Build Incredible Flatpicking Speed With This One Lick

All right, well, hello and welcome to a little speed building, flat picking lesson. I wanted to share this because I get a lot of people asking about building flat picking chops and, you know, building speed and technique and this style. And, you know, bluegrass lead guitar is a. It's a pretty fast style to play in general. You know, we play a lot of 16th notes and a lot of times these tempos are, you know, for sure above 100 beats a minute. So it requires a good bit of technique to play this style. But on top of that, I still get a lot of people asking about building speed and building technique and all that kind of good stuff. So what I wanted to do today here is show you something that I like to practice. This is something I try to practice every single day. And it just kind of helps me to keep my flat picking chops in shape. It also helps me to build a little bit of speed at the same time. So it really is just one lick. It's one lick. And then what I'm going to do is as I move up to faster tempos, I just shorten that lick to kind of just acclimate myself to playing at tempos that are a little bit faster than I'm comfortable playing at. So by the way, if you would like to get the tabs for this lesson, just hit the link down below and I'll send them to you. But let me jump in here and just show you this lick. The full length version of this lick, all the way through here, it is going to go like this. Okay, so one more time, just a little more up to tempo here. There we go. Okay, so that is the lick that we're playing there. So I'm just using alternate picking through that. And there's a couple of things that I like about this lick. Number one, I like that almost all of the notes are picked notes. This. Except for the very end when I get to. So that little kind of Tony Rice sound at the end, I do a pull off slide. Okay. But aside from that, all of those notes are picked. And I also like that it goes from the sixth string through the first string. So our hand has to. It's. It's. Our picking hand is four to kind of COVID Cover the range of these guitar strings here. And I guess. Or another thing that I like is it's just a cool sounding, very usable bluegrass lick. You know, a lot of times when we're talking about, you know, picking exercises and that kind of stuff, a lot of the things that we practice are not. They're the only thing we use them for, you know, is, you know, those kinds of little stretches like that or stuff like you. Or if you're doing, you know, you know, that kind of stuff, which is great for your. It's great for your hands, it's great for oiling the machinery here. But they're not ideas that you're necessarily gonna use in a tune. Whereas this lick is very usable in a wide variety of bluegrass tunes. I mean, it sounds like something that, you know, Cody Kilby or Jake Workman or Brian Sutton or maybe even Tony Rice would use. So that's what I like about this lick here. So one more time, we'll. Okay, so all the way through there. So I want to get this out of the way too, because I'm inevitable. This is another question that I get a lot. And it's the old, you know, brace or don't brace or, you know, do you play with your fists closed or with your fingers out? Do you use downward pick, slanting? Are you using economy picking and all that kind of good stuff? And I really, really think that the most important thing for you to do is to find what is the most comfortable and to find what works for you. Because we're all wired differently. You can watch a lot of different guitar players and their picking hand looks different. The way Tony Rice played looks different from the way that, say, Jake Workman plays. So you have to find what works for you. But one of the things that I like to keep in mind when I'm playing a lick like that is I want my hand, whether I'm, you know, bracing down here or whether I'm on the bridge or whether it's just kind of floating right here. I want my. The grip on my picking hand to be loose enough to where. So do you see how whenever I get up to the first string right there, my hand's kind of like this? So it's loose enough to where it can kind of move up and down the bridge like this. What I personally try to avoid is I don't want, whenever I get up to the first string for my picking hand to be doing this. And the reason is, is because that produces unnecessary tension and it restricts my picking hand's range of motion. Okay? So again, however you're doing it, however you're doing it, just try to keep your picking hand loose enough to where it doesn't restrict your picking hands range of motion and it doesn't produce unnecessary tension in your picking hand. Because if you get that, you're going to get the, you know, that really staccato kind of choppy sound. And that's not what we want here. So again, the main thing is find what works for you, but then try to minimize tension in your picking hand and don't restrict your hand's range of motions. I'm not always perfect with that. And by the way, you'll see other guitar players who totally break that rule. And that's okay. But anyway, just some thoughts that I wanted to throw out there. So anyway, what I want you to do with this lick and once you learn it is I want you to find whatever tempo it is that is kind of your breaking point tempo. The tempo that you can play that, the fastest tempo that you can play that lick all