Advanced Sweep picking

This is a lesson on some advanced sweep picking shapes. Most of the sweep picking ideas we are shown initially relate to simple major and minor triad arpeggios but sweep picking is also a great way to play extended arpeggio shapes.

In this lesson we will show you some interesting ways to use this technique on some more harmonically interesting arpeggios. The examples here are much harder than in some of the previous lessons but the basic concept remains the same. The pick should travel in a fluid sweeping motion and you can make use of hammer on's and pull off's when required. Make sure you learn these shapes slowly before trying to speed them up because left and right hand coordination is essential to make this technique work.

The first examples show ways of playing common chord shapes using sweep picking. We have a minor 7b5 arpeggio and a major 7 arpeggio .

Exercise 1. Am7b5 Arpeggio

Exercise 2. A major 7 Arpeggio

Exercise 3. Major 7 Arpeggio

Try extending these shapes across the entire neck over several octaves for some really interesting and terrifying passages.

Exercise 4. Yngwie Malsteen type sweep

Yngwie malmsteen frequently uses smaller sweep shapes on only three strings to create fast neo-classical type lines. Practice sliding between these three string arpeggio shapes. The diminshed arpeggio is typical of yngwie's sound and can be great for sliding up and down the neck

Exercise 5. Big diminshed Arpeggio

The symmetrical nature of the diminshed arpeggio make it ideal for creating some scary sweep picking lines. This example uses a repeating shape which moves up the neck spanning all six strings.