Guitar Techniques
As important as it is to have a good song to play in the first place, proper use of guitar technique just adds an entirely new layer to a guitarists playing. You can play all the correct notes at the correct time, but that can sound pretty bland. Learning all the techniques available, and taking the time to properly learn them can make a huge difference in a guitarist’s playing.
Most of these types of techniques get labeled as “lead guitar techniques,” but the truth is that every guitarist should have these as part of their repertoire. There isn’t one technique mentioned below that can’t be found in a rhythm part in a number of different songs. Even if you only play rhythm guitar for a band, it is still important to have a firm grasp of how to use these techniques. You may use them less often, but when there are instances they do come up, you’re playing will sound all the better for it.
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Hammer-Ons and Pull-Offs
Hammer-ons and pull-offs are two methods to the same general technique. If you want to play two or more notes on the same string, rather than fretting and picking each one individually, the guitarist literally sounds each note with their fretting hand and skips picking the note each time. If the note is higher on the string, then the guitarist hammers-on the new note by fretting it with enough force to sound the new note. The opposite of this is pull-offs, which are used to move back to a lower note. Before doing a pull-off, the new note must already be fretted. The name is a misnomer, you don’t simply pull off the note, you actually pluck the string with the fretting hand as you pull your finger away in order to sound the note.
These are very useful for rapid sequences of notes that are close together. When done properly, the difference in sound between using hammer-ons and pull-offs isn’t very different from playing each one individually. As you get better at this technique, you will likely find it second nature to use this technique without ever thinking about it.
Bending
Bending literally involves pushing a ringing string along a fret to change the pitch. Doing this changes the tension on the string, and allows a smooth transition from one note to the other. Unlike fretting strings, you are moving through the microtones between the two notes, which can be quite audible in slower bends. You can also unbend a string back to the original note for the opposite effect. A lot of lead riffs and quite a few rhythm riffs are pretty heavily based on this technique.
This can be a little tricky of a technique to pick up because there is an audible component to it. You do need to be able to hear when the string has reached the pitch you want when bending. If you don’t hit it exactly, then the note will either sound flat or sharp depending on if you under or over bend the string. This can be a more frustrating technique to first learn, but it really makes a huge difference in your playing, and you will be very glad for the effort you put into it once you actually learn to bend the string properly. Once you have this technique down, you probably won’t remember why you used to think it was so hard.