Chords for Introductory bouzouki technique - picking on the bouzouki
Tempo:
71.875 bpm
Chords used:
G
E
Ab
F
Bb
Tuning:Standard Tuning (EADGBE)Capo:+0fret
Start Jamming...
So in this lesson I'm going to talk about holding the pick and a particular picking technique for the bazooki.
A very particular picking technique.
I've learned this fairly recently.
I used to hold the bazooki pick with my two fingers like this.
[E] And I used to play like that.
[D] That's a guitar playing style.
It has advantages in the guitar because it keeps [E] the pick very loose in your hand.
[Ab] Which allows you to do things like swooping, arpeggios, and there's all sorts of [G] techniques that facilitate that.
And so many guitars do hold the pick between their thumb and index finger.
[N] But for the bazooki, the standard technique is to actually hold it like this in your hand.
So that you're holding the bazooki pick.
If you see it, it's nested between my index finger rolled up and my thumb.
And I've just got it a little jammed in there like this.
It takes a little bit of practice to hold it right.
You don't want to hold it too tight, but you do want to have a firm grip on it.
And sometimes I actually need to get it right, I'll use my other finger to kind of nest it in there at the right length.
So that's the technique.
The strumming technique, again with the guitar, [Ab] you might use your fingers to do the strumming.
And you might brace [N] your hand against the actual front of the instrument.
And then pluck with your fingers.
But with the bazooki, most of the action is in your wrist.
It's supposed to be in your wrist most of the time.
If you watch good bazooki players, this is where the bulk of the plucking strength comes from.
It's from the wrist.
It gives a particular tone, an important tone.
And it also gives you more strength and more control than fingers.
Fingers are [Abm] fine with an instrument with a single [G] string.
But when you've got these paired strings, [N]
I think the rationale is you don't get the same quality of tone.
You don't get the same clarity of the note and so on if you're holding it that way.
So you have to hold it like this.
This is probably certainly the standard for bazooki players.
Now the technique for plucking, I want to just look at one particular technique.
And this is a style of picking that you hear played by Marcos Vavakaris,
who is an important influence in bazooki Greek music, especially Baroque music.
So his style is very [F] distinct and you can hear [Bb] it.
You pretty well can identify his playing by [G] this one thing, this one feature of his playing.
Nowadays lots of people do it, but back in the day with his recordings,
you could tell it was Vavakaris playing just because of this technique.
It's somewhat subtle.
And I'll just play it for you first.
So I'm just going to pick a couple notes here.
[N]
Now, if you listen carefully, you're hearing a particular slight difference.
I'm plucking the same note and I'm plucking it in triplets, basically three.
And the triplets [G] are one up and two down,
[Bbm] where the second [G] down is a little bit stronger than the first down.
So it's
And [N] this is a very Vavakaris style.
If you wanted to play music in his style, [G] you don't just go
[Bb] It's [A] just playing those [G] triplets.
One, two, three, one, two, three.
That's very casual.
It doesn't have the right accent.
His style is like this.
And he gets at that style by plucking, pulling up on the first and then down twice in a row.
So up, down, down, down, up, down, down.
So
[F] [Fm]
[G]
[F] So that's the Vavakaris picking style.
He doesn't pick every note like that, but when he's playing his little triplets,
his three notes together, that's typically the way he plays.
And it's a very good, kind of old-school Araberica bouzouki [Dm] playing.
And I think for a three-course bouzouki like this, it's a good [Ab] technique to know.
So [E] it's a good starting technique.
A very particular picking technique.
I've learned this fairly recently.
I used to hold the bazooki pick with my two fingers like this.
[E] And I used to play like that.
[D] That's a guitar playing style.
It has advantages in the guitar because it keeps [E] the pick very loose in your hand.
[Ab] Which allows you to do things like swooping, arpeggios, and there's all sorts of [G] techniques that facilitate that.
And so many guitars do hold the pick between their thumb and index finger.
[N] But for the bazooki, the standard technique is to actually hold it like this in your hand.
So that you're holding the bazooki pick.
If you see it, it's nested between my index finger rolled up and my thumb.
And I've just got it a little jammed in there like this.
It takes a little bit of practice to hold it right.
You don't want to hold it too tight, but you do want to have a firm grip on it.
And sometimes I actually need to get it right, I'll use my other finger to kind of nest it in there at the right length.
So that's the technique.
The strumming technique, again with the guitar, [Ab] you might use your fingers to do the strumming.
