
Steal inspiration, vocabulary, and picking techniques from legendary acoustic players.
Intermediate
Beginner
- Improve your alternate picking.
- Discover how to use the ācountryā scale.
- Create a deeper understanding of chord shapes across the neck.
There have been many bluegrass guitar icons, from the pioneering Doc Watson, Clarence White, and Tony Rice, to such modern masters as Bryan Sutton and David Grier. Today, younger players like Molly Tuttle and Carl Miner keep the genre alive.
Traditionally, bluegrass is played on acoustic instruments. Some people will tell you that putting the words āelectricā and ābluegrassā in the same sentence creates an oxymoron, like ābaroque jazz.ā Although those purists have a valid point, electric bluegrass and newgrass are accepted genres that take influence from the early pickers and apply it to more modern instrumentation. And thatās exactly what weāll do right now.
This lesson will focus on the fundamental techniques and note choices youāll need to unlock the essence of flatpick guitar. Once you digest the basics, youāll be ready to steal endless amounts of vocabulary from the masters of the style. The first thing to discuss is alternate-picking technique. Traditional flatpickers exist in a purely acoustic world, and being heard over loud banjos, Dobros, and fiddles is extremely important. The best way to achieve this is with a strong picking hand thatās capable of projecting each note to the audience.
Ex. 1 is a simple ascending and descending G major pentatonic scale (GāAāBāDāE). This is played with strict alternate picking: Begin with a downstroke, then follow it with an upstroke, then play a downstroke, and so on.
The problem with alternate picking will always be when you cross strings. (Note: Entire books have been devoted to this subjectāweāre just scratching the surface here.) The two aspects weāll examine right now are āinsideā and āoutsideā picking.
Outside picking is what happens when you pick a string, and then while targeting the next one, you jump over it and swing back to pick it. The flatpick attacks the outside edges of the two strings.
In Ex. 2, play the A string with a downstroke, then the D string with an upstroke. This is outside motion. Each subsequent string crossing motion uses this outside picking technique.
Most players find the outside mechanics easier than the more restrictive inside motion. As you may be able to work out, inside picking technique is where your pick is stuck between two strings.
The following lick (Ex. 3) uses only this inside motion. Play it slowly and then compare how fast and accurately you can play it relative to Ex. 2.
You wonāt have the luxury of structuring all your phrases to eliminate one motion or the other, so itās best to accept this reality and develop the skills needed to get by with both approaches. The best of the best didnāt make excuses, they just played down-up-down-up over and over for decades.
Ex. 4 features one note per string. This fast string-crossing motion requires a good level of proficiency with both inside and outside approaches to build up any sort of speed.
The secret to alternate picking isnāt to always alternate pickstrokes between notes, but to keep the motion of the hand going. In short, the hand will move in the alternating fashion whether or not you strike a string. If you have a stream of eighth-notes, theyāll be alternate picked, but if there are some quarter-notes thrown in, the hand wonāt freeze and wait for the next note. Youāll play the note with a downstroke, move up and not play anything, then drop back onto the strings and play the next note with a downstroke (Ex. 5).
This way all your downbeats are played with downstrokes and upbeats are upstrokes. Youāll see people refer to this as āstrict alternate picking.ā With that out of the way, itās worth looking at the note choices of a typical bluegrass player.
A quick analysis of some bluegrass tunes will reveal this isnāt harmonically complex music. Nearly all of the chords youāre going to be dealing with are major and minor triads, so note choice isnāt going to break the brain.
One approach would be to play a line based on the major scale of the key youāre in. For example, if youāre playing a song in G, the G major scale (GāAāBāCāDāEāF#) makes a good starting point.
A more stylistically appropriate approach would be to use the ācountry scale,ā which is a major pentatonic scale with an added b3. In G that would be GāAāBbāBāDāE. Ex. 6 shows this scale played beginning in the open position and moving up on the 3rd string.
