# Tapping question



## fps (Apr 3, 2011)

Hey guys,
When I tap, I tend to flick my finger to the side after tapping the note, to make sure the note below sounds well. Just wondering if anyone else does this, and which way you flick your finger, towards yourself or the ground, or whether proper technique is just to remove the finger straight up. Wow, what a nerdy question,
Cheeeeers


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## TRENCHLORD (Apr 3, 2011)

I flick tapping finger(pick hand middle) towards ground. An awsome exercise to reinforce this is to tap at the same fret inwhich you are hammering with left hand. This forces you to get the whole circular motion precice. It also makes for nearly impossibly fast flutter.


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## fps (Apr 3, 2011)

TRENCHLORD said:


> I flick tapping finger(pick hand middle) towards ground. An awsome exercise to reinforce this is to tap at the same fret inwhich you are hammering with left hand. This forces you to get the whole circular motion precice. It also makes for nearly impossibly fast flutter.



Thanks, that's a good exercise I'll work on it. When you tap do you have any part of your picking hand touching the fretboard? I usually use my palm to stop any notes on strings lower than the tapped string sounding, but I'm noticing I can get more power into the tap if my whole hand is free.


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## TRENCHLORD (Apr 3, 2011)

I try to use the side of my right palm just as you do. My right hand always starts to cramp up if it's a long tapping passage and then I just do the best I can to get through. Maybe more focused tapping practice(and some bannanas) would help me.


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## Alberto7 (Apr 3, 2011)

I usually "flick" my finger downward towards the ground, and just a tiny bit forward... But that's just how I naturally do it. I also do try to mute lower strings that aren't being played with my tapping hand. Higher strings are muted with the fretting hand, by flattening my fingers just a tiny bit.


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## SirMyghin (Apr 3, 2011)

It is proper to flick, otherwise you need to hammer the lower note (works too, but different sound, and you want to make sure the open in between doesn't sound so timing is imperative), just releasing to a note is sloppy/poor technique. I don't anchor on the edge of the neck when tapping, as it tends to much unnecessarily. If I need to mute I use the fleshy part under my pinky, but I do a lot of touch style type stuff on bass (where I do most of my tap playing).


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## Facebones (Apr 5, 2011)

Bump for more testimony.

I think this topic is pretty important to those of us who aren't the best tappers or just getting started..


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## krypter (Apr 11, 2011)

i always flick "up". Dunno why, just seems more natural to me. 

I can go up and down one ctring pretty good, but cant string skip for the life of me because of flicking it up though.


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## ittoa666 (Apr 11, 2011)

I usually flick down a little, but I stop when it gets faster. I can't slide very well though.

Also, I rest my palm on the top 4 strings until I choose to go up.


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## Stealthdjentstic (Apr 11, 2011)

The proper way to do it is to flick down if the strings are closer to the ground and flick up if they're closer to the top.


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## Dead Undead (Apr 11, 2011)

I always flick up, just more comfortable, feels like I get more volume out of it.

Good practice.


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## ShadyDavey (Apr 11, 2011)

Always upwards - your muscles are naturally more inclined to pull the fingers in towards the palm rather than away towards the floor so I take advantage of that tendency as it feels a lot more natural than "flicking away".

I read a couple of articles by Jennifer Batten and TJ Helmerich who both utilise the "pull toward" or "flick up" method which lead me into a period of experimentation as as much as I don't consider myself a tapper I did develop a solid foundation through their methods and a very old publication called "The Right Touch" by Steve Lynch from Autograph.


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## Facebones (Apr 11, 2011)

ShadyDavey said:


> Always upwards - *your muscles are naturally more inclined to pull the fingers in towards the palm rather than away towards the floor so I take advantage of that tendency as it feels a lot more natural* than "flicking away".
> 
> I read a couple of articles by Jennifer Batten and TJ Helmerich who both utilise the "pull toward" or "flick up" method which lead me into a period of experimentation as as much as I don't consider myself a tapper I did develop a solid foundation through their methods and a very old publication called "The Right Touch" by Steve Lynch from Autograph.




Thanks for the insight, I'm going to give that a shot later on today.


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## SirMyghin (Apr 11, 2011)

I find pulling down much easier than up, but I treat it like bending, depends what string I am on. This is going to depend a lot on your hand position too.


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## Overtone (Apr 11, 2011)

I don't really flick it. I don't think I flick when I'm doing pulloffs either. When I'm tapping I use the same kind of motion.. taking my finger off the string quickly enough that the vibrations make the pull off happen. Flicking the string w/ the finger that's fretting it just doesn't feel necessary. I don't have any problems w/ multifinger tapping across several strings or on one string, so I guess it works.


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## SirMyghin (Apr 11, 2011)

Easily done with gain Overtone, but if playing cleanly you have to do something else to make the volume levels consistant, a reverse hammer, or a pull off. Turn up the gain and no one is likely to notice, doesn't mean it is a good idea.


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## Overtone (Apr 11, 2011)

That IS in the clean channel though, and the dynamics are fine. There's a chance that I do a very subtle flick towards the ground, I'll check when I plug in tonight.


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## SirMyghin (Apr 11, 2011)

Overtone said:


> That IS in the clean channel though, and the dynamics are fine. There's a chance that I do a very subtle flick towards the ground, I'll check when I plug in tonight.



Duration is a bit of a factor here too, if your tap is pretty immediate and not held then it won't make much difference. Holding notes though for more than the impact is when it will make more difference. So a tapping lick is probably fine, but something more akin to touch style playing not so much.


