WORKSHOP 4X The Guitar Gym { Wie -STEP LEGATO WORKOUT ONTHE CD TRACKS 35.44 x. u. ie awe ie 2 GT RATING Easy il ‘At lower tempos, these exercser are easy, but become the spec In this month’s Guitar Gym, we serve up six more exercises to help your legato technique develop smoott “By using a “= 6-STEP LEGATO <= WORKOUT expression. dificult picks YOUR GITUTOR See pl for more ino onvlithe GT eutors @: SOUND ADVICE outing in people’ faces a the to ‘SMOOTH AND CREAMY TONE he tim ination of picking and legato, you will | FORTHIS LESSON, Fused my trusty cream Fender m der range of dan ‘Custom-shop Relic'57 Strat through a Cornford MK 4 then, when you ean whisper, your SOH valve head and a Palmer speaker simulator The npact by contrast CCornford was set on the following number and the 4 time that we've taken @ look at ‘overdrive button wasn: iteasier to play quick onthe rs say that they Basically the more gin on the amp, the easier is to 1 sound produced by legato ‘use a legato approach, at your sound wil have more rertheless, that needn't u. IF you are sustain and become more compressed (an effect helps hardened and eomnt il ind that your notes to become more equal in volume). However, actse time devoted to legato, which foeuses on the ‘ey co get away with using as lle gain as possible. This xcerity of your fretting hand, will also “wil hve the effect of making you work harder and, improv o make both hands work in Lighter | therefore improve your tone, ordination » ack to picking 90 Guitar Tact weerits their fretting hand that is letting them down. Once they have practised the same lek using legato ppronch, they can usually Flay the picked version ‘much mote easly, DEEP & CRISP & EVEN Wes important, especially if you rely on the legato technique for playing fast passages, that you can produce a convineing sound, ie one that doesn sound like a poor relation to the picked version. Remember, you should aim to preduce as much volume as you can ‘withthe notes that are produced by the fretting hand, and lighten up a bit with the pick, inorder to even out the overall volume ofthe notes ‘Throughout these Guitar Gym workouts, Iwill keep reminding you that the listener is not interested in which particular technique you are using, They just want ta hhear the melody: the techniques that you choose to use should remain your litle secret. ‘When playing through this month's examples, try taping yourself and then ask the same question. Are you ‘rxlucing a bold series of attractive sounding notes, or ‘does it just sound lke a wispy collection of desperately frail hammer ons and pulloff, with wayward timing and ‘the oceasional loud pick? RESTRAINT Apart from striving to produce an even overall note volume, another problem that occurs when trying to ‘master the legato technique is timing. This s something, that I have mentioned when we've studied fretting- hhand legato in the past. ‘The main thing here isto learn how to show restraint, inorder to stop the fretting hand from running away ith tse, Make sure tat you tap your foot to the metronome with each exercise. 4 legato approach often involves the picking coming in at odd places, but ‘You must not let this throw you off from keeping to a strict rhythm. In the future, we will see how odd-note configurations (uch as 5, 7 and 9) are both commonplace and effective ‘when played using the fretting: hand legato technique However, at this stage, I have kept things to more straightforward denominations (8 or 4), so that you can practise building up speed and accuraey with the metronome. Oceasionally, Ive put the examples in 3/4, WORKSHOP Just so that you can see a sequence more clealy However, all of these sequences ean be used over any time signature, Finally, ve chosen one particular fingering forall of the various exereises in order to avoid any cumbersome double-stops (another subject that we will address in the future). EXERCISE | ‘This first exercise is based upon a descending sequence of three, which is one of the most common scale sequences, It involves descending three notes from each note of a scale in turn ‘The example here is plaved within C major, and starts by descending three notes from, firstly, D, then C, then Band soon EXERCISE 2 ‘This is an extended form of EXERCISE I. Here, [ve added on an ascending sale sequence; ome that is frequently matched up with a descending sequence of three, Its actually a rhythmically dlsplaced ascending sequence of 3, but that's not important right now, Just practise playing up and down a scale switclung from the fone sequence to the other (descending to ascending). a Inthis exercise we sce the other most common seale sequence, a sequence of four, which involves descending {our notes from each note ofa scale in turn (asin, fst D, then C ete). Some of you may find that you are slapping down a note on the E string, each