Proper Picking Techniques

[Jan King]

Holding a guitar pick is pretty simple as long as you apply some basic
common sense. The guitar pick should be held between your thumb and
index finger on your picking hand. You will want to keep your wrist
locked and utilize your elbow as the pivot point to move the guitar
pick to pressure the guitar string.
Some people will recommend using a light grade sand paper on your
guitar pick to sharpen the edge and help it grab the strings. This is
a good trick to use as your competency improves.
It is recommended that you use a medium or heavy gauge guitar pick
with a standard width. There are some over sized picks that you can
use for the very beginner or for the younger guitar players. These
picks are good for strumming and for establishing the very
fundamentals of using a guitar pick. Lighter gauge guitar picks tend
to be flimsy and can break quite easily.
Name brand guitar picks are usually good to start with, but guitar
picks, next to guitar strings are probably what you will be likely to
replace the most, so it is important to finds picks that are within
your budget and picks that last based on your playing abilities and
preferences.
It is recommended that you learn to be able to use a guitar pick using
both down and up strokes on the strings. Your picking hand will become
fatigued very quickly if you utilize only up or only down strokes with
the guitar pick. You will also be able to play much faster over time
if you are able to pick using up and down strokes.
For the very beginner, start by just using open strings (no pressure
on the guitar strings or neck from your fret hand), and practice using
up and down strokes on each string. As you are able to produce a
consistent ringing from the open string, practice going a little
faster along each string.
When you feel comfortable with your ability to pick up and down
consistently, try playing some notes on the fret board and using the
same exercise until you are comfortable with the sounds being
produced. These sounds should be a clear ringing, sustained sound with
no "dull" non-ringing of the notes.
To prepare for strumming some chords, practice by strumming the pick
along the open strings, again with no pressure on the guitar strings
or fret board, as you did in the beginning. Be sure to use both up and
down strokes to keep your pick hand from getting tired and developing
your up and down picking ability equally.
Once you are comfortable with the individual notes, move along to
strumming some chords, using simple chords first and being sure to be
able to ring out each note of the chord both individually and
together. Once you re comfortable with a few basic chords, try
changing between those chords until you are able to do so efficiently
and without stopping between chords for finger placements on the
guitar strings.
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