Hi Jimmy -- thanks for all your wonderful remarks.
Since we have you here, and we normally talk about playing
jazz guitar rather than "who's better than who", I thought
I'd try to steer the discussions in a different direction,
before we lose you entirely (I'm sure you're a busy man)!
I started playing guitar many years ago, mostly rock,
blues-rock, and classical-rock. After a few years, I
realized that in order to be able to pick as fast as I
wanted to, I needed to use "economy" picking, i.e., sweeping
wherever possible, like you demonstrate in your video. I
practiced hard and now, it only takes me a few days of solid
practice to get to the point where I can play ridiculously
fast scales, picking every note.
A few years ago I started focusing on jazzier techniques,
such as swing eighth notes. I found that all the years I had
spent on economy picking straight sixteenth notes did not
help one bit. There was no way I was going, in less than 10
years of further practice, to learn to make my sweeping
swing. Instead, when playing jazz or jazzy music, I've
reverted to alternate picking for swung eighths, and throw
in economy-picked lines in triplets here and there, as a nod
to my previous technique. But if the tempo of a swing-feel
tune is too fast -- I'm lost.
So I guess my question is, do you have any particular
advice/approaches for practicing swing feel soloing? Or is
it just a matter of practice, practice, practice?
Thanks -- just picked up _Like That_ and I'm lovin' it!
-Paul
