Sweeping Basics Lesson

Great lesson! The part on muting was great!

Really cool lesson indeed. Covered just about anything I can think of.


Surprised you didn't even touch the 24th fret

So you added in the Palm Mute to prevent the string from ringing. Did I understand this right:

1. You play the note
2. You lift you the finger from the fret, but you are still touching the string
3. You mute the site with your Palm
4. And then you you lift your finger from the site

I will state my understanding of what Pavel is saying here, and he can correct me if I am off base.

1) Play notes like an arpeggio (sweeping picking motion). However unlike an arpeggio, we don't want to be playing a chord, we don't want different notes playing simultaneously.
2) Clearly Pavel avoids barring. He did not bar the notes on the 1st and 3rd string, 12th fret. You for the most part play notes with the tips of your fingers.
3) You do lift your finger after playing a note (to accomplish the goal stated in #1 above).
4) You mute at the bridge to prevent the open strings from ringing after you have lifted your finger. You do this by floating your palm up and down on the bridge over the string where you have just playing a note. I will add (and this goes farther than what Pavel said) that the way you accentuate this damping, both in timing and pressure, will give your sweeps a more (or less) percussive character.

I suggest also reading Wikipedia, "Sweep-picking". This covers the aspect of lifting your finger from a string that you have just picked. Pavel says elsewhere that he primarily focused while learning, on using the bridge muting to kill the note after picking it, rather than what the Wikipedia article focuses on. Bridge muting would would serve the dual purpose of both damping the notes you have picked, and preventing sympathetic vibrations from occurring on open strings. It appears to me that different people look on sweeping differently, and as the mechanics are a bit complicated, there can be a lot of confusion. One final thing, people that describe sweep picking use the term "rolling your finger". Use of the term "roll" is ambiguous. I would say "Rolling your finger lengthwise" to avoid confusion.

Hey i think fkalich mastered the theory part of sweeping perfectly hehe! Good job! I bet he can sweep as hell!

No, can worth a damn. All in theory at this point. Only thing I was missing is on the roll, it might be better described as a "lengthwise roll, with perhaps some lateral rolling of the finger depending on the circumstances."

However, there is a Taoist proverb. To paraphrase, the net is used to catch the fish, but after you have the fish, what do you need the net for? Theory is good, but just to kind of get you in the right place. After that it can be an impediment, after that you go on "feel". Like swimming. There are certain things you should do, certain rule so of good form. However if you are really going to swim well, you will find a form that has the "feel" and you will hold onto that feel. And naturally all the things that you are supposed to do in theory will just occur automatically. If you are stuck on the mechanics, it will just hold you back. Still, you needed the theory to get to the place where you could capture that "feel".

Pavel: I remembered that I wanted to ask you something. Why on this chord, don't your roll your finger rather than play the 12th fret 1st and 3rd strings with your fingertip? It seems to me that rolling the finger has more potential speeed.

I tried to play like that. Honestly - it looks impossible to me to play like that. I also didn't see any live guitar player to play those sweeps that way How fast and clean can you play sweeps like that? The top 3 string are very difficult to mute and rolling brings you much more noise. When you do it fast - you get a "noise mixer". So the best way so far was to play each note with a fingertip.

Hope i answered the question!

You answered very well, and I take you word on this. Let me ask you another about the way you float your palm on the bridge. I have some difficulty on the up strokes. On the down strokes your palm has not reached string you are picking, you pick the string, and shift the palm to that string an instant later. Fine. You also are able to mute sympathetic vibrations of the strings you have passed. But on the upstroke, after you pick a string, well then when you mute it with your palm, it is pretty hard to not also be muting the next string you are just about to pick next. I am asking you to describe in more detail how you use your right palm on the upstrokes, without prematurely damping the next string you are going to pick. Also, it appears pretty difficult to mute sympathetic vibrations of other strings, when do doing the upstroke.

I encountered the exact same problems with Sweep-Picking as fkalich. I wanted to add one question:
When you use your palm

do you move it constantly down and up

or do you lift it and place it on the strings (and then lift it again and replace it on the next string)?

I dont like the second possibility because it is hard to play constantly up or down AND to lift your plam after each side.

I watched the video 100 times but I cant really see what you right is doing.

I think what it would take is to precisely state where youar right palm is positioned during each point of a sweep, both going up and going down. Before hitting 5th string, after hitting 5th string (and before hitting 4th string), etc. Which strings is it covering and how is it positioned at each point in time? And conversely going up, before hitting 1st string, after hitting 1st string and before hitting second string, etc. I know that is asking a bit Pavel, but if you explain this, along with what else you have explained, you may well have given the best description of sweeping on internet, in the entire world. I have looked around, and seriously, that may well be the case.

Ok so let's get started (wow - that will be a long one):

First of all - the right hand! It is always on the bridge right where the strings are "connected". You never lift it from the strings/bridge. You only move it up and down. When you get onto the 1st string - i don't mute it at all. So i mute 5th, 4th, 3rd and 2nd strings with the right hand.