And you might brace [N] your hand against the actual front of the instrument.
And then pluck with your fingers.
But with the bazooki, most of the action is in your wrist.
It's supposed to be in your wrist most of the time.
If you watch good bazooki players, this is where the bulk of the plucking strength comes from.
It's from the wrist.
It gives a particular tone, an important tone.
And it also gives you more strength and more control than fingers.
Fingers are [Abm] fine with an instrument with a single [G] string.
But when you've got these paired strings, [N]
I think the rationale is you don't get the same quality of tone.
You don't get the same clarity of the note and so on if you're holding it that way.
So you have to hold it like this.
This is probably certainly the standard for bazooki players.
Now the technique for plucking, I want to just look at one particular technique.
And this is a style of picking that you hear played by Marcos Vavakaris,
who is an important influence in bazooki Greek music, especially Baroque music.
So his style is very [F] distinct and you can hear [Bb] it.
You pretty well can identify his playing by [G] this one thing, this one feature of his playing.
Nowadays lots of people do it, but back in the day with his recordings,
you could tell it was Vavakaris playing just because of this technique.
It's somewhat subtle.
And I'll just play it for you first.
So I'm just going to pick a couple notes here.
[N]
Now, if you listen carefully, you're hearing a particular slight difference.
I'm plucking the same note and I'm plucking it in triplets, basically three.
And the triplets [G] are one up and two down,
[Bbm] where the second [G] down is a little bit stronger than the first down.
So it's
And [N] this is a very Vavakaris style.
If you wanted to play music in his style, [G] you don't just go
[Bb] It's [A] just playing those [G] triplets.
One, two, three, one, two, three.
That's very casual.
It doesn't have the right accent.
His style is like this.
And he gets at that style by plucking, pulling up on the first and then down twice in a row.
So up, down, down, down, up, down, down.
So
[F] [Fm]
[G]
[F] So that's the Vavakaris picking style.
He doesn't pick every note like that, but when he's playing his little triplets,
his three notes together, that's typically the way he plays.
And it's a very good, kind of old-school Araberica bouzouki [Dm] playing.
And I think for a three-course bouzouki like this, it's a good [Ab] technique to know.
So [E] it's a good starting technique.
Key:
G
E
Ab
F
Bb
G
E
Ab
_ So in this lesson I'm going to talk about holding the pick and a particular picking technique for the bazooki.
A very particular picking technique.
I've learned this fairly recently.
I used to hold the bazooki pick with my two fingers like this.
[E] And I used to play like that. _
[D] That's a guitar playing style.
It has advantages in the guitar because it keeps [E] the pick very loose in your hand.
[Ab] Which allows you to do things like swooping, arpeggios, and there's all sorts of [G] techniques that facilitate that.
And so many guitars do hold the pick between their thumb and index finger.
[N] But for the bazooki, the standard technique is to actually hold it like this in your hand.
So that you're holding the bazooki pick.
If you see it, it's nested between my index finger rolled up and my thumb.
And I've just got it a little jammed in there like this.
It takes a little bit of practice to hold it right.
You don't want to hold it too tight, but you do want to have a firm grip on it.
And sometimes I actually need to get it right, I'll use my other finger to kind of nest it in there at the right length.
So that's the technique.
The strumming technique, again with the guitar, [Ab] you might use your fingers to do the strumming.
And you might brace [N] your hand against the actual front of the instrument.
And then pluck with your fingers.
But with the bazooki, most of the action is in your wrist.
It's supposed to be in your wrist most of the time.
If you watch good bazooki players, this is where the bulk of _ the plucking strength comes from.
It's from the wrist.
It gives a particular tone, an important tone.
And it also gives you more strength and more control than fingers.
Fingers are [Abm] fine with an instrument with a single [G] string.
But when you've got these paired strings, [N]
I think the rationale is you don't get the same quality of tone.
You don't get the same clarity of the note and so on if you're holding it that way.
So you have to hold it like this.
This is probably certainly the standard for bazooki players.
Now the technique for plucking, I want to just look at one particular technique.
And this is a style of picking that you hear played by Marcos Vavakaris,
who is an important influence in bazooki Greek music, especially Baroque music.
So his style is very [F] distinct and you can hear [Bb] it.
You pretty well can identify his playing by [G] this one thing, this one feature of his playing.
Nowadays lots of people do it, but back in the day with his recordings,
you could tell it was Vavakaris playing just because of this technique.
It's somewhat subtle.