Letās put all this into practice. Ex. 7 shows a line built around a G chord using this strict alternate-picking motion applied to string crossing mechanics in both directions. This sticks closely to the country scale, but thereās also an added C in the third measure to allow the 3 to land on the downbeat of measure four.
This next line (Ex. 8) uses the same idea, but now beginning up at the 5th fret area and moving down over the course of the lick.
Itās worth looking at each string crossing to categorize it as inside or outside. This will help further your understanding of the importance of these two picking techniques.
Hereās another idea around G (Ex. 9), but to create some smoother motion, this time we add notes from G Mixolydian (GāAāBāCāDāEāF), as well as a bluesy Db (b5) as a chromatic passing tone. The trick here is nailing all the position shifts as youāre going from the 3rd fret up to the 10th fret.
Our final example (Ex. 10) takes what weāve learned about approaching a major chord and applies it to two different chords. First, we have two measures of G, then C, and back to G.
When playing over the C, your note choice changes to the country scale, but now built from C (CāDāEbāEāGāA). Switching between these chords poses a technical challenge, along with a visual one. Take your time with a lick like this, and make sure youāre able to see the underlying chord at all times.
- Pluck 'Em! A Crash Course in Country Guitar - Premier Guitar āŗ
- Michael Daves: Bluegrass' Jekyll and Hyde - Premier Guitar āŗ
- 10 Commandments of Bluegrass Guitar - Premier Guitar āŗ
- Rig Rundown: Rob Ickes & Trey Hensley - Premier Guitar āŗ
- Rob Ickes & Trey Hensleyās New Songbook - Premier Guitar āŗ
Just like guitarists, audiophiles are chasing sound. It may be a never-ending quest.
āWhat you got back home, little sister, to play your fuzzy warbles on? I bet you got, say, pitiful, portable picnic players. Come with uncle and hear all proper. Hear angel trumpets and devil trombones.āāAlexander DeLarge (Malcolm McDowell) in the film A Clockwork Orange.
We listen to recorded music for enjoyment and inspiration, but few of us expect recordings to rival the experience of live music. Most guitarists know that the average home sound system, let alone Bluetooth boomboxes, cannot reproduce the weight and depth equal to standing in a room with a full-blown concert guitar rig. Also, classical music lovers recognize that a home system wonāt reproduce the visceral envelope of a live orchestra. Still, much like guitarists, audiophiles spend huge amounts of time and money chasing the ultimate ārealisticā audio experience. I wonder if sometimes thatās misguided.
My exposure to the audio hobby came early, from my fatherās influence. My dad grew up in the revolution of home electronics, and being an amateur musician, he wanted good reproduction of the recordings he cherished. This led him to stock our home with tube components and DIY electrostatic hybrid speakers that rivaled the size and output of vintage Fender 2x12s. I thought this was normal.
Later, I discovered a small shop in my hometown that specialized in āhigh endā audiophile gear. They had a policy: No sale is final until you are completely satisfied. I became an almost weekly visitor (and paying customer) and was allowed to take equipment home to audition, which was dangerous for a young man on a low budget. It was through this program I started to understand the ins and outs of building a cohesive system that met my taste. I began to pay much more attention to the nuances of audio reproduction. Some gear revealed a whole new level of accuracy when it came to acoustic or vocal performance, while lacking the kick-ass punch I desired of my rock albums. I was seeking reproduction that would gently caress the sounds on folk, classical, and jazz recordings, but could also slay when the going got heavy. This made me a bit of an odd bird to the guys at the audio shop, but they wanted to please. With their guidance I assembled some decent systems over time, but through the decades, I lost interest in the chase.
Recently, Iāve begun perusing online audiophile boards and they seem oddly familiar, with tube versus solid-state discussions that might feel at home to guitaristsāexcept the prices are now beyond what Iād imagined. For the most part, they mirror the exchanges we see on guitar boards minus the potty-mouth language. Enthusiasts exchange information and opinions (mostly) on what gear presents the widest soundstage or most detailed high-frequency delivery, all in flowery language usually reserved for fine wines.
