Eric Johnson Lesson: Rolling Threes (Cascade, Chapter 12)

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An ingenious EJ pattern lets us ripple upward through the pentatonic scale. Watch the entire 6-hour Cascade seminar: troygrady.com/...

[@MichaelGuy]

Probably the best guitar and music theory educator of our time.

[@dananthony6258]

Eric Johnson is such a genius. Hes in a class completely by himself.

[@LeighGhostTao]

Beautiful, this is my favourite type of faster playing. Articulate, maintaining strong rhythmic integrity and note seperation, ballsy, interesting intervallic leaps etc. It may not be as 'fast' as the high-gain single string and 3NPS crowd, but it sounds so much better I think.

[@reaganbrowne6373]

Agree 100%

[@SpedSpedding]

Just said out loud... “This guy’s a dude.” Outstanding information and delivery.

[@GuitarJesse7]

Your analysis is great. I’ve been a guitarist and teacher for a long time, but EJ’s cascading with economy picking has always been a struggle for me to master. Thanks!

[@dmueller78]

I keep watching these CC videos, working for a few months on pieces, then coming back and discovering even more in them. It's truly amazing and transformative. Very thankful for these videos.

[@chrismcdermott7766]

I can't believe how much you just helped me clean up and clarify things I have been doing for years but didn't understand how to uncomplicate it. Your research and teaching style is absolutely stellar. Thank You!

[@juddaustin399]

I stumbled across this vid on a whim, and I really appreciate your insight and expertise. it illuminates something I might not have tried to accomplish otherwise.

[@jenyminor]

Troy...you rock! It's awesome that you share all this wonderful information on guitar playing. WOW. YOU are amazing! God Bless.

[@troygrady]

jenyminor thanks for watching; glad you're enjoying the videos!

[@dadude7]

Christ Troy. Where would my guitar playing be without your videos. Amazing. Thanks for your effort.

[@JustinArmstrongsite]

Great lesson. I'm loving all the Eric Johnson stuff. I've never felt more comfortable playing pentatonics.

[@guts2112]

Troy, I love your channel! As a "self-taught" guitar player, finding quality insight into advanced techniques can be very challenging. Your Cracking the Code series is exactly what I've been looking for. This video is no different. Thanks for the demonstrations and help in bettering my technique.

[@troygrady]

Thanks Jordan!

[@sotrder]

Dude, you are awesome! Thank you, Troy, for this eloquent and detailed (and technical) look into these licks. I really appreciate stuff like this put out there for us 'laymen' to learn from. And though I've been around for a while and watched a lot of stuff, I feel like I've had a breath of fresh air watching you. So, thanks! :)

[@da5idnz]

This is all _way_ beyond me, but I still enjoy watching it.

[@scottduke9713]

Wow. Cracking The Code is the best analysis and Troy Grady's playing is awesome

[@PoppysGuitar]

This is perhaps Troy's greatest lecture.

[@VGMrawk]

I just mastered how Yngwie butters his toast... now i have to learn Eric's!?? this is getting complicated.

[@hectorgonzalez9170]

I think I figure out twinkle twinkle little star. With no help. Lol

[@stevedoingstuff3960]

Hey Troy - I am really liking your videos so far. This is really great work. One of the best artifacts of all of this analysis is that you are basically developing a taxonomy/dictionary of guitar lick concepts. This vocabulary takes some complex passage and reduces it to a single word. Brilliant!

[@miaouew]

Troy, you're one of my favorite KZbin guitar teachers. The way you see music and the way you explain certain things makes absolute sense to me in my head like you are saying things that I am thinking but don't know how to pick the words for. I don't usually compliment others but I am glad you have a channel.

[@r.tack676]

One word for your playing and teaching method, Awesome

[@manimusicka2]

Thank you so much for sharing your valuable experience and knowledge!

