In this instructional video, Aaron Jaxon addresses the challenge many bluegrass flatpicking guitarists face when learning crosspicking—a technique that mimics banjo rolls or fiddle shuffles by picking across three or more adjacent strings. Rather than relying solely on abstract picking exercises, Jaxon proposes a musical‑context approach: he selects four classic fiddle tunes—Beaumont Rag, Wheelhouse, Red‑Haired Boy, and Bill Cheatham—to serve as practical vehicles for developing crosspicking. For the first two tunes, the crosspicking pattern is embedded in the melody (B part of Beaumont Rag, A part of Wheelhouse). For the latter two, Jaxon draws directly from David Greer’s seminal “Building Powerful Bluegrass Solos” instructional tape, adapting Greer‑inspired arrangements that heavily feature crosspicking. Throughout, he emphasizes that mastering these tunes will both expand a guitarist’s repertoire and force the development of solid crosspicking technique.
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One of the most challenging techniques for a lot of bluegrass guitar players is crosspicking— picking across 3 or more adjacent strings at any given time, like this, or— and we do that to essentially mimic a banjo roll or a fiddle shuffle. It's a very challenging technique for a lot of bluegrass flatpicking guitar players, but what so many people do when they're trying to develop this technique is they just spend a lot of time working on picking exercises. Now, I am not against picking exercises. I like them and I use them, but I wanted to give you something today that will help you work on your crosspicking but do it in a musical context. So I'm going to be showing you 4 classic fiddle tunes that are great for any flat picker to learn, but each one of these will force you to develop your crosspicking technique as you're learning the tune. And so the 4 tunes are going to be Beaumont Rag, Wheelhouse, Red-Haired Boy, and Bill Cheatham. Now with the first 2 tunes, crosspicking is just a part of the melody. On the B part to Beaumont Rag, you have to crosspick it in order to be able to play the melody. On the A part of Wheelhouse, you have to crosspick it in order to play the melody on a guitar. Now with the last 2 tunes here, Red-Haired Boy and Bill Cheatham, I want to cite my sources on this. So the arrangements that I'm going to be showing you for these 2 tunes come from this classic instructional video that I absolutely wore out and watched as much as I could when I was a teenager. This comes from David Greer's classic Building Powerful Bluegrass Solos instructional tape that came out on Homespun back in the '90s, I think. And the version of Red-Haired Boy that I'm going to teach you is inspired by a version that he plays at the beginning of this video. And then the version of Bill Cheatham that I'm going to show you is from a version of that tune that he teaches in that lesson. So with both Red Haired Boy and Bill Cheatham, I'm going to be showing you some very David Greer-inspired versions of these that incorporate a lot of crosspicking. So again, these are must-know tunes for any bluegrass flatpicker, but in addition to learning some great tunes, you're going to be forced to really develop your crosspicking technique. All right, let's jump into the first tune.
