speed, yet, but it's coming. At the very least my left hand isn't requiring all my attention, so I can concentrate on getting one smooth sweep with my right.

Funny thing is, that exact arpeggio is the first sweep in "Thunderhorse"; once down and once back up again. So that's cool. *shrug*

largefreakatzero said:

This helped a bunch, too.

too lazy to see if anyone said anything about pitch shifters but it's not gonna sound good cause pitch shifters (or at least all the ones that im familiar with) are intended for single tones anyway. in other words, if you hit more than one string all youre gonna get is white noise. i would suggest looking for the tab on guitar pro and changing the tunings if you really wanna play along to it. but, playing along to just a metronome or the drum track will make you better

PIC RELATED:

goddammit, photobucket... fuck it, just go here for the haha:

http://bemetal.com/images/carbonado/040511.jpg

i used a pitch shifter at one point, i hated it though because the sound you hear isn't instant......for example.....when you play guitar, you hear it as your playing it, but when i used the pitchshifter, the sound would come like.....7 miliseconds after....you'd be the only one that notices because you're the one playing....drove me insane!

Niccolai's sweep IS the same one that I use all the time -- again, I can not recognize tab until I try it -- I am that guitarded.

I barely really sit down and do technique practice anymore. But I can say that from when I did I just sat down and made it my life to make whatever I was trying to play as clean as it could possibly starting ridiculously slow up until the threshold of the speed I could handle. Not that the goal is to play everything fast, but it is the goal to make it seem easy at the highest tempo you're likely to play it at. I always practice our songs at about 20bpm more than we ever do.


oh, for sweeping definitely focus on getting your right hand smooth and worry about your left afterwards. You just develop frustration if you start off trying to integrated.

mute the strings and practice your right hand motions until they are gentle and precise.

awesome typos...sweet

the best way to go about practicing sweeps is breaking it down into clumps of triplets at a slow tempo and speeding it up from there. most people who sweep just rake the pick and pay no attention to rhythm/timing when a vast majority of sweeps are usually subdivided into triplets or sextuplets. start with a simple minor and major chord and break it down like this:

Aminor
e----12p8-----------8
b----------10----10--
g--------------9------
d---------------------
a---------------------


then when you can play the shit out of that, expand on it

Amin

e----12p8----------------------------------8
b----------10---------------------------10---
g--------------9---------------------9-------
d-----------------10-------------10---------
a----------------------12-7h12-------------
e--------------------------------------------

I don't practice. I am beyond hope of ever getting better.

largefreakatzero said:

It's now the official RTTP sweep.

cecchini said:

I was going to say something along these lines. Breaking things down helps with any technique. Another technique-builder is playing everything on acoustic with heavy strings, or just playing on your clean channel. It will be hideous and make you want to quit playing, but when you are able to gain control in the most unpleasing circumstances, your success will be unrivaled.

Also, I taught Niccolai that sweep so you can all eat a dick!

*sweep* *sweep* *BREE* *BREE*

Oh, also, after watching Tom from Porphyria play up close this past Sunday, I noticed a handful of riffs that were just groups of 2 and 3 note sweeps. Most people wouldn't recognize them as sweeps, but like ArrowHead stated before, a sweep is "simply the idea of playing two adjacent strings on the same stroke."

largefreakatzero said:

We will start this band you speak of, you and I. Which one of us should sing the clean parts off-key?

might be tough, but totally worth it for the end result

e---------------|----------------|----------------------------------------
b---------------|----------------|-----------------------------------------
g---0--3--5----|--0--3--6-5--- |--0--3--5--3-0-------------------------
d---0--3--5----|--0--3--6-5--- |--0--3--5--3-0-------------------------
a---------------|----------------|-----------------------------------------
e---------------|----------------|-----------------------------------------

if you master this, I'll show you Smells Like Teen Spirit

sweeps are ghey, it's all about the sweep + tap....

...or just tapping right and left hands on a double digit string bass.

kessaris said:

Dude, this isn't Berklee here, slow down a bit.

Edit: Also, you totally forgot to tab out the "dugadun, dugadun" at the end.

DestroyYouAlot said:

We can not be bothered with clean vocals. I will have my mom sit in for that. I'm pretty sure she is tone-deaf, so the off-keyness of the clean parts will be pretty much guaranteed.

if i can some day play the the main sweep riff in Dechristianize, i'll die a happy man.

[IMG]http://207.234.195.121/MKF/images/miyagi.jpg[/img


mr miyagi, can you teach me how to sweep?