Guitar Gains #1: Neoclassical Picking Power Up

Guitar Gains is a series of short, high-impact lessons designed to help you make real progress on guitar — one focused exercise at a time. Each post gives you something you can practice immediately to build speed, control, and overall precision.

This exercise not only sounds cool, it’s one of the most effective ways to build real control in your alternate picking.

As shown in the video, play the pattern in four ways:

All downstrokes
All upstrokes
Alternate starting with a downstroke
Alternate starting with an upstroke

Working through all four angles forces total control of your motion. The goal is to make every version sound equally clean and powerful.

Most players are comfortable with all-downstrokes from Metallica-style riffing, but the all-upstroke version is where hidden weaknesses show up. That one alone can solve many picking issues — even when you only play one direction, you still need the opposite motion to reset.

You can apply this four-way method to any scale, lick, or sequence.Keep accuracy your top priority — clean execution beats speed every time.

If you want to download the Guitar Pro, MIDI, or PDF tabs, they’re available in the Premium tier in the Guitar Gains course.

And if you want to go even deeper into mastering alternate picking, check out the Alternate Picking Deep Dive in the Classroom.

20 comments