[@DanElder1976]

after hours of searching, the 1st clip is from Western Flyer about 2:30 in

[@ryanirish4968]

How am I just now watching your first video? Amazing teaching style, amazing camera work, and great technique...simply awesome. Thank you for taking the time to put these together, what an outstanding resource!!

[@takeuchitb007]

What a great in depth lesson , Troy your attention to detail is fantastic, you just dont see many videos like this at all with this level of explanation and understanding of whats really going on.. Im a long time player myself, I grew up playing guitar in the late 80s and 90s. I can fully appreciate the work you have put forth for this kind of stuff.. amazing man also your technique is incredible! cheers

[@troygrady]

takeuchitb007 thanks!

[@carlosclaptrix]

I love your way of using words. Nearly lyrical, at the same time very exact! Great!

[@bems5066]

Really amazing works you've made and amazing guitarist you are !

[@troygrady]

+Benoit Signorini Thanks Benoit!

[@OnlyBARKMATTER]

best guitar teacher on youtube! Keep up the good work.

[@seanpatrick03]

Thanks a lot for this! Helped me out so much. Always wondered what little trick he used to do this. Great playing and tone :)

[@Sarahbuildsstepsequencers]

Troy, your knowledge is astounding! I see you as a sort of forensic guitar scientist!

[@rguitar87]

Thanks for the videos, Troy. Your discussion of Yngwie and Eric utilizing homologous mechanics reminds me of Newton and Leibniz both arriving at the discovery of calculus!

[@Thayne2222]

Whoah Troy talking about left hand technique?? Wild. Love it

[@KingTabor]

No rest stroke at 6:48, your 'sweep' is already "stopping" in the air... man eventually you will outplay the subjects. Awesome Troy!

[@danhall716]

I was just thinking the same thing...Troy is outplaying the guitarists he's studying!

[@mickminn1071]

i love the terminology, "Finger swap " I figured that out too , it works ring /middle OR ring /pinky , even pink/ ring , depending on direction , and position . I think it IS important to have terminology, to explain these rules of thumb

[@alfredoperez2375]

Troy- Great stuff as usual but did you notice that Eric is throwing is throwing in a F# on the last string? G - F# - E. Probably a pull-off. Let me know what you think!

[@alejandroosuna3169]

yes, there is an F#

[@mrcali68]

SUPERB instruction! Thank you so much! This helped me immensely!

[@frozencons]

Fantastic work per your usual!

[@horganism]

Really enjoying these. I bought the Cascade pack (and the Antigravity one a while back) and am going through them learning the examples. It's crazy how difficult I find 'unlearning' the way I'd naturally pick them though sometimes, particularly the pentatonic stuff which is so ingrained in my playing. I guess my playing is a bit of a hodge podge of legato/economy picking/string hopping approaches so trying to teach my right hand the more efficient ways sometimes is really hard! I have to keep slowing down and checking that my right hand isn't falling into it's old habits as I speed up! On the plus side after I've been woodshedding this kind of thing for a while and I just relax and solo over something I find all kinds of new things sneaking into my playing phrasing wise. For someone who's been playing for 30ish years that's very exciting :) Keep up the great work!

[@troygrady]

Horganism Thanks for picking up our stuff! And glad you're seeing results. Re: "unlearning", I like to think that it's more like the other way around. Everything you already know just makes the next thing that much easier. I didn't unlearn Italian (or English for that matter!) to make room for Spanish. Yes there is the occasional confusion. But the advantage in terms of overlap is massive compared to someone starting from scratch.

[@horganism]

***** Welcome! The videos are really great to watch and your passion for this subject really comes across in them. I just got the Inside the Volcano series the other day too and am really enjoying that too. Re Unlearning, I agree, it's just tricky sometimes for me to play the pentatonic stuff in the EJ series with the picking you demonstrate as I'm used to playing them in a different (less efficient!) way. Ironically the Yngwie stuff I find easier to learn because I have no in-built habits for playing that kind of thing. I'll keep at both though as I can definitely see the advantage to the DWPS method of playing. Part of why I started working on my picking at all is that I've been trying to master an arrangement of Vivaldis Summer Presto, funny thing is when I try to convert what I was doing with strict alternate picking to the 'Yngwie system' of using legato and sweeping to keep the pick strokes even it's not only easier, it also sounds better! Lesson learned!