the way through at, and you can play it cleanly and, and in time I'll kind of show you where that is for me here. So now don't worry about, you know, if that's a lot faster than where you're at. No problem, no problem. Just find where that is for you. That might be 40 beats a minute. That is totally okay. I work with students all the time and we're doing fiddle tunes at 40, 50 beats a minute. That is totally okay. Just find the tempo again, the fastest tempo that you can play that cleanly and in time at. Okay, so that's, that's where I want you to start. And again, whatever tempo that that is, that is totally okay. Now here's what we're going to do. We're going to take the same lick, but I'm going to shorten it just a little bit. Okay? And that's going to go like, I want you to kick that tempo up at least five beats a minute, preferably 10. And I want you to try to just play that lick at again, either 5 or 10 beats per minute faster than you were playing the full length lick at. Here's what it sounds like for me. So again, again, I'm just kind of showing you where I'm at here. But don't get intimidated by that. Find wherever that is for you. Maybe your breaking point tempo on that full length lick was say 50 beats a minute. Fine, kick it up to 55 or 60 and play the shortened vers. Okay, so now let's add another variation here. And all I'm gonna do is I'm gonna shorten that lick a little bit more. I'm gonna do again, same ground that we've covered, but now I've just shortened that full length lick even more. Okay, again, just use an alternate Picking through that. All right, so now from here, I want you to kick again, either that drum track or that metronome up another five to ten beats per minute from where you were with that second lick. And try practicing that shortened lick at that tempo, alright? So for me, that'll sound like this. Okay? So it's getting pretty ridiculous here, but again, and I know I've said this, but I want to reiterate it here. Don't worry about, you know, you just find wherever that is for you, it does not matter where it is. But now I want to kind of bring all this together here, because with that first lick, okay, if you can find, again, find your breaking point. Tempo, Find that tempo, the fastest tempo you can play it at. Again, cleanly and in time. And if you'll start from there, but then after that, kick it up a little bit more and play the first shortened lick. And then kick it up a little bit more and play that second shortened lick. Now, what you're doing is you're acclimating your brain and your hands, which are, you know, obviously very intricately connected. You're acclimating your brain and your hands to playing at tempos that are faster than you think you can play at, because I promise you what you'll find. A lot of this stuff is mental. And I've been doing this for a long, long, long time, and a lot of this stuff is mental. All right, y', all, I was having some issues on my other camera, so I'm just going to wrap up here shooting this on my phone. So what I wanted to say from here was, yes, a lot of this stuff, you know, weirdly enough, is mental, but there's obviously a physical side that goes along with this as well. And so what I do with each of these licks, I mean, it's really one lick, but there's two other shortened variations on that is, you know, I like to put in, you know, a bunch of reps on each one of these. With this first one, you know, do I find my breaking point tempo. I like to do that about 30 times. You don't have to do it 30 times. But the. The point is you want to be doing it, you know, you want to be doing a lot of reps on this and doing it consistently. And then I'll do that other variation you again about 30 times, and then the other one again. And I'm kicking that metronome up about 10 beats a minute as I'm practicing those. So I'm putting in a lot of reps I'm doing that every day and I'm pushing up the tempo as I'm playing those shortened licks right there. So anyway, I hope that you'll be able to incorporate this into your practice routine. And you know, just think about it. I mean, I promise if you start doing this stuff every day, like you're finding, you know, like the fastest tempo that you can play that full length lick at, you know, cleanly and in time, and then you're pushing the metronome or the drum track up and playing those other two shortened ones and you're doing a bunch of reps on those and you're doing that every single day. Like, I promise you, you're going to build speed, you're going to build chops. And especially if you stick with this over time, like. Like if you start doing that, imagine where you'd be in a year. Imagine where you'd be in two years. I know a lot of times people don't like thinking that far ahead, but if you can just start making this stuff a habit and then just get into the flow of it and really start to enjoy it and then stick with this stuff over time, I promise you, you really start to develop some speed and some chops and all of that other good stuff that we're playing or that we're chasing in this style of guitar playing. So anyway, I just wanted to share this with you here because it's something that I like to practice, something I like to do to push myself every day. And again, if you'd like to get the tabs for this lesson, just hit the L link down here below and I will send that to you. Anyway, thanks for hanging out today and I will see you next time.