time you try to finger the G note on the B string with the fourth finger ereating an ‘unpleasant double-stop effect), ‘This wil happen because your fourth finger is shorter ‘than the rest, which makes you hold it straight in order ‘to get maximum lenght This problem can be rectified by shifting the heel of the fretting hand — especially the bottom right hand ‘comer of your palm (as you look at your hand with the Dalim face up) ~ closer to the back of the guitar neck ‘This will give you more slack in the fourth finger, thus allowing you to avoid holding the B string down at the ‘same time. This is something that requires you to be flexible inthe wrist, 4 ‘This is an extended form of EXERCISE 3, Note that, although the second bar isa transposed version of the sequence played in the first bar, the first note isnot picked, because there is no change of string ad, ‘therefore, no need to use the pick EXERCISE 5 As you probably predicted, now its time for the ascending version of EXERCISE 3. Remernber, hammer- ons are easier than pull-ofs, so be careful not to speed up in places when playing this exercise, EXERCISE 6 Finally, we have an extended version of EXERCISE 5. bit like an ascending version of EXERCISE 4. As with everything that we are going to cover in Guitar Gym, all of these examples eraploy the principles of ‘economy’ picking (which involves taking the most direct route a ‘WINTER 2002 Gitar Techniques 91WORKSHOP when travellinfrom string to string with the pick) Apart from minimising the amount of work for the plekng hand, when in eomes to picking legato passages, ‘econamy picking has another advantage ‘TURN ON THE TAPS Tapping is the practise of starting a new string with a hammeron (tap') from the fretting hand, Its easier to tap onto a new string using the third or fourth finger than with the first fnger.. ry it With economy picking, upstrokes are used when you are shifting froma thin string toa fatter one, and, when you do this, you will usualy play the frst note of ‘new string with the third or fourth finger ~ whereas, when you ascend a scale, it's usualy the frst finger that plays the first note on each string, This makes it possible to replace all ofthe upstrokes shown in any of this month's exercises with fretting-hand taps. This is why’ many of you have probably already discovered that its easier to play deseending runs without picking, rather than ascending. Employing fretting-hand taps is good for afew reasons: © By replacing the upstrokes in, say, EXERCISE 1, you will have the desired effect of both stripping out the Clutter (by taking out che two upstrokes where you have three picks ina row), and producing a picking pattern that gives you one dew-stroke on each beat (group of six notes), Similars, i you try replacing the upstrokes with fretting:hand taps in EXERCISE 4, you vill get the equally convenient effect of having one pick on the star of each beat (group of four notes). © Left-hand tapping wil also help to improve the strength and overall quality of the placement of the fretting hand. SEE (60) 20) (100) ‘2 © Diy taking pressure off the picking hand, I produces better opportunities to ada pleking-hana taps (we willbe lookin at ferent ways that right-hand taps ean be used in conjunction with left-hand legato in future editions of Guitar Gym). Having sad this, I strongly suggest that you master the written version fist (with the upstrokes included), as fretting: hand tapping takes a lot of practise Furthermore, ifyou find yourself playin without very ‘much gain on your amp, your poor fretting hand is ging to:need all the help it can get ‘TARGETS AS usual, if you ea the GT CD, try push those seary targets? lay along to the fastest workouts on ‘things even further. Remember # 16th notes (four notes per click) @ 160-200bpm V/16th note triplets (six notes per click) @ 120-160bpm Your ukimate aim is to play anything you are currently playing by picking only the first note an each string! Next month, we're going to practise sweeping through scales, In the meantime, if you are new to legato, make sure that you are sensible when practising, Practising the guitar fs not lke running, which often involves pushing ‘through the pain barrier. You should know the ference between a warm tited feeling (which Is doing you good) and pain (whichis defritelyb Listen to your body, and if you fel your hand complaining take a break and practise something else for a while. Dorit ereate long-term problems for yourself by ‘being too impatient. Your stamina will merease as you go along, so give it time to devel Good! luck! see you next month, a 92 Guitar Techniques wwneTER 2002SS (60) (0) (100) SS (00) 110) (140) 2 ‘6:STEP LEGATO PRIMER EXERCISE 4 (20) (110) (140) mm omy 40-1 1010-81086 10-6 OS SEE (2) (119) (140) SS (20) 190) (140) my RA a ef 7 ST eo TT a ween 2002 Gar Techniques 93