Hey guys,

Saw this Guitar World "Betcha Can't Play this" video with Emil Werstler and thought how fast his playing is, but at some parts the video looks a little funky, like it's been sped up?

It doesn't sound like it's sped up to me, but the video looks that way in some parts... what do you think?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ruv4ySycAQA


Oh and here's another Betcha Can't play this with Emil, this one looks authentic...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNm8Al0gfuw&feature=channel

Here is another vid of Emil playing the lick in question

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOuzKTLV4jQ&feature=related

He can do it

WOW!!! Didn't see that vid... :)

Thanks Ursin, Emil can shred!!!

Yeah, Emil is great. I like his Django influence. His band Daath I don't like so much and he doesn't do much of this type of playing in Daath. But I really enjoy watching him play.

Doesn't look any faster than Pebber to me.

Hey uderoche,

I've been reading through older forum posts and came across this posting featuring Emil Werstler. Here's another sample that shows his right hand in action:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fIMN5Q2sPVk&feature=related

It looks like sarod or scalpel. But it's like he is using his forearm too. What do you think?

I thought more wrist loose thumb/pointer....no?

That lick looks fun!

Yeah. But look at how his arm moves as he speeds up. Plenty of stuff going on there. The lick looks addictive....

Quote: John567 wrote in post #6

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Hey uderoche,

I've been reading through older forum posts and came across this posting featuring Emil Werstler. Here's another sample that shows his right hand in action:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fIMN5Q2sPVk&feature=related

It looks like sarod or scalpel. But it's like he is using his forearm too. What do you think?

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You know I knew a guy who sorta picked this way. When he went into his 16th note runs you could see his arm shake. He was a great player but I think his form took a toll on him. He would wear wrist and elbow braces because he used to practice too much. Has that been a problem for guys who practice sarod/scalpel? So far I haven't had any problems.

Absolutely nooooo problems for me. Thats hours and hours a day at high speed.
eeeee.....but then...I can trill for 6 hours...soooo....I dont know...lol.

FRaKh...6 hours, eh? Man I can barely do it for a minute without my hand needing to rest. I'm still trying to incorporate the idea you talked about when practice sarod and trilling at the same time. It's like taping my head while rubbing my belly. Do you have a video of it?

I can make one....one really cool thing you will notice if you can do both.....
Notice how the left hand is in sync with the right hand(since you are trilling with 2 fingers).....i.e.....dwn stroke-1st finger....upstroke-3rd finger.....dwn stroke-1st finger...ect.
hint.....
2 note per string patterns
or more importantly
for even note per string patterns
Sarod is a perfect match for theem.....!

Thats my hint for the day.....

Sarod - Pebber, Frakh, McLaughlin, Buckethead, Indian classical musicians
Wrist - Paul Gilbert
Stiff Arm - Rusty Cooley
Stiff Arm with anchoring fingers - Michaelangelo Batio
Scalpel - Howard Roberts and tons of jazz players
Wrist and circle picking - Yngwie, Eric Johnson

All of these techniques can be isolated, worked on individually, and combined together.

Some of the newer forum members may be confused on this as I see people incorrectly identifying certain guys as using sarod when they aren't.

For newer members, watch all of Pebber's videos as all of the above is covered.

I guess those are the "big 6" thats out there. That's a great little overview. Thanks uderoche. I'll have to keep this in mind when practicing as well.

Thanx Ursin!!

He's playing very cleanly and effortlessly at that speed. Barely any outside string noise going on too, impressive.

Since this topic started about Emil Werstler... first things first.

Emil's picking approach is just the same approach Gilbert and Batio have on same level, but with different approach to anchor.

It all can come down to angled down stroke into the strings, towards the body of the guitar, and up stroke outside from the strings, away from the body of the guitar.

The term for describe the movement that occurs by doing this is cultivated on different guitar forums into the term of "oscillation" motion... or maybe easier to say, tap motion with the hand.