Speaking of whining, youāll rethink your idea of expensive cables when you hear folks comparing 18", $1,700 interconnects for their DACs. Some of the systems Iāve seen are more costly than an entire guitar, amplifier, and studio gear collection by a serious margin. Mostly, the banter is cordial and avoids the humble-bragging that might go along with the purchase of a $10,000 set of PAF humbuckers. Still, I have a lack of insight into what exactly most are trying to accomplish.
If youāve ever worked in a big-time studio, you know that the soundscape blasting out of huge monitors is not what most of us have in our homes. My experience rewiring pro-studio patchbays is that less emphasis is placed on oxygen-free, silver-plated, directional cables than the room treatment. Iāve found myself wondering if the people on those audio boardsāwho have spent many tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars on their home systemsāhave ever been in a studio control room listening to music as loud as a 28,000 horsepower traffic jam of NASCAR racers. That might be an eye-opener.
One of my takeaways is that even though music recording began as an attempt to reproduce what actually happens in a room, it hasnāt been just that for a long time. With all our effects and sonic wizardry on display, recording is like playing an instrument itself, and much more complex. This is not a new revelation to Beatles fans.
What amazes me is that both audiophiles and guitar fanatics pursue the sounds we hear on recordings for differing reasons and with subjective results. Itās a feedback-loop game, where we chase sounds mostly exclusive to the studio. So, how do we determine if our playback is accurate? Will we ever be satisfied enough to call the sale final?
Iām not convinced, but just the same, Iāll continue my own search for the holy grail of affordable, kick-ass sound that still loves a folk guitar
Mooer Prime Minimax M2 Intelligent Pedal boasts 194 effects models, 80 preset slots, MNRS and third-party sample file compatibility, an 80-minute looping module, internal drum machine, high-precision tuner, Bluetooth support, and a rechargeable lithium battery.
Over the last few years, Mooer has released several Prime multi-effects devices, including the Prime P1, P2, S1, and most recently in 2024, the Prime Minimax M1. Excitingly, the company is kicking off 2025 with a brand new addition to the Prime familyāthe Prime Minimax M2 Intelligent Pedal.
Within this small multi-effects device, a whole lot of functionality is packed in, including an impressive 194 effects models, including overdrive, preamp simulators, cabinet models, delays, reverbs, modulation effects, etc., and more. In typical Mooer style, though, the company took things a step further by offering limitless flexibility through the support of its in-house MNRS sample files, as well as third-party IR sample files. Essentially, this means that users can download additional tonal emulations and effects from the Mooer Cloud and third-party sources to the device, which they can then save across 80 preset slots.
As with some past models in the Prime series, the M2 sports a convenient touchscreen design, facilitating easy browsing through the devices banks of presets. However, guitarists are not limited to interfacing with the pedal in this way, as it also features two footswitches, both of which can be used to switch between presets in each bank. There is even a MIDI jack built into the device, enabling users to connect their MIDI controllers to extend the control functions, and the MOOER F4 wireless footswitch support is also supported. Essentially, these augmentation options facilitate additional footswitches to ensure switching preset tones is always as quick and seamless as possible within any workflow.
While the Prime M2 Intelligent Pedal is primarily designed for effects and tonal simulations, it also comes packed with an array of other useful features. For example, it contains a looping module with a hefty 80-minute capacity, in addition to 10 recording save slots to ensure that any looping creations can be kept for future use in performances. Similar to past looper modules in Mooer's products, users are also free to overdub their recordings and even undo or redo their overdubs, offering a lot of real-time flexibility for creating loop-based musical structures.
As if the addition of a looper wasnāt enough, this feature is also synchronizable with an internal drum machine and metronome, a combination that includes 56 drum grooves and 4 metronome varieties. Ultimately, itās a reminder that Mooer clearly recognizes and wishes to solve the struggles that musicians have when attempting to produce precise loops while staying in time. Upon commencing recording, the drum machine can produce four initial beats to serve as a count-in cue, and of course, this can be combined with the device's tap-tempo control for dynamic use. Best of all, this feature can also be applied to modulation and delay effects, ensuring that they work perfectly in time with any performance.