[@TheTinMan123]

Appreciate you gettin back that's a fair comment, I love guitar all types of Styles etc your a great player, I guess I'm old School 🎸🎸🎸🎸

[@troygrady]

MrPerfectfeet No worries. Whatever works! That's what it's all about.

[@elbanj]

I love these videos. awesome work troy. I'll shred yet!

[@tandybare]

after studying EJ/Malmsteen techniques; I never in my wildest dreams imagined my left hand would be trying to catch up with the right.

[@nokomisnichols]

Fantastic man. Sounds fanfreakintastic.

[@villepaasimaa7768]

So well analyzed and taught! 👍

[@howiboy]

what a beast you are Troy

[@osix1]

just purchased season 2 pass.! keep up the good work troy.!

[@rockinroy]

i am envious in your ability slow it down with your special equipment... great. i wish i could see cliffs of dover in slow motion like that. great video as always. you are great and very analytically gifted as well as a fantastic guitarist. i think he plays fret 15 14 and 12 instead of dropping from 15 to 12 at 1:03 but it sounds good either way.

[@DaaWalker]

I think your videos are GREAT!

[@Nik930714]

I really love how you reffer to 180 as "well ... it usually not that fast", and i am just sigging here at 185 ish at eighteenth notes being like "DAMN YOU METTALICA, i wanna play the intro of Master of Puppets"

[@tbagsha]

very nice video! love your guitar!

[@dreamawaythemiles]

Struggling with this, but I can't imagine it could be explained more clearly - thank you!

[@mrbsred1]

I think it's amazing what you do! I will say that, I would much prefer to see just you going through advanced scale runs. Still using all the resources; camera, slo mos of different techniques, etc. I realise these vids are like mini-documentaries and is very original, but many others (including myself) would learn your knowledge a lot faster. Anyway, that's not to take anything away from your hard work. It is remarkable :-)

[@TommyBrothers75]

Great Lesson!!

[@Xubuntu47]

This made me dust off my guitar. Whattaya know, some Bach that I had pretty much given up on years ago suddenly seems playable. Also, remembered I'd heard something about Gypsy jazz and down strokes. A bit of searching, and yes, switch strings after downstrokes, sweep picking on arpeggios. Other things are different, of course, and I don't know about the slanting, but the mechanics have a lot in common with this. Thanks for your years of toil extracting these secrets, and your great production values on the videos; I spent hours watching today. BTW I remember taping that same Austin City Limits episode. Now what seemed superhuman is merely astounding.

[@troygrady]

+Xubuntu47 Indeed, the gypsies are downward pickslanters and you can check out some of our Joscho Stephan clips here on the channel. Thanks for watching!

[@rybolia]

Hey Troy love your detailed videos man. I always wanted to learn the beginning improvisation of the cliffs cover performance. It's like a series of ambient/melodic chords that sound so nice. By any chance to you have a video on that or possibly make one? Cheers :D

[@69nukeee]

Killer as usual! I've never been an alternate picker my hole life, but CTC videos actually helped me going through some since I'm quite comfortable with sweeping. Thank you Troy, your work is amazing ;) I was wondering if you were ever going to tackle some of Zakk Wylde stuff: he definitely picks everything, but since he picks very hard and adds all of those crazy pinch harmonics I'd be super curious to know your analysis!

[@meltring]

Troy, you're an incredible teacher. I just discovered your videos and I'm ready to dive in. I'm a details person, so this is perfect for me. The slow motion close up videos are great. Question: I've been playing for 40 years and have a habit of using my pinky in the box form. I'm noticing a lot of fast players don't use their pinky unless stretching a good distance. Will breaking this habit increase my speed?