And yes, Ursin is right very much while describing these guy as wrist pickers, since wrist is primarily moving from right hand "swan" to straight and vice versa. Forearm movements and thumb flicking are a side effects, and yes, Batio advocates stiff thumb, while he is not aware of his scalpel ammount while playing.

The percent of the scalpel may differ but just by watching fist video of Emil. You can notice his thumb is adapting to the strings. In warm-up video, it may be more noticeable that his forehand is doing some rotation movement along.

Lots of stuff is going on there... in first video, in technical terms, some reverse alternate picking, some legato, some semi-directional stuff, some amount of stiffness etc... but it all serves the lick he plays very well.

Watching these shred guys can be very motivational, since there's some virtuosity going on, but one can get carried away and try to imitate something what works for very few people and is very hard to accomplish.

Lets make a conclusion, Pebber and Frakh are two guys who are the best example that something, you may caught yourself logically thinking of as a revelation, (while sitting on a toiletand do the thinking, like in my case), as a top shit of all techniques, and it's an ancient approach to picking.

And this is the 21'st century and we're still complicating.

Final words for everybody's second thoughts on this one... while analyzing any of your hero's technique... always try to find amount of Sarod and Scalpel in it. You' ll be amazed...

Interesting stuff Pebber. When You look at a map you can see the sarod (India) to the OUD (Turkish) go even onward into Europe with gypsy music. Check these guys playing gypsy type music:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuXPpmROU9I

These guys are crazy pickers. All they seem to do is tremolo. Crazy, eh?

Yes... I have seen these things...the differrent picking motions...referred to in all sorts of different terminology. I was making a short video to explain but, alas, I became sidetracked.

The point is, none of these names matter. This verbage thrown around doesn't mean anything. So, if someone wants to call it "Gillette Razor Picking" it really means nothing. We just come up with these names to make a differentiation between certain things. Even Pebber will tell you that during lessons John McLaughlin never called Sarod picking "Sarod picking." He didn't call it anything. But, for organizational and instructional purposes, Pebber needed to devise some sort of name. So, he looked to the origins of the technique which originated with oud, sitar, and sarod players from the east.

That being said, some names have stuck and are used with more frequency. For instance, "scalpel picking" "circle picking" "stiff arm picking." So, if some guy on Youtube is circle picking but has developed some new term for it, more power to him, but it's probably not going to stick. You see?

I guess my point is, practice the techniques and don't be overly concerned with names. These terms are only for the classroom. They are fine to be discussed here in this educational forum, but they aren't something to be overly concerned with. Knowing how to do it at a high level is much better than only knowing the names. The names mean almost next to nothing. Even in theory. One man's A# is another man's Bb.

I cannot stress enough that music is not black and white this or that. It is a combination of many things together. Same with technique, same with theory, same with life. Life is not black or white and neither is music theory or playing guitar. People get on youtube or they try and make it a "this or that" issue. But, for instance, Yngwie Malmsteen cannot possibly begin to explain the TOTALITY of music or his approach to playing guitar. So, he just hits the high points and people (usually beginner/intermediate players) run wild with this as some sort of gospel. Not Yngwie's fault. The magazine is only giving him a 3 or 4 page interview.

Music is so VAST and the amount of knowledge, practice, theory, etc etc etc and, more importantly WHAT IT TAKES TO GET TO THIS LEVEL cannot possibly be covered in a magazine or video.

If there was a magazine that had in it what Yngwie Malmsteen ACTUALLY did, nobody would buy it. Because it would be trills, picking on one string, and playing the same A minor sweep arpeggio 1 million times. Who would buy that? So, they print all the Yngwie licks you can't play.

Pebber is the only person on the internet showing you exactly what it takes!

Hope this makes sense.

Peace

-U

Ha anyone seen this? I think it sounds like crap, but I thought the video would be fun to put here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHIxxH7_g9U

NNNNnoooooo...
These guys need to do it on an acoustic guitar!!!!!!
Thats the only way to see...NO EFFECTS!!!!!!