What is flatpicking? Despite the name, it’s more than simply playing with a pick. Flatpicking refers to the acoustic guitar style, heard primarily in the bluegrass and folk idioms, of playing individual notes with a pick to form melodies, solos, and fills. The approach characteristically has a crisp and snappy sound achieved by combining quick picking, open chord voicings, melodic lines, and concise licks.
Learn to Play the Fiddle Tune “St. Anne’s Reel” on Guitar
This flatpickers' favorite is ubiquitous at old-time, Celtic, and bluegrass jams.
Pickin’: Learn Doc Watson’s Hot Take on ‘Black Mountain Rag’
Go with whatever pick suits you best, and remember to use alternate picking on the eighth notes—down on the downbeats and up on the upbeats.
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Watch Doc Watson Demonstrate His Picking Approach to “Deep River Blues”
It’s hard to overstate the influence of Doc Watson, the blind guitarist and singer who wowed folk audiences with his virtuosic picking from the beginning of his career in the early 1960s until his death, at 89, in 2012.
Using Slurs in Fiddle Tunes
Learn to maintain the right pick direction when playing hammer-ons, pull-offs, and slides.
Play the Traditional Song “Down in the Willow Garden”
This excerpt of “Down in the Willow Garden” is arranged to be played with a plectrum. I play the melody on the low strings and the accompaniment on the high strings.
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Flatpick the Fiddle Tune “Forked Deer”
Dan Crary describes it as “one of the great, majestic fiddle tunes.” The first eight measures of Scott Nygaard's arrangement are transcribed here.
How to Play ‘William Tell Overture’ Like Glen Campbell
Glenn Campbell was not just a charming, golden-voiced entertainer; he was a hell of a guitarist as well.
Learn to Play the Fiddle Tune “St. Anne’s Reel” on Guitar
Fiddlers play this tune in the key of D, and it can be played effectively on the guitar in D without a capo or capoed up to the second fret and played out of C position.
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Video Lesson: Build Accurate Flatpicking Skills to Make Your Guitar Parts Richer
From the August 2017 issue of Acoustic Guitar | BY DAVID HODGE Sometimes playing guitar requires finesse. It may certainly look like guitarists flail away at the strings. But if you listen carefully, you’ll hear that seasoned players have a subtle control over their instruments. They can hit one, two, three, four,…