question about legato

[mary]

what kind of equipment do I need/what settings to be able to practise legato?
when I do hammer on's and pulloff's the sound kind of fades away more and more.
it doesnt matter if i hit the string with all my power. I dont think my fingers are to weak because ive been playing for one year now. can someone help me?

[Black Star]

are you practising without distortion? because having distortion allows you to have a lighter touch on the strings. however, distortion will mask your mistakes

i suggest just turning your amp up :)


Here's my amp settings:

Contour: 0
Treble: 5
Gain: 0
Bass: 10

and with thsoe settings i use a multi effects pedal and get a really really nice smooth clean distortion, and a great clean tone.

I'm a picker though. not really a legato guy.

[eische]

ermm, may I ask again, what exactly your problem is??? - of course the sound does fade, that's just normal, soo...??? - I'm lost here. To bind them notes together just means to let them mingle-ring for a short period of time, after that the first one fades and if you don't play on the last note fades too...
...the legato is just the effect between the notes, so to say, so that they are not seperated, but the first one is melting into the second...

[mary]

ermm, may I ask again, what exactly your problem is??? - of course the sound does fade, that's just normal, soo...??? - I'm lost here. To bind them notes together just means to let them mingle-ring for a short period of time, after that the first one fades and if you don't play on the last note fades too...

but every new note sound a little weaker than the on before.....until i pick again :(

[eische]

eerm, yess the string vibrates only for a limited amount of time, you can't help that...
...so if you do hammer-ons in an endless row the notes will fade more and more - that shouldn't happen with pull-offs though, because you kind of »pick« the note when you pull it off with the left-hand-finger and so renew the vibration..., but of course you'll get a different sound, if you pluck the string with the fleshy part of the finger, than you do with using the hard pick/nail (you can hear that on the right hand too, it's a little dumber)

[JiMi=GoD]

What exactly is legato?

Im confused, never properly studied all the clever latin words or whatever they are!

rob

[SwampDonkey]

Legato means playing smoothly. You achieve this on guitar by not picking each individual note, but using hammer-ons and pull-offs. Make all the notes sound like they're bound together with no space inbetween :)

[eische]

hmmm, don't know what you mean by smoothly, but to me smoothly is represented more by prescriptions like largo or andante...

...legato then means bound (by translation - btw: not latin, italian JiMi=GoD :p ), so you bind sounds together by letting them flow into each other, not just by hammer-ons and pull-offs, you can do that with just picking - e.g. on two different strings... the thing is just to let the notes slightly ring into each other, so the »start« of the next note isn't heard definitely...

[The Fury]

eische, I use Largo and Andante to mean slow or solemn (serious, gloomy)

I usually see them to describe a slow movement of a concerto.

[eische]

yupp, but slowly or solemnly and smoothly fit the same impression to me and my humble ear... and because I can't think of anything else being smoothly and because bound sounds do not approach my ear as being smooth, because legato-passages can be as fast and aggressive as others, I wanted to make sure the difference and wrote »I don't know what you mean by smooth«, ok???

[geffen]

for legato just play 100% of the note length

[bones98]

Legato is very essential in solos, Iron maiden use em
on "Number Of The Beast." The technique is not very hard, took me 2 seconds to learn it....LOL!!!!

[Andrew]

I have always heard legato described as 'smoothly'. Largo means slow. Andante means quite slow (not as slow as largo).

When you are talking about 'legato' on guitar as a technique, it always means hammer-ons and pull-offs.

[geffen]

Originally posted by Andrew
When you are talking about 'legato' on guitar as a technique, it always means hammer-ons and pull-offs.

i dont know about you guys but ive always heard legato described in terms of how much sound and silence in your notes not hammer ons and pull offs. i just pulled out an old worksheet i had and it says this

legato= 100% sound 0% silence
long lifted notes = 75% sound 25% silence
short lifted notes= 50% sound 50% silence

the long lifted looks like a note with a legato and staccato symbol on it and short lifted looks like staccato

[Andrew]

Yeah, that's right, for music in general, but when someone says (about the guitar) "he's got a good legato technique" or "that solo is played using legato" they are talking about hammer-ons and pull-offs.

I don't think it means the same for classical guitar though.

[eische]

hmmm, I don't know, what the thing about classical or not guitar should count for on this item, I mean:

say you play a g-b on open strings and the sheet says legato, that is the notes are bound with that little bow underneath them, so how the heck would you do a hammer-on or a pull-off??? - on open string??? - would you really want to bother to grip those notes, just because you are to bind them together??? - I don't think so... - you would just make sure they melt into oneanother...

...just gave my humble impression of the smooth, slow, whatever thingy..., you know, if someone came up and said: play this smooth, I won't do it as a piece where all notes were written in legato - I would do it in calm/slow way, that's all...

[geffen]

thats a slur not legato and i would play it a- 10h14 or d - 5h9 or g - 0h4

[Andrew]

Legato, for guitar, means hammer-ons and pull-offs.

The sheet music won't say 'legato' below two open strings, because the person who wrote the sheet music should know that 'legato' means hammer-ons and pull-offs.

I could search through magazines and find a million quotes saying "legato means hammer-ons and pull-offs", but I'm not that sad, so just take my word for it, okay?:)

[eische]

well, I know and play a lot of sheet-music, that give fingerings in 0 on notes having the legato-bow, so...you have to find a way playing it without hammer-ons...- and having this on notes from Sor, I don't believe he didn't know, how to write music for guitar...- okay ;)

[Andrew]

I said it was different for classical guitar.

[John Prophet]

As far as the original question goes...legato technique is referring to left hand technique...the ability to play a lot of notes without picking.

You pretty much have to have some distortion going to get a smooth legato...if you are having to pound on the strings then it aint really gonna sound smooth and you wont be able to play very fast.

I use lots of legato and I have my guitars setup with really low action...almost low enough to buzz. I cant play guitas with high action at all.

The idea with legato (and electric guitar in general) is to play with a light touch...light enough so that the fingers seem to just float across the strings.

A good way to practice any technique is to make a lick that repeats and just play it over and over.

if you want to hear some legato, check out the song called "end solo to river" on my webpage http://members.toast.net/jusjoking/ its the last lick that is the long legato one. Some of the other ones like "some loose Jimmy Page solo work" have lots of legato also.

Also, when you pull off the string dont just pick your finger up, you actually have to sort of flick it downward...sort of "plucking" it...with practice the "plucking" gets so small that you almost forget about it. It'll come it just takes time and practice...and distortion!

Lemme know what you think about any of my songs or solos.

JP

[John Prophet]

Oh yeah, the one called "blues intro" has some fast legato also...it has a couple of fast licks that sort of stop on a dime. Its in a minor/major if I remember correctly.

http://members.toast.net/jusjoking/

JP

[het]

I guess i know what legato means:singing the notes close one to another.you know,in italian "legato" means "tied togheter",so think you should use hammer-ons and pull-offs as well as letting the notes ring if they are played on different strings.Well,something like that.:D
BTW,whst is that sing in those sheet music papers ">" uderneath the notes?or that point "." also underneath the notes?could it be legato and staccato or something else?:confused:

[The Fury]

A dot under the note means staccato

A " > " underneath means play the note with added emphasis (play it harder)

[het]

Thanks man...