How to Alternate Pick: Beginner's Guide 

Of course I would like to acknowledge the marvelous Troy Grady for bringing pickslanting to the attention of lead guitarists like myself. For years I had no idea how I was crossing strings. I just kinda 'did it', and some string crosses were easy and some took a bit more movement/effort. I would like to make an addition to what I say in the video about picking motion: This here is the "forearm rotational" style (used wonderfully by Yngwie Malmsteen and even more so by Chris Brooks). The other main way to pick is the "side-to-side wrist" motion (not demonstrated here). So I thought I'd clear that up. Good luck, friends.

It's Awesome man.. This lesson will benefit both begginers who want to start picking efficiently...And also intermediate players who need to refine their technique... Continue the series,it's cool

I've spent ages watching useless videos trying to learn alternate picking when I could simply watch this one and get the full picture..

3 notes per string positions are marvelous to practice that because alternate upstroking becomes crucial to go up the scale efficiently.

That was an excellent comprehensive lesson on the mechanics of alternate picking. The illustrations were very well done too.

THANK YOU!!! No other words can express the amount of happiness I got as soon as I saw this video!

Wow.After watching this video I am having immediate improvement.God bless you Sir.

Thank you for so detailed explanation and elaboration of the true wrist motion!

Damn Alfred... you nailed it, this was somewhat eye-opening for someone who came from an acoustic guitar and never used a pick before picking up the electric guitar... thanks so very much and all the best wishes to you!

One of the best videos about alternate picking! Thank you so much!

i just love how you managed to be the best amongst overs in uncovering the unclear details about alternate picking technique, which may often confuse the beginners. no one matches your step-by-step, systematic approach. also appreciated the illustrations, thank you ❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥

Holy shit. Just that first slant picking lesson and im already flowing. Finally starting to get the hang of Snow by RHCP

Cleanest informative video I’ve seen so far didn’t skip once even I didn’t know what I wanna know

Wow halfway this video my alternate picking improved more than I could amagine, thx!

Thank you very much, it helps me a lot to continue playing free solo with a backing track

such a great lesson and teacher - thanks

I always look forward to youre vids ,you teach so accuratly and explain things so well.Always to the point with no fluff or sillines.Youre a fantastic teacher.

Excellent lesson, Alfred.

Video illustration was so great, it helped to crack my picking technique. Thank you so much!!

Thanks Alfred!

I have to give you an immense THANK YOU for sharing your knowledge of playing guitar. I am a still a noob at 49 years of age playing for just under 2 years. I bought your '40 Developmental AP Excercises' and the very first lesson introduces what you call PHI - Picking Hand Isolations. I can honestly say that this simple idea has changed the way I will practice for good. It dawned on me that I could use this concept for anything that I am struggling to play fast and clean. I gave it a go for the simple 'Pentatonic Linear threes A minor' lick from your '40 Scales Sequences'. Very cool sounding lick but I have struggled to get it up to speed and clean. Just the simple idea of isolating picking instantly showed me that I was getting tangled up. 15 minutes later I played the lick and it sounded awesome! Once again Thanks.

I bought that Alternate picking exercises PDF, really helps, it's awesome

the pick angle really helped

best video yet, i think i was doing everything he said not to before i watched this

Great comprehensive lesson. !

Very helpful video about pickslanting

Thanks for doing this, Alfred. You are a very good teacher and player :D

Great information and nicely presented Regards from England

My god, I'm so glad I subbed!!!!

How i developed my alternate picking is by playing slayer all the time.

Finally a no fuss no muss clear understanding of alternate picking, that I have been looking for. Great tutorial! Thanks for taking the time to do this. I'll be looking at your other postings as well.

This is beyond helpful thanks

That's was good demonstration and good instructions to teach us was beginners of Zero In Guitar Knowledge but thanks for Share knowledge to mr and other 🎸🤘🤘

Very comprehensive❤. Please make a video on how to legato, for begainers.

Thanks man, very helpful and very clear.

Good advice.

Dios de la guitarra, para mí eres uno de los mejores guitarristas del mundo

Great video as always! =)

Alternate tickling 😂 love it. Good lesson brother

I've been playing guitar for 2 and a half years and I hadn't even learnt to alternative pick LMAO, about time I do

great vid

Really interesting thank you ! (didn't even know that those technics get a name !)

