TECHNIQUE FOCUS

Achieving independence

The key to the tapping techniques covered in this lesson is independence of both hands. Just like a pianist, your aim should be for your tapping (picking) hand to be able to play anything your fretting hand can. A great workout for this is to try playing scales and arpeggios using only your picking hand. One aspect of your picking hand technique requires a little thought, though: are you going to use a mixture of hammer-ons and pull-offs, or purely hammered notes? I personally take the approach of using both, but there are some amazing tappers who use a hammer-only technique with dazzling effects.