Scott Ainslie: Right-Hand Guitar Technique

Over four decades of teaching roots and blues guitar technique, I would say that 80-90% of the problems that I resolve with players have to do with the use of the right (picking) hand and the role that the arm and the thumb play in grounding the sound of the instrument and arrangements.
We have a tendency to focus on the left (fretting) hand's role, leaving aside the right hand. But, while the left-hand changes the notes, the right (picking) hand makes the sound. The personality, if you will, and the power or delicacy of the sound you make depends entirely on how you use your right hand, wrist, and arm they are the distal parts of.
Working here in Dropped-D tuning, you'll find details of exactly what is going on as the right-hand addresses the guitar string plane to get clear, strong, individual notes with both a flat pick and with finger picks (same principles apply for bare-fingered playing).
As I say at the end of this brief demonstration, making music is often a matter of millimeters--as string is too high or too low, the string spacing is slightly wider or narrower than one expects, the gauges of the strings are heavier or lighter--taking the time to really deeply explore how very physical our relationship to the instrument and the music is will play an important role in advancing the sound of your playing.

[@stayclean777]

Thanks Scott 👍

[@scottainslie]

You bet!

[@jayclement17]

Looking forward to our week of Right Hand technique at the secret place in July, Sensei. ❤️

[@scottainslie]

Me, too! Truly. May we all be safe and sound!!

[@dmyerstc55]

Which video covered left hand? This is a awesome lesson?

[@scottainslie]

Thanks, Don. The discussion on left-hand/fretting hand technique is on my Patreon page. Here is that text: I’m writing in the early morning fog at the Mining Museum in Springhill, Nova Scotia-of Folksong and repeated mining disaster fame. It snowed yesterday.
It is the first of May. May the daffodils be blooming in your neck of the woods.
An old friend has taken on a young student, introducing her to guitar with special attention to how to wrap the (mind and) body around this instrument including sort of best-practices in terms of positioning the guitar for greatest ease of chording and playing: neck at a slight upward angle, rather than horizontal; thumb at the back of the neck, fretting hand elbow held out from the body a bit (not anchored to the waist); paying attention to the arch of the fingers as they come down to fret a string; forming chords in the air above the strings and putting all the fingers down at once (lift and repeat); building chords from the lowest pitched string to the highest, not the other way around); and things like that.
Asked about other things to consider, I replied:
Making music is a deeply physical endeavor. You are right to focus on it early.
And my first thoughts (finger-typing on a phone, so blessedly brief) are:
The fretting hand rotates around the long axis of the neck to facilitate clear chording on each required string, when the fingers have to arch over and clear open strings (think a first position G-chord made without the index finger involved), the thumb will indeed rotate to the middle of the back of the neck, if one uses the thumb to play a bass note (F# in D or F in F), then of course, the thumb and fingers will All move to a different orientation. This longitudinal rotation , where the elbow swings further under the guitar neck to highly arch the fingers, or swings back toward your own body flattening the fingers somewhat to facilitate certain chords is a good thing to notice.
The same sort of fluidity and movement of the instrument itself in space to make certain things easier is also a good thing to notice. There are certain chords that my short-fingered, square-palmed hands can only make with the peghead very close to my own head and the neck at a very steep angle (an E-chord with an F# added on the 4th fret of the D string, for instance), and there are times I will move the guitar so the neck is more horizontal when that simplifies the making of a certain chord.
The lack of rigidity here is key in both the spirit and the physical nature of making music.
Each basic postural ‘rule’ can be broken, or rather, one can take exception to it, when the ease of making the sound you want asks it.
Did I say ‘brief’? Ah, well.
Your thoughts?

[@dmyerstc55]

@@scottainslie well it is a definitely journey at both ends of the fretboard and the middle. Patience is key and always slow.