alternate picking

Alternate Picking is a right hand technique that involves strictly adhering to playing an upstroke after every downstroke, and a downstroke after every upstroke. It is most commonly used by electric guitarists, but can be used on any picked instrument.

What is the point of Alternate Picking?

There are two main reasons to learn Alternate Picking: Speed and Tone.

Alternate Picking is often the fastest way to play a phrase.  Players famed for their speed, such as Yngwie Malmsteen and Paul Gilbert, are able to play as fast as they do because of their incredible Alternate Picking technique.

Alternate Picking also has a very even and precise sound to it, and gives the player an incredible amount of control over the accent of their notes.  This helps make the music sound more defined, and also can help the guitarist's playing better fit into the groove of the rest of the band.

What are the best ways to learn Alternate Picking?

Find some exercises and practice them!

Start with an easy one first, without too much string skipping.  Start playing slowly, slow enough that you can play it perfectly without much effort.  Then speed it up very gradually.  If you have a short 4 bar phrase, you can play through it 8 times and then speed up by 1 beat per minute.

Are there any downsides to Alternate Picking?

Alternate picking is not always the most efficient way to play a phrase, and for people who are aiming to play faster, there are other techniques they can better use in certain situations.  Arpeggios are often much easier to play using Sweep Picking - some guitarists refer to the mixed use of Alternate Picking and Sweep Picking as "Economy Picking".  Other phrases, with large intervals, can often be played much more easily with right hand tapping.  Some guitarists have a much faster left hand, and find that they can play scalar passages faster with legato technique.

As discussed before, Alternate Picking does have it's own sound - very even and defined.  In some situations, this might not be the best way to play.. it can at times be particularly unsuited to hard rock and blues based music.  Legato based techniques, such as hammer-ons, pull-offs and tapping give a more "slinky" and fluid sound to the playing, and often mix better with string bends.  Downstrokes played on their own can sound more aggressive, although for most passages you will be limited in how fast you can play.  And sweep picking also has it's own sound, which may sometimes be preferred.

This doesn't at all mean that you shouldn't learn alternate picking, but learn it as just one approach of many that you can use.  If you have a mix of techniques at your disposal - downstrokes, alternate picking, sweep picking, legato phrases and tapping - then you will find that you have versatility in your picking techniques, and as you become familiar with each approach to playing you will form your own preferences for which ones are best used in different situations.

Practice a variety of exercises.  When you find a good exercise that really helps you improve, it can be tempting to just stick with it.  Don't do this - it will limit you to the particular shapes that you've practiced - especially when you are improvising.  To cover most bases, you want to find some exercises that are chromatic, some that are diatonic and some that follow the blues scale.  It's not necessary to go over every single possible phrase you might one day play, you just want to practice your Alternate Picking so that you are not stuck to any one particular shape when you use it.

Use a metronome.  You don't need to practice with a metronome every time you sit down and play (in fact, I'd suggest that you don't), but use it often.  Not only does it give you better rhythm chops and make you more disciplined, you also get very objective feedback about how your playing is improving, which is good motivation and helps reinforce good practice habits.

Be careful and don't overdo it.. warm up properly and do some finger, hand and wrist stretches before you try to play anything really fast.  If you are feeling pain then you are doing something wrong.  You won't hurt yourself if you play until your hands or forearms are tired, but it is a good sign to take a break.

And practice regularly.  If you don't play often you won't improve and might even go backwards - even if you can only find a couple of minutes on a busy day, it's good to play as often as you can.