How to Do Picking for Jazz Guitar

The picking position on a guitar is the location on the string where it is plucked. The choice of picking position has a significant effect on the guitar's sound and is an especially important decision in jazz guitar. The following steps will show how to do picking for jazz guitar.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. Move the picking position closer to the neck. This increases the amplitude of the string's vibration resulting in a fuller, more mellow sound. Jazz players frequently play further up on the string than other guitarists for this reason.

2. Play closer to the bridge for a brighter, tinnier sound. The bridge is the part of the guitar where the strings are anchored to the body. Although not the norm, jazz players still use this picking position occasionally for strong leads.

3. Use alternate picking in most cases, especially scalar runs. A strict alternate picking technique uses downstrokes and upstrokes alternating continuously with downstrokes on the downbeat and upstrokes on the upbeat.

4. Employ economy alternate picking for maximum speed. This modification uses the same stroke to pick two consecutive notes that are on adjacent strings and is most often used when speed is more important than phrasing.

5. Practice sweep picking for large arpeggios. This technique tends to be faster than alternate picking in passages spanning more than one octave where more than three strings are involved. Sweep picking is similar to simply strumming a chord except that each string is muted with the fret hand before the next note is played.