[@mikecross9479]

Great lesson!!

[@LifesonPetrucci]

For someone to go through the time and study Eric's technique like this is just amazing. I used to replay and replay these video clips trying to figure out some of these runs. Very awesome. Is this a KZbin lesson that's free or do you offer more of these EJ videos somewhere else? Thanks

[@TahaNasser]

God this is incredible!

[@chrisdaviesguitar]

Incredible skills here

[@davidatyson]

Do u have any more economy picking lessons??? This was awesome

[@rustyshackleford4743]

Troy have you ever gone in depth on how to hold the pick? I know that seems very simple but I think the little details matter when applying pick-slanting.

[@puffnightynight]

Incredible!...

[@yougotmikelopez]

Would love to hear this guy break down some Tony MacAlpine

[@howiboy]

Troy is a real guitar hero

[@Nilli4rock]

Even though these videoes are way out of my legaue, they're still extremely enjoyable to watch! Will you be doing some covering of Shawn Lane's style/type of playing? That would be amazing. Keep them coming!

[@dimevh84]

I think season 2 episode 5 of cracking the code will be going into detail about Shawn Lane's picking technique. Im really looking forward to that one myself :)

[@Nilli4rock]

si dog Really? That would be truly amazing! Shawn's picking style was quite unique, combined with his blazing left hand hammer-on / pull-off techniques

[@dimevh84]

Yea man absolutely, Shawn was the best. To check out the content of future episodes just go on the CTC website, its all listed under the season 2 page

[@hairlessdog101]

si dog Hes prolly gonna talk about the ascending 5's sweep thing he did and upward pick slant snap things

[@victorkrothe4332]

NOTHING is out of your league. You just have to want it bad enough.

[@wilbstrange2]

Troy...can you tell me how your running the delay and reverb settings in stereo because its a great mix! I want that setting for my lead playing!

[@KOLDBLU3ST33L]

Troy, 1. Your lessons are very helpful, thanks! 2. Your tone is killer. Rig/settings run down PLEASE 😎.

[@phabi0]

Is this going to reach Frank Gambale, eventually?

[@KingTabor]

not THIS because FG is a 2-way pickslanter

[@phabi0]

Marcus Vinnas yes I meant "this" as in "this series", not this technique.

[@KingTabor]

TheFabio oh yes sorry

[@joebarker7643]

I love your videos!

[@evalex71]

Great lesson and killer tone, man. What are you playing through?

[@christographer70]

GREAT lesson .......guy reminds me of jay leno for some reason..

[@Composer19691]

Hey Troy...Is John McLaughlin a downward pick slanter? Would love to see you break down Chris Poland's unique style of picking as well. Great stuff man!!

[@troygrady]

***** Upward! We cover him in Antigravity.

[@jeffhudson9130]

+Troy Grady Is it just me misshearing? When you slow down the Eric Johnson ACL vid, he is clearly hitting the F# note as well (1st string 14th Fret) And Troy Grady is simply skipping this note at going from G to E whereas Eric does G to F# To E. I hear this run all the time in erics playing but troy always skips the F# he just goes from 15th fret to 12th fret whereas Eric often goes 15the fret, 14th fret then 12th fret. Which totally takes away the down up I know but I believe he just pulls it off then picks upstroke on the E(12thFret.

[@troygrady]

Hi Jeff! You're not mishearing, but that note really isn't part of the pattern we're talking about here, which mainly concerns string switching. However, we do address Eric's use of the maj7 / min9 type sounds he gets with this note in other chapters in the Cascade seminar, since as you point out it's something he does all the time and it's a signature sound for him.

[@jeffhudson9130]

Okay and is that in the masters in mechanics section only??

[@jeffhudson9130]

oh never mind I answered my own question by checking out the website again. Well..... Guess I do have my job back again so I guess Ibetter Subscribe again!!!:-)

[@TCMx3]

14 December 1988. Still working out what Eric was doing nearly 30 years later.

[@stevesuv]

Thanks.

