Mark Knopfler's Picking Technique - Sultans Of Swing analysis

What a tune, what a guitar player. Yeah, Mark Knopfler, right, so we had this, uh, you called it chicken picking earlier. Yeah. It's kind of, it's kind of country. Yeah, I think he was, he was influenced by a lot by Chet Atkins, I believe, um, guitar of my limited history of Mark Knopfler, but um, but yeah, I think he only used a, he used a pick for rhythm stuff, you know. But it definitely gave him that distinct sound. And for those, in case you have no idea what chicken picking is, but if you think there's your string, and then you put your, your finger and thumb on it, um, so if I'm there, so, it's on, like, so, and then my thumb will pick the string, and then you get the. And then, and then your first single would then pluck it up. Uh, and. Do that kind of stuff, and then he, no, er Dire Straits was influenced from Clapton, and Clapton got influenced by Dire Straits on the. Absolutely. The lay down kind of sadly stuff, but one great thing with Mark Knopfler is that he would incorporate. Uh, arpeggios, wouldn't he, absolutely, so there's the swings full of them. Yeah, so we'll take, you know, a, a regular kind of Chuck Berry influence. Kind of shape minor pentatonic, uh D minor pentatonic. There he's got that F triad, an SU F major chords, and his phone. He's throwing all that stuff in it. Which isn't just It does that as well, but those little or the. It's highlights, so a few things, it's highlighting the chord changes in the solo notes, for example, that part. Yes. Literally walking up what everyone will know is an A major bar called by an E-shaped park. D minor. Going back up to D minor and then. Little D shape there as well. With the C, you know, a C major cage shape, you'd think about this, but we've got that little shape there. And they're the building blocks of the solo, I would say. And then the licks that are a bit more minor pentatonicy, uh, sort of colour it or fit in the gaps between after he's highlighted the chord or or before he's just about to. Yeah. Combining that with this chicken. Picking, picking thing. I mean, how do you, how do you recommend someone gets into it? So you've got, you can have, no, obviously with, with picking, you can use a pick, you use your fingers, or you can do the hybrid picking or picking fingers. And so the fingers like that, which I've done lessons on, so wicked familiar with it. There'll be tags up the top. Um, so I always started with picking fingers anyway. Yeah, yeah, er, cos my teacher, uh, I remember I used to hold a pick like that. And he was like, oh no, Mike, you're gonna wanna have your back free nails, and he had quite long fingernails. And I was like, oh, I was like, what do you mean like use your fingers, like that's what a pick's for, you don't use your fingers. Uh, and I'm so glad I kind of stuck with it, so like playing an a chord. I would do like, you know, the pick on the 5th string, and then kind of pluck in those back 3 on the 4th, 3rd, and the 2nd string. So You've got that kind of sound, and like Eric Johnson will do stuff like with high powered amps going on, and you're getting cool kind of. Uh, big kind of beastie sounds. So say you take shape one A minor. But then tried this, so my thumb's on it and my first finger's on it. I was like. Well, you made it riff then. That's a very good exercise, and coming back down would be interesting as well. If you enjoy this video, why not check out the full range of courses available at andyguitar.co.uk. From Total Beginner 2 Advanced acoustic and electric guitar, we have structured lessons, exclusive song tutorials not available on YouTube, regular live lessons so you can get all the feedback you need. Try all of this for free with a 10 day free trial, the link to that is in the description. Let's get back to the video. The money shot licked. Oh, so that, yeah, so let's do that. I remember, I'm gonna say a story of this very quickly. I remember, uh, my teacher, again, as I mentioned him, uh, I remember learning this with the pick. I didn't know, this was before, this was 1998, right? God, the dark days. And, uh, you know. The glory days. Yeah, the glory, actually I should say, Big Breakfast was on every morning, it was great. Um, but yeah, so I, I didn't know anything about, uh, hybrid picking, playing with a pick, not, you know, I just thought you'd play with picks. So I remember like getting it. And I was like, that sounds awful. That's not, well it, it doesn't, it's just not the sound that we know. Yeah, exactly, yeah, and I didn't know about. And you can think it might be a pedal, it might be the guitar, but it's actually with the fingers, which I think it makes it easier cos you've got, you kind of assign your thumb to string two first finger to string one, right? Hm. Well, of course as well we've got ham-ons and pull-offs, so I didn't know about that either. I was just it. Yeah, yeah, I'm just trying to pick every single note. So the thing, as soon as you, you know. It's like OK, it's a bit more like it now. But there's still that. And I'm still, as I'm that little slap and a pop, right? Yes, a slap and a pop. There you go, that's that's bass player. Yeah, yeah. So, but there it's basically a, a D minor arpeggio game, Mr. Arpeggio. But when you go up to speed, so we've got, no, 10 and 10 on the top two strings. And then we're pulling off 13 back to 10 on the 1st year. But when you get up to speed, you start getting a little bit of the chicken pick come in there on that string cos it's just a little muted, isn't it, it's just your fingers grip the string a bit more so it's gonna sound a little bit like, it's not a straight a um the pick will move across the strings quicker, right? Yeah, but your fingers hold on it and it sounds, it gives it that, it gives a character doesn't it? Yeah, that kind of and it seems harder cos you know there's not a lot of gain on it. I think it's more kind of badass, right? There's nothing you're leaning on to you, you've got your hands on the guitar to the tones. You could do, you could do the same thing on acoustic, yeah, yeah, well I think that's what he started off, he was like a bluegrass kind of guy, I think, you know, which kind of shows I think he does, you know. Um, but when you go up here, that's again what Andrew was saying about your arpeggio. Just call me Andrew. Did I say Andrew? Yeah, I think, I think I'm, I, I sound like I'm being told off. I call you Andrew. He's insane. My brother's called Andrew. Oh, is he? You know, he's Andy Bradley. He's Andy, but I still call him Andrew, yeah, sorry, sorry, yeah, I can't believe I did that. How dare call me Michael. Slap my wrist, Michael and Andrew today. Yes, Michael. Thank you, Andrew. And um, but yeah, so there, what Andy said, um, we got our, our peggio. On that one, haven't we? You can hear that do do do do, it's literally 3 notes that make up the chord, right? Yeah. There's a beef flat. like that, you know. Come on, let's give it, give it an up 123. One more properly up to speed, so kind of 1234. If you're not warmed up, it's hard. It's like I was running out of juice. Uh, it's a tough technique. Finally, we've found his limit, guys, playing that over and over 20 times. Basically, yeah, that, that, that, that, that throws me a bit. But it gives it such a cool character when you start throwing that stuff in.