I'm dave brosky's new student, and I was just wondering if anyone knows how to do a sweep technique that sounds something like yngwie malmsteen, or some other 80's shred guitar players. I saw tony levin doing a sweep in the stickmen song "hands", so i know its possible, but how do you do it?

Do you mean around 7:20?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpT1nqRohj0

I cant really help with technique but well remember my obsession with Yngwie & his sweep technique in the eighties. I have in front of me , the Rising force LP on Vinyl ( 1984) , the sticker on the cover saying " Metal - Play it loud "!
The tracks Black Star & Far beyond the Sun will stay with me forever I suspect. Good Luck , the idea of transposing Yngwie to the stick is an interesting one.
Cheers
B

I remember some many years back, Guitar Player magazine used to have what they called "sound page" recordings, which were actually very thin vinyl records that came in the magazine. Anyway one issue had a recording of Joe Satriani playing a one-handed arpeggio piece that sounded exactly like sweep-picking to me. Basically you would just do the left hand part, or you could do it with the right hand, or if you have LOTS of time to practice you could do it with both hands in harmony or counterpoint.

yeah that part

That makes sense Jeff I still have many of those plastic "soundpages" and joes left hand piece was quite a challenge . I might have to try it out myself, would be a good approximation to sweeping.

How Time flies when you are having fun.
I found the plastic soundpage and the Feb 1988 issue of Guitar Player. It still plays with authentic crackle and reveals a finger busting arpeggio exercise. The transcription is a little scary although I recall giving it a go way back then.
Joe Satriani is on the cover sporting Hair, unlike today!

B

Try something like this.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkpZ645ztl0[/youtube]


I had started to get into this sort of thing before I got my Stick 2 years ago. After seeing this thread the other day, I decided to try to adapt something like this using both hands on the melody side of my 10 string Stick. It wasn't long until the pattern clicked. I was using a 5 string sweep pattern adapted from guitar. Once I get it up to speed, I might post a video if there's any interest.

I would like that very much. The high school metal player in pittsburgh mostly judges skill based on sweeping. So the stick's halo effect, plus that would give a pretty good edge. Plus and I enjoy the sound of sweeping, and its in the spirit of playing music for the right reasons, and all that.

@leadbass,
What do you mean? Sweeping is a pick technique where you do not alternate downwards and upwards picking but rather sweep the hand quite far up or down while letting the pick touch each string as it passes. The Stick is a fretboard tapping instrument... do you imply playing it with a pick?

I listened to the Stickmen song example and my guess is that you actually mean arpeggio? Tony is playing a bunch of arpeggios while singing at the end of that song. Arpeggios are simple: just play the notes of a chord up and down. For a beginner this should be easier to play fast arpeggios with fretboard tapping on the Stick compared to do it with sweeping pick technique on a guitar.