Aug 25
Guitar Picking - Right Hand Tips
in Guitar Instruction
4 Comments »

Guitar Friends,

Ask Bobby Molton Your Guitar Questions:

  1. Post your questions here on the site, or
  2. Email Bob Molton at bob@bobmolton.com

I’ll be sure to answer back ASAP!!
Thanks alot :)

Here’s a question from Mark Pierce

QUESTION:

Hey Bob:

The DVD was really informative.  Can you give me further guidance on your right hand technique.  I have plenty of dexterity in my left hand and want to “rebuild” my right hand technique.  What interested me in you to start with was your similar right hand style of Doug Aldrich.  I quit playing guitar for 17 years and have spent the last 2 regaining chops.  My right hand technique used more motion of my elbow than I should.  I know my music theory etc.  My challenge is my right hand and want to emulate what you are doing.  Any help and advice would be greatly appreciated.

God Bless!
Mark Pierce

Answer: Great question Mark! You mentioned using your elbow more than you should. The truth is, it can be a good thing, and it can be a bad thing.

  1. Good Thing: Using the elbow-forearm technique can allow you to play at speeds that would be difficult, if not impossible, using only the palm pivot method. With that being said, it is a method that can be used occasionally for the extreme high speeds, but I would not recommend it as your full time picking style.
  2. Bad Thing: This method doesn’t allow you to have a pivot spot on the bridge, and due to that, you don’t have a sweet spot to work with. This method also tends to wear you down after long periods of playing.

WARNING-  The worst thing that can happen from this style of picking is the possibility of developing tendonitis in the elbow. This did happen to me, and it took a few years to work through it. I’ve since discovered tons of other people having the same problem from this style of picking. I’m not trying to give any medical advice, I’m only sharing with you what i’ve already been through, and what i’ve learned from others who have experienced the same things.

THE REMEDY: I recommend using the movement between the index finger and the thumb, while resting the palm of the hand on the sweet spot of the bridge. This allows you to have a pivot point as well as using your sweet spot for guitar tone enhancement at random. This is probably 90% of my picking style before I enter into to the elbow forearm method, which i still use for the fast stuff when needed.

REMEMBER: The number one thing to remember when you’re developing your right hand is to try and relax when you start playing faster. It’s more of a mental thing that you need to be aware of, when you start picking fast. It’s real easy to start tensing up when you go faster, and that wears you down quickly. The more you can relax when you pick fast, will result in you being able to play much longer, and more accurately at those speeds without getting fatigued.

OVERVIEW- Use the movement between your index finger and thumb, while pivoting off of the bridge. Use your sweet spot at random. Only use the elbow-forearm method for the extremely fast guitar picking, and be careful not to tense up when using it. Use the very tip of the pick, as to not get too much friction drag across the strings. I recommend to always use alternate picking, unless you are sweep picking. Also, practice your alternate picking with a metronome daily, for at least 15 minutes or more…

It might take a while for all of these things to start feeling comfortable, but I guarantee you will never look back once you start getting contol from this combination style picking. 

Hope that sheds new light on the subject…Please post a comment to let me know how this helps you. Be assured, others will learn from your questions and comments as well.

More soon…

Bob Molton














Aug 09
Guitar Chords within Modes
in Guitar Instruction
3 Comments »

Guitar Friends,

Ask Bobby Molton Your Guitar Related Questions:

  1. Ask in the comments section, or
  2. Email Bob Molton at Bob@BobMolton.com
  3. I’ll be sure to answer back ASAP!!
    Thanks alot :)

Here’s a question from Klint

QUESTION:

  1. Hey Robert… thanks for the lessons… I appreciate you going to all the trouble posting those lessons. I’ve got one question…How do you create a chord using the modes? I mean, your chord progression in the Lydian mode sounds sweet, and I wanna how learn to do it. How do you do it? thanks…

ANSWER: Another Great question! One of the things I teach all of my guitar students is that just because you don’t know the name of a chord doesn’t mean it’s not a chord… With that being said, every mode has it’s different shapes and petterns, which makes it slightly different from the one before it, or ahead of it. Although they are all the same notes as the original scale, the notes are in a different order and that creates different shapes and patterns.

EXAMPLE: If I’m playing in the Lydian Mode, it has a certain pattern that must be followed, and within that pattern you can experiment with playing any of those notes together. This is how you create chords within a mode. You can play two notes together, or three, four, five notes together, and then you tie all of it together with little runs from within the mode.

Overview - you’re playing several notes together using only the notes within the mode pattern, and stringing them together with single notes from the same mode as well. This all goes back to what I was saying about how it doesn’t matter whether you know the names of these chords or not, as long as you can apply them musically and be comfortable doing it. You can always learn the names later. This method gets the ball rolling much quicker in a musical sense.

Re-apply this method to all the modes and you’ll soon be creating some real musical compositions.

Hope that sheds new light on the subject…Please leave me a comment to let me know how this helps you. Be assured, others will learn from your questions and comments as well.

More soon…

Bob Molton














Aug 08
Guitar Body Wood
in Guitar Instruction
1 Comment »

Guitar Friends,

Ask Bobby Molton Your Guitar Related Questions:

  1. Ask in the comments section, or
  2. Email Bob Molton at info@topfuelguitar.com 

I’ll be sure to answer back ASAP!!
Thanks alot :)

Here’s a question from Tyler Davis, WI .

QUESTION:

  1. I’m gathering information about building my own guitar and was wondering if you could give some insight on what the different types of woods sound like for an electric guitar body…

ANSWER: Great question! The wood tones from an electric guitar can really vary, because wood really does sound, and resonate differently from each other. It also varies from the shape and thickness of the cut. The best thing to do is research several different wood types and see what type is closest to the guitar tone you are going for. Then start with that wood.

EXAMPLE: If you want a real bright sound with lots of punch and sustain, you might lean more toward maple wood. If you want a real dark sound with lots of bass and growl, you might lean toward mahogany.

So you can see that the wood is the most important place to start.

Here’s a video to give you further insight…

Hope that sheds new light on the subject…Please leave me a comment to let me know how this helps you. Be assured, others will learn from your questions and comments as well.

More soon…

Bob Molton














Aug 05
Guitar String Changing
in Guitar Instruction
1 Comment »

Hey Guitar Friends, Thanks for all the questions. I’m thrilled to be able to help so many of you  improve your guitar playing skills.

Please continue to ask your question in the comments section, or email me at bob@bobmolton.com

I’ll be sure to answer back ASAP!!
Thanks alot :)

Here’s a question from John weise, Arizona:

QUESTION:

  1. Can you elaborate a bit more on the importance of changing your strings properly. This is something I was not aware of at all. When you mentioned what was happenning with the string as it gets twisted it all started to make sense, but it would help to know a bit more…

ANSWER: Yes absolutely, I’ll even do one better and show you a video that goes over everything you mentioned. It’s actually pretty simple but very critical for proper tone, intonation, and chord voicing.

Hope that sheds new light…Please leave me a comment to let me know how this helps you. Others will learn from your questions and comments as well.

More soon…

Bob

 
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