# Steve Morse-style alternate picking



## distressed_romeo (Oct 24, 2006)

By this I mean strict alternate picking for everything, holding the pick at a reverse angle with the thumb, middle and index finger.

I started experimenting with this over the summer, and it's led to a lot of very cool intervallic ideas creeping into my playing. It's also great on acoustic guitar, as it gives far more projection than a 'normal' pick grip.

Whilst it won't ever replace my normal picking style, it's become a great 'secret weapon'.

Anyone else experimented with it, or used it as their default approach?


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## MetalMike (Oct 24, 2006)

distressed_romeo said:


> By this I mean strict alternate picking for everything, holding the pick at a reverse angle with the thumb, middle and index finger.
> 
> I started experimenting with this over the summer, and it's led to a lot of very cool intervallic ideas creeping into my playing. It's also great on acoustic guitar, as it gives far more projection than a 'normal' pick grip.
> 
> ...



I've experimented with his style as a whole. I devised what I call the "Steve Morse Country Scale" as a 3 note per string scale that sounds like anything out of Dixie Dregs.

As for the strict alternate picking, I came up with some very cool picking patterns within arpeggios that it works nicely with. 

The fact that he can play probably play an arpeggio shape with strict alternate picking faster than most can sweep amazes me.

The only practical use his style has in my playing, is using strict alternate picking for Joe Pass like position arpeggios, that almost sound like jazz exercises until they are played fast. In the tab, I started the sequence on C Major 7 and ended on G7 but you could honestly go on with that forever up and down the neck. It's a nice sounding example nevertheless.


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## distressed_romeo (Oct 24, 2006)

That's exactly the type of stuff I've found this picking style is great for, as I'd really struggle to pull off those sort of lines using my normal approach. 

Have you experimented with the kind of open string scales he uses in his 'countrified' playing? I got into those sort of scalic patterns (on an acoustic in DADGAD tuning) over the summer, and they're seriously addictive.


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## MetalMike (Oct 25, 2006)

distressed_romeo said:


> That's exactly the type of stuff I've found this picking style is great for, as I'd really struggle to pull off those sort of lines using my normal approach.
> 
> Have you experimented with the kind of open string scales he uses in his 'countrified' playing? I got into those sort of scalic patterns (on an acoustic in DADGAD tuning) over the summer, and they're seriously addictive.



A little bit. I haven't figured out too many of those types of shapes, but using the ones I do know, creating countryesq banjo lines is quite cool.


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