Extra features are included to complete this all-in-one pedal, including a high-precision tunerwith fully customizable frequency ranges. Guitarists can even leverage the M2ās built-inBluetooth input support, allowing them to practice, jam, and even produce looped musicalstructures over their favorite backing tracks, band prototypes, and musical pieces.
Perhaps unsurprisingly for existing Mooer product users, the Prime M2 also boasts an impressive variety of audio routing systems. As was previously mentioned, that includes Bluetooth input, as well as industry standards such as dual-channel stereo output, perfect for stereo delay and modulation effects. It also supports headphone output for those who wish to practice in silence, and even OTG recording, which means that guitarists can record their creations directly to their smartphone whilst on the go.
Speaking of on-the-go, Mooer is continuing its recent portable-play focus with the Prime M2Intelligent Pedal, as it is fitted with a built-in rechargeable lithium battery with a battery life of up to 6 hours. Ultimately, this means that even a lack of local power sources wonāt get in the way of rehearsals and live performances. Combined with the pedalās lightweight and small build, it truly is an ideal addition to the pedalboard of any traveling musician.
Overall, the Prime M2 Intelligent Pedal is set to be an impressive new addition to the Prime series. It features augmented functionality when compared to past models, yet still in a minimalist and easy-to-use package, keeping the size small and light yet still packing in footswitches, a touch screen, and other flexible control systems.
Features:
- 194 built-in effect models and tonal emulations
- 80 preset slots for storing downloaded MNRS and third-party sample files
- Compatibility with the MOOER Cloud tone-sharing platform
- Built-in 80-minute looping module
- Record, overdub, pause, delete, and playback functions for looping
- Internal drum machine module, stocked with 56 drum grooves
- 4 unique metronomes
- Synchronization between drum machine and looper
- Convenient count-in cue function support from the metronome
- High-precision and customizable tuner module
- 2 multi-function footswitches
- 1.28-inch touchscreen interface
- LED digital display
- LED charge indicator
- Portable USB/OTG recording
- Direct compatibility with the MOOER prime mobile APP and MOOER Studio desktop software for preset management
- Bluetooth 5.0 audio playback
- 3000mAh integrated lithium battery with up to 6 hours of use time
- DC 5V/2A power supply and charging
- 3 hours charging time
- Low weight of 228g
- Compact, at 74mm (L), 125mm (W), and 49mm (H)
- Sample rate of 44.1kHz
- Bit depth of 24bit
- Compatible with MOOER F4 wireless footswitch
- 3.5mm MIDI port
- Mono TS ¼ā input
- Stereo TS ¼ā output
- 3.5mm headphone output
- Power switch button
The Prime Minimax M2 Intelligent Pedal will be available from the official distributors or retailersworldwide.
For more information, please visit mooeraudio.com.
Hereās Chris Martin surrounded by a group of guitars created to commemorate his familyās 192-year history.
The home organ once ruled the world, only to go extinct. Is the acoustic guitar next?
When I was growing up, my Aunt Kate had a home organ in her living room. Back then, home organs were everywhere. They were sold at malls across America, and were a staple of post-WWII households. Brands like Lowrey, Magnus, and Hammond dominated the market. Lowrey, a division of Norlin (which eventually acquired Gibson), was especially massive. In fact, in a year where Gibson generated $19 million in revenue, Lowrey pulled in a staggering $100 million.
But like all booms, the home organās success was temporary. By the 1980s, it had gone bust. A huge contributing factor was the entrance of Casio: a more affordable, portable alternative that rendered the home organ obsolete.
Thankfully, the acoustic guitar has always had portability on its side. Iāve witnessed three major acoustic-guitar booms in my lifetime: the folk and folk-rock explosion of the late ā50s through the late ā70s, the MTV Unplugged resurgence, and most recently, the COVID-era surge.
