Topic: Alternate Picking
Hi all
I've been playing for about a year, mostly "chords" and strumming, but also a few instrumentals (Ventures, The Shadows). Most of my playing has been just on my own, no backing, no background even and it was only when I went to play Walk Don't Run (The Ventures) that I realised how slow I was and how much faster I would have to get to play it "in time" with the backing.
So, I've started to practice alternate picking and trying to use that in everything I now play. I'm still not great at it (i.e, I still suck!), but I was wondering - as an experienced guitarist, do you use alternate picking as the norm or do you, errrm...alternate, between straightforward down picking and alternate?
The practice routines I've been using, other than playing WDR over and over, are simple alternate picking chords and scales to get me used to string skipping. Pleased to say that in a week I've gone from Godawful to about 60BMP without slurring notes, so I guess that's progress!
Cheers, Kevin