Copyright ©2004 Mickey Cochran
From folkofthewood.com

Introduction

Crosspicking guitar has immense roots. A culmination of many styles, artists, and instruments inspires the technique of crosspicking. Because the guitar itself dates back many centuries, as a member of the lute family, approaches to playing the guitar have been myriad and varied. Usually the style of music would dictate the approach. As to crosspicking, many styles of music can be effectively played so that crosspicking itself dictates the style.

The guitar has usually been categorized as an ensemble instrument when utilizing the flatpicking medium. Many times a guitarist will grapple when asked to play a piece solely with a flatpick unaccompanied. In this case, yes, with a flatpick, choradal accompaniment can be accomplished...or chord solos can be effectively played, only, when playing flatpicking leads, it's very difficult to establish harmonic support at the same time...In spite of its capability as a lead instrument, the guitar has always been underrated as a flatpicking solo instrument. There are very few flatpicking artists that can carry the guitar's own harmonic support while still playing a flatpicking lead line...such as, Norman Blake, Doc Watson or Dan Crary. With applied crosspicking technique, the guitar becomes a forceful flatpicking solo instrument capable of filling a room with colorfully supported melodies. Crosspicking bombards the listener with a barrage of notes. As is similar to Bluegrass banjo, crosspicking guitar doesn't seem to pause for a breather. A continuous succession of notes pours forth establishing the melody while filling in all of the spaces with harmony notes. Not only does the guitar support itself, with spaces filled harmonically, but crosspicking technique works effectively for supporting other lead instruments and vocals.

How do you focus on a new technique and bypass the normal frustration involved with learning new habits and maybe even shedding old ones to accomplish the task?

There are many approaches to playing the guitar ; many of them haven't even been invented yet! The more you can learn about your chosen instrument, the closer you come to actualizing your musical goals. Whether you play the guitar as an accompanist or instrumentalist, your arsenal of licks, chords and techniques is what you depend on. If you haven't already, once you've incorporated crosspicking into your arsenal, you'll wonder how you've played so long without this colorful texture.

A Note on Developing Crosspicking

To become oriented in the task of learning crosspicking involves setting short-time goals. Reward yourself with the sense of accomplishment that follows after mastering a crosspicking exercise or arrangement. And, don't let anybody tell you that crosspicking is easy. There are times when you will hit the wall and feel like you're not getting anywhere fast. Your best strategy in this case is to go back over what you've learned up to this point and keep on practicing. Before long, you'll find yourself smoothly moving forward to other goals.

Right-Hand Position There are as many ways to position the right hand as there are guitar players. Many of the positions limit the right hand from moving freely. This restricts the playing capability of the right hand and will limit speed and dexterity. With crosspicking, it is critical that the right hand is loosely positioned above the strings so that it can move completely free of any obstruction. For instance, many guitar players rest the heel of the hand on the bridge; this restricts the right-hand picking movement and does not allow the hand to take advantage of playing closer to the fingerboard for a mellower tone. Crosspicking technique can be accomplished efficiently by keeping the wrist loose. Imagine trying to jump from string to string for every other note with a stiff wrist. Although, it can be done, your whole forearm has to move for every note; whereas, with a loose wrist, the movement is much more concentrated and can be easily accomplished with minimal movement. The forearm does not need to be completely stationary, in fact, by playing with both a loose wrist and forearm you'll have optimal movement for speed and efficiency.

Lesson #1: Forward Roll Patterns

Notes: The roll patterns, in the 4 studies below, will demonstrate how the guitar can have a driving tone similar to 5-string banjo. These roll patterns can be applied within most any 4/4 context...after learning the rolls below, we will then apply these very same patterns to chord progressions in our next lessons...The following exercises involve only the right hand, your picking hand, and does not require any fretting whatsoever (notice there are only "0"s indicated on the tablature). This is to ensure that we're focusing on the crosspicking pattern only...once we're comfortable with this pattern, we will then be moving on to applying this very same pattern to chordal studies.

A Note on Picking Direction: Notice the "D" and "U" symbols above the tablature. This represents your pick direction. The "D" stands for Down and the "U" stands for Up. Picking patterns, how you choose to go up or down with your flatpick, is critical to the rhythm of your crosspicking arrangements. Below, you'll find that we're using nothing but down and up patterns...now, after learning this picking pattern, you can also experiment, with the following arrangments, using a DDUDDUDU pattern...however, if you're not an advanced player already, you might want to adhere to what's already written...