FretSpider!

First of all, alternate picking is the technique of using both upstrokes and downstrokes in your guitar playing. The point of this is to allow you to play fluently at speed while using as little motion as possible from your picking hand.

Alternate picking is probably one of the most important techniques you could learn on guitar. If you don’t already know how to play using up and down strokes I guarantee that your technique will dramatically improve by the end of this lesson!

Practice firstly by playing an open string over and over again. Instead of using basic down-stroke picking, pluck the string down and then pluck the string the opposite way, up.

Lets start off with a simple exercise that incorporates the technique into a basic riff.

e|--------------------------------------------
B|--------------------------------------------
G|--------------------------------------------
D|--------------------------------------------
A|-----0-3-2-3-5-3-2-3------------------------
E|--------------------------------------------
-------d u d u d u d u

If you struggle with this at first, just learn it as you normally would with downstrokes, and then use alternate strokes.

The key here is to just play it extremely slowly while practicing on your strokes. Slow it down to a suitable speed (even if it is ridiculously slow) just so that you are using alternate strokes. – Play this until your brain is about to pop out of you head, then play it some more! Once you get the hang of it slowly speed it up, if you trip up you’re going to fast.

It really pays to get out your metronome to practice here.

Consciously practice that you are playing the technique by moving your wrist and fingers, don’t play it from your arm or elbow! The key to this is to loosen your whole arm up, give it a shake and play loosely but accurately, as soon as you tense up you will employ all sorts of bad techniques such as playing from the elbow, moving your whole arm around, and not giving your fingers freedom to move.

Just remember that alternate picking is all about economy. This means you are playing with the least amount of movement and energy. The more you practice, the more your technique will improve, meaning the less movement in your playing, the faster and more fluent your style will become.

Once you have mastered this, practice playing on multiple strings. Follow this next exercise on open strings. All you need to do here is play 4 times on the low E string (down, up, down, up), continue on to the next string as below.

e|-------------------------0-0-0-0-----------------|
B|---------------------------------0-0-0-0---------|
G|-----------------------------------------0-0-0-0-|
D|-----------------0-0-0-0-------------------------|
A|---------0-0-0-0---------------------------------|
E|-0-0-0-0-----------------------------------------|
---d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u

Again, I can’t tell you how important it is to keep an extremely slow pace at first. Keep it slow enough that you can play each and every note at the same length as each other. Speed it up as your technique improves. Don’t take the above example as a strict guide, mix it up a bit by playing different strings and adding some fretted notes here and there.

Next, we will get out of this four-note rhythm. If we be realistic, most songs will contain many notes in many variations. Here is a simple exercise that will broaden your alternate picking skills and get you closer to easily applying them to the songs you already know.

e|-------------------------------------------------|
B|-------------------------------------------------|
G|-------------------------------------------------|
D|-------------------------------------------------|
A|-----------0-0-0-0-0-----------0-0-0-0-0---------|
E|-0-0-0-0-0-----------0-0-0-0-0-------------------|
---d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u

Rather than intervals of 4, these are in intervals of 5. You will need to be careful that when switching strings you are continuing the up/down motion with your right hand with no interruptions.

It is also a good idea to practice other intervals such as in 3s. Remember to be mindful at this point that you are actually moving your wrist while playing and not your whole arm or elbow as discussed above.

This following exercise has this potential to really boost your skills when played over and over again. So get ready to go over this simple melody as many time as possible.

e|-----------------------------------------6-7-8-9-|
B|---------------------------------6-7-8-9---------|
G|-------------------------5-6-7-8-----------------|
D|-----------------5-6-7-8-------------------------|
A|---------5-6-7-8---------------------------------|
E|-5-6-7-8-----------------------------------------|
---d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u

e|—8-7-6—————————————–|
B|———9-8-7-6———————————|
G|—————–8-7-6-5————————-|
D|————————-8-7-6-5—————–|
A|———————————8-7-6-5———|
E|—————————————–8-7-6-5-|
—d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u d u

I really encourage you to play this one over and over with a metronome and keep increasing the speed as you get comfortable with it. Notice your technique while playing it (you don’t want to develop any bad habits) and play this until your fingers are almost bleeding! Learning guitar is all about extreme repetitions and practice, this is how the pros get where they are today, they break everything down into tiny sections, focus on the hard stuff and just play repetitively.

Once you have practiced this an infinite number of times, apply the alternate picking skill to the songs you already know. Just don’t give up on this technique! I remember it took me months to imprint the skill into my head. I used to think, ‘well I can play this riff fine this way, why would I need to re-learn it using alternate picking’ – as it was slower and frustrating.

The fact is, once you know this technique and begin applying it to all your playing from now on, you will develop a knack for it. you will instinctively play in up/down motions fluently without thinking about it. This will give you the edge with your playing, you will sound more confident your notes will sound more ‘free’.

I can’t leave this lesson without telling you to learn Thunderstruck by ACDC. It is an iconic rock song and even if you learn just the intro, you will see exactly how alternate picking is meant to be played.