Excelent as always!!! Greetings from Cd. Juarez México!!! I am a subscriber of your channel!!! O:)

great lesson , and you´re album is very good , a lot of vinnie moore mind´s eye influence

Great lesson, dude! I wish my accent was half as cool as yours!!!

I had absolutely no idea that upwards muting was different and that upward strokes also needed a different type of slant but it makes sense. Why is it that pretty much no tutorials I've found talk about that in depth?

Perfect timing my dude, learning cerebral hybridization by Fallujah and its easier to tap some parts than pick lol.

Thanks for the breakdown of the technique. Most videos just tell you to pick up and down. Only if it was that easy.

thank you; this is EXTREMELY helpful!

Very nice presentation - tho only a beginner and learning the basics I'd be very interested in any guitar course you teach 👍👍

5:30 Alfred: Play with relaxation. Me: Ok. Alfred: I really mean it. Me: Ok fine.

ive watched numerous videos trying to build my beginners skills. There are of course skilled and helpful musicians out there, with good tutorials. But i find ur videos more interresting. You give a personal and more in depth reflection on many of the basic techniqes. Thoughts i have about some things im struggling with, and to hear ur take on it. It help me to understand it better. Sorry for maybe bad spelling and maybe my text doesnt make sence haha. But just wanted to send a thank you for ur work

my advice to get started with this is to start strumming like you would play a single note (true picing motion/ wrist rotatin not forearm move or even jerkin off movement/up and down move from wrist )

Как всегда, все на высоте.

I got late to the Alfred Potter Fan Club but at least I got here. Great video and yes you are correct about Troy's series. I struggled with the 'hopping' motion when changing strings until I analysed my picking hand motion and then I finally 'got it' what you show so elegantly in this video, the pickslant. Thanks for this insightful video. I do have a question. When you demonstrate the downward pickslant at 9:00 you are lightly palm muting the string you are playing and in the upward pickslant you are not muting the string you are playing. Is that by design or is it because you normally lightly mute the low E and A string when you play them?

Now I know what pickslanting is :)

Nice video man! If you’re alternate picking fast, do you switch between the down and upstrokes?

I’ve been doing only down pics been getting better harder songs need too know this

I’m trying to learn Inferno (Unleash the Fire) so I search on RU-vid to figure out how to Alt pick. It just so happens that I decided to click on this vid, and you have the iconic Symphony x masks in the background. Lol, coincidence.

7:14 my hand goes the other way

Good lesson. i wonder which effective for palm mute down picking, up pick slant or down pick slat?

I have three questions. (1) For the true picking motion part, I found it is difficult to rotate only my wrist while muting. I then combine slight wrist rotation and slightly move the wrist up and down. How is your case? (2) For 3 notes per string, do you do alternate or economy picking? (3) For one note per string by alternate picking, how do you do pick slanting? Thank you.

No one alternate picks like the Great Anton Oparin

I can move my fingers fast up and down the fret board by tapping... every once in a while, my stroke hand catches up. I think I have to synchronize and not tap!

What if I used downward pickslant and ended with a downstroke on lower string and how to go to the higher string? You know what I mean?

love the accent 😂 where are you from???

Can you explain how Kiko Loureiro alternate pick? It looks like his thumb and index finger are moving in a way my fingers can’t

Hey is there another payment method I can use instead of PayPal? I really like your material it’s a huge help and what to purchase some of you pdfs but PayPal is a pain. Cheers

Maestro es usted muy bueno no podria poner vídeos subtitulados a español? Se lo agradeceria mucho

What Hawk Pick tonebird do you recommend?

As an amateur it feels confusing to switch between upward and downstroke pickslant position constantly, depending on what string I need to skip.

Harry potter goes metal \m/

Not totally true about the wrist motion. You simply need to stabilize the forearm on a surface to support the wrist and than you’ll be able to perform that side to side movement much faster without engaging forearm rotation. Forearm rotation is a much more difficult technique to learn crosspicking with. It’s great for single string stuff but that’s about it imo. Great video overall.

My pick always get stuck😔 how to solve it?

he said wrist stroke

So I literally held my pick wrong for years?!

Hay vãi đái

If this guy commentates game play videos, it would be hard to stay awake. This man has a good but boring voice.