- Tapping is a great effect that many shredders use. Just make sure that you don’t over do it, otherwise you will sound cheesy and cliched. Many players advocate tapping and coming off the string hard, but I like to just focus on the tap. If you come off the string too hard, it just sounds like a regular plucked note.
- I prefer to use my right hand’s middle finger for tapping because it’s the longest finger of the hand, and I don’t have to move my pick around to tap. You can use your right hand’s index finger, but that requires you to move your pick, and that finger is not as long and as strong as the middle finger. Both ways give a lot of control as compared to using the edge of your pick though. Using the edge of the pick allows you to tap much faster, at the expense of control and some of the nice effects you can do.
- Use your right palm and even your left hand’s finger tips to mute the strings that aren’t played as much as possible. Just don’t over do it with your right arm or you might push the muted strings into the pickups, making some extraneous sound.
- Guys like Eddie Van Halen and Randy Rhoads (RIP) supposedly invented tapping, and they have classic solos that use tapping. However, I like to use the solo from Metallica – One as a quintessential example.
-t19p15p12-|-t20p15p12-|-----------|------------
-----------|-----------|-t19p15p12-|-t20p15p12--
-----------|-----------|-----------|------------
-----------|-----------|-----------|------------
-----------|-----------|-----------|------------
-----------|-----------|-----------|------------
-----------|-----------
-t17p13p10-|-t18p13p10-
-----------|-----------
-----------|-----------
-----------|-----------
-----------|-----------
- I suggest keeping your eyes on your tapping hand when you are attempting this. Your hand will naturally go toward wherever you look, so that helps with tapping accuracy. If you do this you will need to be very confident with your fretting hand though.
- You can combine taps with vibrato, bends, and slides for some really nice advanced effects. Keep in mind that you must always stay in key though. It’s a little difficult because bending the strings changes the pitch of your note, so when you tap, the note you will produce will actually be different from the fret you are tapping on.
- Here are some examples in the key of E minor. In each example, play the tap without any bending to get an idea of how it should sound. Then, play it with bending, but keep in mind you will have to tap on a different fret because you’ve bend the note. Indicated is the fret number to tap on.
- Bend from 4th to 5th, tap on the 6th.
-17-19-t20-|-17b-t18-
-----------|---------
-----------|---------
-How it----|---------
--should---|---------
---sound---|---------
- Bend from 4th to 5th, tap on the 7th.
-17-19-t22-|-17b-t20-
-----------|---------
-----------|---------
-How it----|---------
--should---|---------
---sound---|---------
- Bend from 4th to 5th, tap on the octave.
-17-19-t24-|-17b-t22-
-----------|---------
-----------|---------
-How it----|---------
--should --|---------
---sound---|---------
- Bend from 4th to 5th, tap on the minor second and bend to the minor third. This one is really hard! It’s hard because it’s a one and a half step bend. Note that this is impossible to play without bending, unless you have a guitar that has 27 frets.
-17-19-t26b27-|-17b-t24b-
--------------|----------
--------------|----------
-How it-------|----------
--should -----|----------
---sound------|----------
- Bend from 7th to octave, tap on the 3rd.
-----------|---------
-15-17-t20-|-15b-t18-
-----------|---------
-How it----|---------
--should---|---------
---sound---|---------
- You don’t always have to bend then tap. You can tap and then bend too. Here’s an example. Tap on the 7th, and bend from the 4th to 5th. It’s tricky because you have to tap, bend the string while your tapping finger is down, and then pulling off your tapping finger while the string is still bent, and then release your bend.
-t22-19-17-|-t22p17b-
-----------|--------
-----------|--------
-How it----|--------
--should---|--------
---sound---|--------
- Here’s a simple example that will help you tap rapidly between different strings. This one does not involve any bending.
-t17p15p12-----------
-----------t17p15p12-
---------------------
---------------------
---------------------
---------------------
- Here’s another one that spans all six strings.
-t19p15p12---------------------------------------------------
-----------t19p15p12-----------t19p15p12---------------------
---------------------t19p15p12-----------t19p15p12-----------
---------------------------------------------------t19p15p12-
-------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------
-t19p15p12---------------------------------------------------
-----------t19p15p12-----------t19p15p12---------------------
---------------------t19p15p12-----------t19p15p12-----------
---------------------------------------------------t19p15p12-
-----------------------------------------t19p15p12-
-------------------------------t19p15p12-----------
---------------------t19p15p12---------------------
-----------t19p15p12-------------------------------
-t19p15p12-----------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------
Recent Comments