combining alternate picking & sweep picking

[oska]

Hi,

I have been practicing alternate picking all these while and have recently started to practice sweep picking.

What i want to ask is that is it a good idea to combine alternate picking & sweep picking?

For example, if i have to play 3 notes per string, i start say on the 6th string with a down stroke. then up stroke & down stroke for the 3 notes on the 6th string.
Next when i am going down to the 5th string what if i don't get all the way around to the bottom of the string to play an up stroke as alternate picking requires? if i continue the down ward motion from the 6th to the 5th and sweep pick the 1st note on the 5th and then continue alternate for the 2 remaining notes on the 5th string.

I understand that sweep can be used in this way if i am playing legato. But if i don;t want to play legato and want to alternate pick for more definition of the notes, is it worth to do the above technique?

I ask because to practice that, i have to start all over again and it will take a considerable effort to unlearn the old way & perfect the new one.

[javert]

I guess you could do it in principle, but doesn't it defeat the purpose of sweep picking in the first place? I mean, you sweep pick because it can be done faster than alternate picking...

[oska]

yes sweep picking is faster but is generally employed for 1 note per string. Expanding that, we can use sweep for 3 notes per string legato. BUT when i wanna pick every note to retain more each note definition i have to use alternate picking. now next arises my question............i have to alternate pick but can it be made faster if i sweep pick when changing strings?
like when i have to play 1-2-4 on 6th string and 1-2-4 on 5th string.....the picking pattern would be down-up-down.....sweep to 5th string down-up-down

[javert]

Isn't that what economy picking is?

[oska]

i think so...............then what do i practice? strictly alternate or economy picking............will the latter make me substantially faster?

[javert]

I don't know, I haven't tried it myself. I mostly combine sweeps with legato.

[Newc]

Depends on your picking hand dexterity and accuracy. If you can mute the last 6th string note just as you strike the first 5th string note coming from the same downstroke, then you'll obviously be able to do it faster that way than by hitting the first 5th string note with an upstroke since you ended on a downstroke with the previous string.

There's no right or wrong way. Whatever you can make work for you is the best way, whether it's strict alternate or strict economy or strict legato or a mix of all of them.

[micha]

Just do what feels right for you.

Personally I don't sweep anything below three strings and I might even pick these alternate if the context is alternate picking.
I like to sweep these three or four string patterns when there's either a string skip or some legato going on before and after the lick.
Somehow economy picking looks great in theory (and I know there IS people playing that way very successfully), but it just isn't worth the hazzle for me practically.

a short sweep on every string-change sounds not worth it for me.
Train your inside and outside picking both seperately if you mention one feels harder to do than the other and keep it alternate.
Just my opinion.

[ironworker221]

I started alternate picking with my wrist and sweep picking with my forearm it took a few months but was worth it.I think I got this from watching Micheal Batio videos.My problem is I cant feel an upstroke,outside picking kicks my ass.

[Frigo89]

I think its very cool that you guys actually can discuss things like this, I envy you for it.

I can play guitar reasonably well, but have no formal training, I learned old school. Put on an album and just figure out how to play shit by ear. It has worked out well for me (due to record an album this fall), but It would be nice to be able to discuss guitar playing with people beyond "I just do it that way"

I still don't even know what the fuck an Arpeggio is! hahaha

[Hellbat]

I still don't even know what the fuck an Arpeggio is! hahaha

In it's simplest form think of it as a chord with the notes played one at a time in succession like a scale.

[hunterkolb]

not to dig up a possibly dead thread, but what really helped me was playing with the "solo" after the tritone in Ozzy's Over the Mountain. What randy does is sweeps a major(i think...) on the bottom 3 strings, then alternate picks back up. i messed around with the harmonic and harmonic minor versions of it. get down your sweeps first though!