And I'll just play it for you first.
So I'm just going to pick a couple notes here. _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [N] _
Now, if you listen carefully, you're hearing a particular slight difference.
I'm plucking the same note and I'm plucking it in triplets, basically three.
And the triplets [G] are one up and two down,
[Bbm] where the second [G] down is a little bit stronger than the first down.
So it's_
And _ _ _ _ _ _ [N] this is a very Vavakaris style.
If you wanted to play music in his style, [G] you don't just go_
[Bb] It's [A] just playing those [G] triplets.
One, two, three, one, two, three.
That's very casual.
It doesn't have the right accent.
His style is like this.
_ And he gets at that style by plucking, pulling up on the first and then down twice in a row.
So up, down, down, down, _ _ up, down, down.
So_ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [F] _ _ _ [Fm] _
_ _ _ _ _ [G] _ _ _
[F] So that's the Vavakaris picking style.
He doesn't pick every note like that, but when he's playing his little triplets,
his three notes together, that's typically the way he plays.
And it's a very good, kind of old-school Araberica bouzouki [Dm] playing.
And I think for a three-course bouzouki like this, it's a good [Ab] technique to know.
So [E] it's a good starting technique.
A very particular picking technique.
I've learned this fairly recently.
I used to hold the bazooki pick with my two fingers like this.
[E] And I used to play like that. _
[D] That's a guitar playing style.
It has advantages in the guitar because it keeps [E] the pick very loose in your hand.
[Ab] Which allows you to do things like swooping, arpeggios, and there's all sorts of [G] techniques that facilitate that.
And so many guitars do hold the pick between their thumb and index finger.
[N] But for the bazooki, the standard technique is to actually hold it like this in your hand.
So that you're holding the bazooki pick.
If you see it, it's nested between my index finger rolled up and my thumb.
And I've just got it a little jammed in there like this.
It takes a little bit of practice to hold it right.
You don't want to hold it too tight, but you do want to have a firm grip on it.
And sometimes I actually need to get it right, I'll use my other finger to kind of nest it in there at the right length.
So that's the technique.
The strumming technique, again with the guitar, [Ab] you might use your fingers to do the strumming.
And you might brace [N] your hand against the actual front of the instrument.
And then pluck with your fingers.
But with the bazooki, most of the action is in your wrist.
It's supposed to be in your wrist most of the time.
If you watch good bazooki players, this is where the bulk of _ the plucking strength comes from.
It's from the wrist.
It gives a particular tone, an important tone.
And it also gives you more strength and more control than fingers.
Fingers are [Abm] fine with an instrument with a single [G] string.
But when you've got these paired strings, [N]
I think the rationale is you don't get the same quality of tone.
You don't get the same clarity of the note and so on if you're holding it that way.
So you have to hold it like this.
This is probably certainly the standard for bazooki players.
Now the technique for plucking, I want to just look at one particular technique.
And this is a style of picking that you hear played by Marcos Vavakaris,
who is an important influence in bazooki Greek music, especially Baroque music.
So his style is very [F] distinct and you can hear [Bb] it.
You pretty well can identify his playing by [G] this one thing, this one feature of his playing.
Nowadays lots of people do it, but back in the day with his recordings,
you could tell it was Vavakaris playing just because of this technique.
It's somewhat subtle.
And I'll just play it for you first.
So I'm just going to pick a couple notes here. _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [N] _
Now, if you listen carefully, you're hearing a particular slight difference.
I'm plucking the same note and I'm plucking it in triplets, basically three.
And the triplets [G] are one up and two down,
[Bbm] where the second [G] down is a little bit stronger than the first down.
So it's_
And _ _ _ _ _ _ [N] this is a very Vavakaris style.
If you wanted to play music in his style, [G] you don't just go_
[Bb] It's [A] just playing those [G] triplets.
One, two, three, one, two, three.
That's very casual.
It doesn't have the right accent.
His style is like this.
_ And he gets at that style by plucking, pulling up on the first and then down twice in a row.
So up, down, down, down, _ _ up, down, down.
So_ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [F] _ _ _ [Fm] _
_ _ _ _ _ [G] _ _ _
[F] So that's the Vavakaris picking style.
He doesn't pick every note like that, but when he's playing his little triplets,
his three notes together, that's typically the way he plays.
And it's a very good, kind of old-school Araberica bouzouki [Dm] playing.
And I think for a three-course bouzouki like this, it's a good [Ab] technique to know.
So [E] it's a good starting technique.