How to Use Picking Techniques For Acoustic Guitar Licks

Good day fellow students of the guitar. Darrin Goodman here with another guitar lesson for y’all. Today I want to look at some acoustic guitar licks.

The acoustic guitar is really cool because of all the different styles and techniques that can be played on it. There are obviously way to many to cover them all in this article so I will go over some of the main ideas and techniques.

Finger Picking:

Let’s take a look at finger picking for a minute. This technique can be found in just about every genre of music and although the sound and styles may differ, the technique is somewhat universal. The fingers on the right hand are identified by the letters P, I, M and A; thumb is P, first finger is I, second finger is M and third finger is A. Sometimes even the pinky is used, but mine is so short I don’t use it LOL. Here is an exercise for you to work on your right hand.

After you get the hand of the technique then you can move on to playing licks that use this technique. Here is an easy Spanish guitar lick lesson.

Spanish Guitar Lesson

Strumming with a pick:

Now for strumming with a pick there are a variety of styles and patterns. A good place to start is with what some refer to as “the universal strum”. This is basically a single down strum for beats 1 and 2, so a half note, and then another down strum on the down beat of 3 and up strum on the down beat and then do the same for beat 4.

Hybrid Picking:

Another popular technique is hybrid picking. This is a technique that is used in country as well as other styles. Here is a lesson on hybrid picking for country to mimic the style of banjo. Although this lesson is demonstrated on an electric guitar, it is easily done on the acoustic as well.