[@parkerdoolin6007]

You said "with how long it takes to learn stuff in general" how long should a riff like this take to learn to get up 170-180 bpm

[@turdferguson5857]

So COOL

[@pepeowen]

I understand this is a sample of the seminar. Are these licks on tabs for subscribers or are you meant to follow video and audio only?

[@69erthx1138]

This is why I've always told players that get decent a 3 string sweeps and get anxious to go to more strings, "you have a universe at your finger tips, just integrate with with your prior technique."

[@5urg3x]

Is this what Guthrie uses in the Regret #9 solo?

[@renemarino404]

you should analize guthrie and kiko loureiro and richie kotzen

[@twoamps]

If you don't mind telling,,what is your pick up set up on that Gibson??

[@omegagreg]

Thanks Tony - great dissections as always. What is that cool Gibson you're playing?

[@boruchburnham3282]

It's a Gibson Nighthawk.

[@bagleyoutdoors3892]

Where’s the tab?

[@funginum]

amazing

[@MrMacGaunaa]

"The metronome intensitive crowd" :)

[@Guitar387]

Is there a tab for the whole lick including the defending part

[@alejandroblanco2071]

Discovery channel should include these series in their show.

[@jannenilssonnilsson]

Wish there were tabs for the licks he's playing

[@AnthonyUFOLundell]

Hi. This 3 pattern per swing (down / up /down; next string down) would that be going up the scale.. And do you reverse that descending? Up / down / up; next string up? Sorry if you explained it and I missed it.. Thanks

[@checherocka]

While descending Eric Johnson uses legato to make the number of picked notes even.

[@sethcollins893]

Eric "Ultra condensed molecule" Johnson

[@stepitup5409]

best Ive hears a Nighthawk sound!

[@ether_lana3921]

I;m sure Bonomassa has watched this video for some of his runs too, they are identical

[@Dedonarivl96]

is that a gibson with a *single coil*

[@petresilegov2581]

Kyle Brady there is a Gibson Stratocaster actually! It belongs to yngwie

[@jerrymorganjr]

Yes! That's a Nighthawk I think. It's got a body contour and a 5 way like a strat. Very cool

[@arch8295]

Does anyone know what EJ song this is when he is discussing the technique?

[@utubehound69]

Thats a Real Blues Hawk I haven't seen one of those in years, IDK what they didn't catch on? You Like it? Whats the most unique thing about the Blues Hawk? Thx for ALL yer hard work.

[@troygrady]

Watchman4u Hi! It's actually a Nighthawk. I picked it up while looking for guitars with smaller bodies, which I find more comfortable. The Nighthawk is a weird guitar for Gibson - 25.5" scale length, five-way selector, it can sound very Stratty in certain pickup positions, which I think is why some players like it.

[@utubehound69]

***** That's right Robbie Rowen played one, the kid from Dio.

[@marcharrad3732]

Troy Grady Hi have you ever played a Patrick Eggle, I’m not the tallest of guys but they are small bodied very comfortable, with 22 or 24 frets and awesome to play. Comes with or without a whammy. I have 3. Awesome videos by the way...

[@PNW_Fiddle]

Super video. hey, you could do videos for Shamwow!

[@troygrady]

Pshaw. I will never wear the telemarketer headset microphone!

[@PNW_Fiddle]

Well, If you plugged it, I'd buy it. You're very convincing and enthusiastic. But yeah, headset is not a s cool as your guitar.

[@AlejandroGonzalez-wo5fk]

Why do guitarist tend to obviate their pinky when theyre shredding?

[@Shutupletstalk]

So sad these videos don't have millions of views! This videos are AMAZING and if you really give a damn, they're worth a watch even if you don't take any techniques from it.

[@mickminn1071]

that lick he's playing is a 10 note pattern 2 groups of 5