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## Overtone (Apr 12, 2011)

Urk! I didn't play last night... too busy getting mindfucked by Inland Empire (David Lynch movie).


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## penguin_316 (Apr 12, 2011)

Just wanted to add my 2 cents....pulling downward after a tap is pretty much the standard. I just wanted to add in though that when tapping you should be keeping the tapping finger in a rigid form.
I guess what I mean is....my finger doesn't extend straight out to tap it may be slightly bent...but it stays solid. There is no flicking of the finger, rather it's a wrist movement.
That's what i do and pretty sure how most do it. I could see a lot of constraints if you actually want to flick your finger each time...speed constraints anyway.


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## Dead Undead (Apr 12, 2011)

penguin_316 said:


> Just wanted to add my 2 cents....pulling downward after a tap is pretty much the standard. I just wanted to add in though that when tapping you should be keeping the tapping finger in a rigid form.
> I guess what I mean is....my finger doesn't extend straight out to tap it may be slightly bent...but it stays solid. There is no flicking of the finger, rather it's a wrist movement.
> That's what i do and pretty sure how most do it. I could see a lot of constraints if you actually want to flick your finger each time...speed constraints anyway.



I tap with my finger doing most of the work and don't have any problem with speed. But I fingerpick a lot so that might have somehting to do with it.


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## Infamous Impact (Apr 12, 2011)

I always flick up when tapping.


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## penguin_316 (Apr 12, 2011)

Dead Undead said:


> I tap with my finger doing most of the work and don't have any problem with speed. But I fingerpick a lot so that might have somehting to do with it.



Correction...i guess it depends on the passage. I use a slight flick and wrist movement usually


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## Dead Undead (Apr 12, 2011)

penguin_316 said:


> Correction...i guess it depends on the passage. I use a slight flick and wrist movement usually



Well when I'm tapping scales I move my wrist, of course, for switching strings and such.

When I tap (unless it's multi finger tapping) I'm always holding my pick between index finger and thumb while tapping with my middle finger. just something a previous guitar teacher got me doing early on, so that's the way I've always done it. Anyone else?


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## Blind Theory (Apr 13, 2011)

An even better tapping question!
What licks do you guys use to practice tapping on multiple strings in one go? Like that string skipping, tapping stuff?


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## CooleyJr (Apr 13, 2011)

The way I learned, was to always pull off towards your palm.


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## Facebones (Apr 13, 2011)

When you talk about pulling toward your palm, do you mean like this guy?


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## Facebones (Apr 13, 2011)

Maybe this is a better example:


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## Overtone (Apr 15, 2011)

So here's 2 things I noticed in my playing

-What the left hand is doing is important... I often hammer on the left hand instead of pulling off w/ the right, but even when I'm not, how well I'm fretting the note has a huge impact on what happens when I take my right hand off the fretboard.
-My right hand applies force at a slightly downwards angle. So I'm not just pressing with force perpendicular to the fretboard... it's a slight angle, where I'm letting the weight of my hand apply some force downwards. This creates tension. When I remove my hand, the release of the tension causes the string to vibrate. It's more like stretching a rubber band and letting it go than it is a flicking motion. Try it out... let the weight of your hand pull the string down ever so slightly (it shouldn't be so much that it affects the pitch) and have your left hand fretting a note. If you do it right removing your hand will cause the string to vibrate. It's a subtle difference, but it seems like it's important for when I'm tapping two strings simultaneously and pulling off to a chord on my left hand, something I often do. But even with single notes it's more of that gravity effect that comes from my whole arm than a flicking motion from one finger.


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## Fiction (Apr 18, 2011)

I usually rest my palm on the strings higher (towards my face) then what string i'm tapping on, or if its further down the fretboard past where the body is I kind of "latch" on to the fretboard with my thumb on top and have my hand floating above where i'm tapping.

An exercise I use to do back when I learnt tapping I got from a Paul gilbert video was;

|-5p4p2-4-2h4-|
|-T------T------|

And just repeat that, can be done on any string obviously. Kind of got a circular motion going and helped playing the notes more fluently and producing a cleaner sound. Good finger strength exercise.


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## Iheartmidgetbooty (Apr 19, 2011)

A good practice lick with tapping is a:

--9t13h11t14h12------------------------------------
----------------------8t12h9t13h11------------------
----------------------------------------7t11h9t12h10
----------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------


Start going up, go back down and even invert it. It's using most of you're fingers and really helps in placing inside pentatonic-type riffs.

My technique is good steady , FIRM, pickhand using the middle finger to flick out and a good deal of up and down 'punches', so to speak. To skip strings I simply adjust my pickhand in whichever way I'm skipping and then reaffirm my palm. My string hand is inline or coordinate with my pickhand and following it's every aftermove. It's sort of like sweep picking, except the movements are most of the time in and out and not up and down. 

Hope that helped a bit, I pride myself in my tapping and just wanted to share with some people getting into it. Keep shredding!


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## Ill-Gotten James (Apr 20, 2011)

Here is my two cents. For me, it feels more comfortable to pull up after tapping. However, I get a much better tone from pulling down. It may sound strange and others may argue that there is no difference, but I can hear a slight difference. I do not know what the correct way to tap is, but based on the tone that I produce with my guitar, I would say pull down towards the ground. Most of the time though, I go with the comfortable route and pull up. However, I am trying to curb my habbits and learn how to effectively pull both ways.


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