That video on fast, precise tremolo is the best. It really doesn't matter so much about the pick as the technique. But I say that as someone who doesn't play any tremolo but used that video to try to be able to play faster in general.
That video on fast, precise tremolo is the best. It really doesn't matter so much about the pick as the technique. But I say that as someone who doesn't play any tremolo but used that video to try to be able to play faster in general.
It's been years since I've played any tremolo. We've been down this road before, but I don't find it useful for playing Irish/Scottish trad on mandolin.
Actually it's a bit beyond "not useful" and more like "non-idiomatic" to my ears, because no other instrument in this genre plays a continuous stream of staccato notes like that. The music is based on the sound of smooth, unbroken sustain from pipes, flute, whistle, fiddle, concertina, and so on. Nothing broken and jumpy like tremolo in that group.
To my ears (and just personal opinion), using tremolo for Irish traditional music sounds like Classical or Italian music trying to sneak in through the back door. Opinions will vary on this, of course.
Thanks - You might play one of the genres that indeed rarely uses tremolo....but in some ways, you make up for it with the various picking ornaments that correspond to the rolls and cuts and cranns and such pipers, fiddlers and flute players use in ITM.
From my experience Irish mandolin and banjo seem to share the same ornamentations style....no tremolo indeed, but lots of triplet and 4-let groups of picking "rolls".
Where Italian music sneaks in the backdoor is Scottish fiddling, where there indeed has been Italian violin influence.
I pretty much only play old time music. There are a few tunes where I think tremolo would actually be very appropriate, but mostly I never find it necessary. For those tunes where it would make sense to use it, I guess I feel too self-conscious to do it. Like I'd be showing off or making a scene or drawing way too much attention to myself. A moral failing, I suppose. Maybe if I was a man I'd feel less self-conscious about drawing attention to myself.
I actually do not know any mandolin players who play tremolo in old time music. The most expert one in my group will usually just strum or shuffle a full chord. First time I heard Kenny Hall play I thought, gahh, make it stop. All that tremolo is really annoying. Whatever. I've found a tune or two where it works, but I rarely do it.
Kenny Hall used a specific measured tremolo that certainly was not like an Italian tremolo!
It sounded to me like it was a rhythmic element, not a sustain-type tremolo.
Other than the fact that Kenny used a bowl back mandolin, our concepts of what was good mandolin playing were quite different.
At tempos from about 80 to 130 Bpm, sextuplets (d-u-d-u-d-u) seem to work best for me too.BTW, if you're working through the method described in the video (four-to-a-beat going to eight), I'd stop midway at six-to-a-beat. That's a standard Monroe-ism!
If the tempo is an Adagio, I might be able to squeeze four d-u into the beat, for an Allegro or Vivace, two d-u might be sufficient to create a kind of tremolo, but Andante, Moderato or Allegretto seem to work best with three down-strokes, each followed by an upstroke.
At least, that's the way how I approach practicing tremolo.
When I play it, I rather concentrate on the expressiveness instead of thinking about maths.
Cheating yourself - I agree that tremolo is easier with round edge, but I'm not about to start spinning pick in my fingers to different edges midway through a song.
John Moore (California and Bluegrass Etc) uses them extensively.
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