I'm into blues soloing right now, and I just cant do the butterfly vibrato (i think thats what they call it). it the vibrato where u have 1 finger, usually index, on the fret and u rock the finger back and forth with ur wrist. its a bb king speciality. anyone can guide me on how to do this? i usually just vibrate by pushing the string up and down with the finger.

errr .. this sounds soo bad ....... wat u doing ?????????

exactly what you said... move your wrist up and down..

try this. imagine you're doing the up and down bend, but instead of moving your finger you rotate your wrist instead

i tried mate, but my finger is not even moving the string. it freaking hurts too.

for those wondering, heres the vibrato im talking about (at 2:30)



This post has been edited by archinkent: Sep 6 2008, 01:25 AM

best way to practice this is by hitting a note on the very low frets 1-4...
then bend with your wrist...
1 stroke, 4 bends to 4 beats to a slow metronome say 70-80bpm.

i guess i might try that, tho it seems so amateurish lol. well gotta start somewhere i guess

amateurish? tell that to one of the top sessionists in the country

actually, on classical, you rock your wrists horizontally left and right, not exactly vertically. and the strings hardly move at all but you can still hear the vibrato.
On electric though, you just move your wrists with you finger in one place. and dont put too much pressure on the strings.
Thats how i do it at least @_@

on such vibrato technique, there's actually not su much string movement. The finger barely moves the string, so you shouldn't feel any pain !

Just rotate your wrist "around" the part of your hand that touches the neck. For bb king, the contact point (or pivot) is certainly the first articulation of the index finger. For me, it's more the articulation of the thumb (i have small hands).

So rotate your wrist quickly, and you'll see your finger "gliding" above the fretboard, with the string in between. The basic is quite easy, it's harder to master it

Is this the one?

well if thats the one, the last note of that short lick i played. then you need to increase your finger strength, do normal bendings i find them the best and then when you get that do fast vibratos. when your fingers get strong enough that bending and vibratos are second nature that would come naturally.

Good excuse to self promo huh? Haha..

hahahhaha, thats like a simple lick compared to the things the peopple here do.

You mean like this? Haha, but not really that complicated lah.

wow i cant do that

long more to go for me,

Haha, chill bro. I have only played for 1 year 9 months. And i started late, at 18 somemore. You can do it if you work on it!

thats like fast! im at 6 years and i cant do that, i started early summore at 16 i think.

maybe i slack too much

Haha, just push yourself. Like I started learning COB songs and all to improve my sweeps. Always push yourself past your comfort point, then your fingers will learn to adapt and you'll improve. But make sure you start slow, don't straight away starts shredding uncleanly.

i can shred (a few mistakes here and there at times), just well......no motivation to go further. the 3 string + tap i cant do, only can do the 3 string well with a few mistakes here and there again.

duno 6 yrs after the 2nd yr kinda got bored of my guitar.

time to feed your GAS

I started with 5 string sweeps, then only 3 strings and sweep+tap. I don't know why, but 5 strings is easier for me.

how did we go from a sweet sounding bluesy soulful vibrato from bb king to extreme tasteless random sweeps ? (quoted from your youtube title, no harm intented)

some people just don't care about doing 5-strings sweeps actually... (cf. "freak show excess" by steve vai... where Vai kind of make fun of the whole thing ) even though it remains impressive for the guitar players, it doesn't really sound good in most kind of music.. (IMO)

Haha, I don't know how we got here either. I don't worship sweeps, i'm more of a tapper myself. I just like sweeps because they are IMO a very difficult technique. If you can nail sweeps down, you're know you're on the right track TECHNIQUE-wise, not necessarily musically-wise. But still, its a very subjective matter.

i find alternate picking harder than sweep picking >.<
oh and serpent ash's 5 string sweeps are bbq sauce

it is subjective indeed, so besides musicality, i must say it's a good achievement to reach such good sweep technique after less than 2 yrs it shows some extreme dedication to the instrument.
don't become the next rusty colley though...

Thanks man, although I wouldn't really consider my sweeping good yet. Don't worry, no one can become the nect Rusty Cooley. Why would anyone want to anyway?

thanks. the pain is actually from fretting and vibrating the same note for quite a while, and also the fact that i never use my index to bend strings. i have small hands too, a wide neck doesnt help either, so i probably doing the same as you. the hardest part is to kill off the habit of vibrating with only the finger.

i agree about that. 3 years ago i thought shredding/sweeping was godly and thats what i practiced everyday, till i mastered the 5 string sweeps (minor and major scale). but then i realise its hard to incorporate them when u write a solo or improv over a backing track, and musically it sounds like shit. i then got into blues soloing and its SO MUCH better, playing and listening wise.

This post has been edited by archinkent: Sep 8 2008, 02:50 PM

well if you can vibrate with one finger i dont see why thats a problem, anchor the finger down but instead of using your finger to do the vibrato you twist the wrist instead.

hahahha thats why i never bothered to shred, im no bluesman but somehow despite all the speed and fretboard skillz. sitting down with a penta and playing it with thrills and vibratos somehhow just makes me feel a lot nicer, since im playing for personal pleasure i just decided to screw getting better shredding and jsut wank the pena the way i love it.

+3kk:
lol, but after awhile u ll get bored, so its time to increase ur licks palette with major and minor as well as some modes...

it's extremely difficult to vibrate a string with the strength of the finger alone ! Mere mortals are not built for this kind of effort...
Anyway, vibrato is effortless. If you feel any pain, stop right now before injuring yourself.

Bending with the index is not really common, i would say it works for small bends, but big bluesy bends are done with middle or ring finger.
Another method is to detune the string
Another one is to use your trem bar...
And another one, push or pull the head of the neck
You can imagine bending the string behind the fretting finger also...

Play in direction of the south pole, and twist toward the north when bending is required. The increased magnetic field might pull the string for you.

Naaa. I'm just bending your leg.