GUEST COLUMNIST:

JOHN DELCALZO

Legato Techniques



Hi, my name is John Delcalzo and I am a 16-year old shredder from Alliance, Ohio. I have been playing for a couple of years now and some of my influences are Nightwish, Stratovarius, Symphony X, Sonata Arctica, Michael Angelo, Buckethead, and Dream Theater. For my first column at Chops From Hell I would like to cover the legato technique. This will involve legato scale runs as well as two hand tapping arpeggios and a multi-finger tapping exercise. If you've got any questions or comments you can e-mail me at johndelcalzo@hotmail.com.

Example 1 - Example 1 is a simple E minor tapping arpeggio on the high E string. It is easy to work up to speed and sounds impressive when played fast.


Example 2 - This example is a simple legato pattern in the key of A minor. It sounds cool when played legato or with alternate picking and is easy to work up to speed.


Example 3 - This lick is an example of a seven string legato run up the A Aeolian mode. When playing this lick make sure you can play it cleanly before you try speeding it up.


Example 4 - The final lick is a multi-finger tapping run that moves up the neck chromatically. Buckethead uses a run very similar to this one in his song “The Ballad of Buckethead”.