The ā80s, however, were a tough time for acoustic guitar builders. That decade belonged to pointy electric guitars and hair metal. But the acoustic guitar came back. And unlike the home organ, it has not only endured, but thrived.
My great-grandfather capitalized on the demand for mandolins in the early part of the 20th century. We also tried to make and sell banjos. In addition to that, we made archtops, and although they werenāt as popular as some other brands, we did borrow the 14-fret neck.
While we were making 12-fret guitars with steel strings (the real benefit of that era was a dramatic improvement in the quality of steel strings), we discovered that many players wanted more access to the body and a slimmer profile. Starting with a 000-size guitar, we quickly converted many of our models to the new modern neck design, most notably our dreadnought model. The timing was right, as the dreadnought became the go-to guitar for country music. The steel-string flattop would lend itself to a fantastic melding of styles and types of music from around the world (and around the corner), becoming the driving voice of not just country, but also folk and many other genres.
Baby boomers (myself included) grew up with the sound of the acoustic guitar, and playing the music of our youth remains an essential part of any enthusiastās repertoire. Our generation is not only large but also living longer, thanks to modern medicine and healthier lifestyles. Many of us have accumulated wealth, and for those of us in the business of making and selling guitars, thatās good news.
I mean no disrespect when I say, āThank goodness I wasnāt born into the worldās most famous accordion-making family.ā Accordions had their day, just as the home organ once did. Interestingly, accordions still have a niche following, whereas the home organ is now a historical artifact. While home organs were, for a time, all the rage, I doubt that even at the peak of their popularity anyone owned more than one. Quite a different situation when it comes to guitars and guitar collecting.
I do wish I could share with my ancestors how popular the guitar continues to be.
Every so often, someone writes an article with a headline like, āIs the Guitar Dead?ā My answer is simple: no.
As long as we boomersāand everybody elseākeep playing.
The collection includes Cobalt strings with a Paradigm Core, Tim Henson Signature Classical Strings, and the Tim Henson Signature FretWrap by Gruv Gear.
Engineered for maximum output, clarity, and durability, these strings feature:
- Cobalt with a Paradigm Core (not RPS) for added durability
- Nano-treated for maximum lifespan and corrosion resistance
- Gauges 9.5, 12, 16, 26, 36, 46 (Turbo Slinky set)
- Available individually or as part of the Tim Henson Signature Bundle
Tim Henson Signature Classical Strings
Crafted for dynamic, percussive tonality, these strings pair fluorocarbon trebles with silver-plated copper basses to deliver exceptional response and clarity.
- Gauges: 24, 27, 33, 30, 36, 42
- Available individually or as part of the Tim Henson Signature Bundle
Tim Henson Signature FretWrap by Gruv Gear
An essential string-dampening tool, the Tim Henson Signature FretWrap is designed for cleaner playing by eliminating unwanted overtones and sympathetic vibrations.
- Features Tim Hensonās custom āCherub Logoā design
- Size Small, fits 4-string basses, 6-string electric/acoustic guitars, and ukuleles
- Ideal for live performance and studio recording
- Ernie Ball collaboration with Gruv Gear
- Available individually or as part of the Tim Henson Signature Bundle
The Ernie Ball Tim Henson Accessory Bundle Kit
For players who want the complete Tim Henson experience, the Ernie Ball Tim HensonSignature Bundle Kit includes:
- Tim Henson Signature Electric Strings (9.5-46)
- Tim Henson Signature Classical Strings (Medium Tension)
- Tim Henson Signature FretWrap by Gruv Gear (Small)
- Tim Henson Signature Cable (Exclusive 10ft white dual-conductor cable, only available in the bundle)
The Tim Henson Signature String & Accessory Collection is available starting today, March 19, 2025, at authorized Ernie Ball dealers worldwide.
For more information, please visit ernieball.com.