Downstroke:

So we pick the 5th string, - the right hand is "attached" to the bridge right above the 5th string. Now we lift the finger and fret the 4th string - the right hand moves slightly down to mute the 5th string and picks the 4th string. Next - we lift the finger from the 4th string and fret the 3rd string - move the right hand down the bridge to mute the 4th strings and pick the 3rd string (the movement and picking is done together). Lift the finger from 3rd string - fret 2nd string, move the right hand to mute the 3rd string and pick 2nd string. Lift finger from 2nd string, fret 1st string and move the right hand down the bridge to slightly mute the 2nd string and pick the 1st string.

Now comes the upstroke:

Pick the 1st string, do a pull-off (depending on the sweep shape), as soon as you fret the 2nd string the fretting finger slightly touches the 1st string so it becomes muted (check the Basics Of Legato lesson if not sure what it means). SO WE DON'T mute with the right hand on the upstroke but with the FRETTING FINGERS! Now we lift the finger from the 2nd string - at the same time we fret the 3rd string and mute the 2nd string with the fretting finger of the 3rd string. Right hand moves up the bridge as you pick. Lift the 3rd string finger, fret the 4th string and slightly touch the 3rd string with the fretting finger of the 4th string. Move the right hand up the bridge and pick. Fret the 5th string, lift the finger from the 4th string (this is done at the same time), slightly touch the 4th string with the fretting finger of the 5th string. Move the right hand up the bridge and pick.


I think now i described the process of sweep completely. If you still have any questions - feel free to ask! But i think this is the most complete "tutorial"

wow. This helped me alot

Thanks Pavel! You answered the question perfectly. You are correct, you have described the process of sweep completely. First person I have seen to do that that, and I have looked around quite a bit.

OK cool! I am glad to hear that!

Any more questions - post it here!

I AGREE WITH FKALICH.YOU HAVE EXPLAINED SWEEP ABOUT AS GOOD AS POSSIBLE FOR WORDS.I HAVE LOOKED AROUND FOR QUITE A WHILE TOO FOR INFO ON SWEEP AND THIS IS THE MOST DETAILED I HAVE SEEN.

WOW pavel well explained! Don't think there could be any more detail than that.

Do you mind if i ask you what pick you use for sweeping?

Hey Kizmiaz7 thanks! Sorry for a late answere - didn't check this lesson for a long time.

I use 1.14 picks - Peavey or Fender.
If you wonder about BigStubbies - good picks - but they are not good for me to sweep.

Pavel, I finally made it over to your sweeping lesson!! Im really chuffed with this lesson, ive only been doing this since yesterday and already i feel good technique comeing on. Im muteing with my palm as I sweep down too, sounds good!! Cant wait to speed this up slowly over the following weeks

Pavel,
Should I reach a certain bpm before i move onto the next sweep picking video? I feel i have the technique down but im currently playing at only 65-70 bpm.

You can go to next video to have a little change in your practicing, but you can also stay on the current lesson to make it faster.

It's not important - practicing sweeping is what matters so it doesn't matter if you do it on this lesson or the other! But again 5 string sweeps are a bit different than 3 strings.

Good advice Pavel thanks. I thought I would ask, as I like to get every lesson down exact ! =O)

awsome
i need to study this definitely
thank u pavel

awsome
i need to study this definitely
thank u pavel

I have been doing this 2 days and i am already sweeping clean at 70bpm! thanks heaps Pavel i have tried this for months with no results and finally i can do it

That's great man! You're welcome!

Iv read all the above comments, but i still dont understand how to mute the strings on a downstroke, because to drag my pick down the strings, most of my hand is further down the bridge to pull the pick. If i keep my hand in a more normal picking position i find it possible to smoothly sweep the strings - my pick gets all choked up in the srings. Any advice?

It's all about the pick angle not to get stuck between the strings! You sweep just like you pick - the hand position is the same. Btw. you have to relax your right hand while sweeping. I can't answer you more precisely as i don't SEE your problem. I was also getting stuck between strings before i realized i have to slightly angle the pick!

YOU ROCK PAVEL!! practice really does make perfect im doing the C Major 5 string sweep at 90-100 bpm now

Imagine GMC with people like Pavel....

how to sign up

I have amazed myself, i finally feel worthy of my beautiful gibson les paul! Thanks for this awesome lesson Pavel. Sweeping is just so much fun.

You're welcome! I'm glad this lesson works for you! Keep up the practicing!

i can get this down its just the muting im bad at

hey, that's what I was looking for ... but there's a whole lotta work to do for me ...

and ...

Thanks I am working on this like crazy thank you for the help.

ok, lemme see if I got this, you mute with your right hand on the downstroke, and on the upstroke you mute with your left hand fingers. I try to do the downstroke I always seem to mute the first note, so I'm guessing I should move my right hand higher up the bridge, am I right?

i finally got it... slowly, but it works

i love this lesson

I missed this lesson, I really like your explanation Pavel!
Very simple and straight to the point. I loev the talking vids too. good job!

Great job with this lesson. I've been practising sweeps for at couple of months now, always trying to bar the two 12th fret notes. Somehow I never considered moving my index finger as shown in the video. Embarrasing, but thanks to your video I'm now building speed almost by the day :-D

Great lesson. I never practice sweep enough, so I just decided to start from basics again.

Could you add one more video showing the muting stuff from a top view (like the view we have when we are looking to our hand when playing)? That would be great to be sure we are doing it right.

great one, love this technique