Guitar Lessons - Sweep Picking Arpeggio Essentials

The series kicks off with an intro demo and a breakdown of the sweep picking technique.

Before we get started on the really fast stuff, we look at some arguably more tasteful, bluesy applications of the sweep picking technique, as well as “raking” into bends.

Now we start to look at the fast stuff: Sweep arpeggios covering the top 3 strings. We cover the major and minor shapes first of all.

Next, we take the major shape we learned in the previous lesson and practice moving it around the neck to form other arpeggios and create melody lines that follow chord progessions. You can incorporate similar sequences into your own compostions to see just how much mileage you can get from this technique.

Now we take both the major and minor three-string sweep shapes we learnt and practice moving them around the neck, following a popular chord sequence. Try this yourself with your own compostions to see just how much you can get out of this technique. Later in this lesson, we look at a new shape: The diminished arpeggio, covering three strings.

In this lesson, we’re going to learn a lightning-fast diatonic run, covering an entire octave. There are only 3 shapes to remember in order to play this run: Major, minor and diminished. This run is essentially like playing a scale using sweep arpeggios. Later, Bobby shows you how to harmonise fast sweeps in a two guitar band or when layering guitar parts in the studio.

Now we start to cover huge sweeps across five strings, starting with a movable major shape.

Continuing with our sweeps across five strings, we look at the movable minor and diminished shapes.

Now that we’ve learnt to sweep across five strings, we can start moving our arpeggios around the neck, following chord progressions and giving ourselves even more exciting tonal possibilities.

Taking our sweep arpeggios even further, we now look at a movable minor 7 sweep arpeggio covering 5 strings.

Taking our sweep arpeggios even further, we now look at a movable major 7 sweep arpeggio covering 5 strings.

Taking our sweep arpeggios even further, we now look at a movable dominant 7 sweep arpeggio covering 5 strings.

Taking our sweep arpeggios even further, we now look at a movable minor 7 flat 5 sweep arpeggio covering 5 strings, followed by some closing words about what we’ve covered in this series of lessons. Happy sweeping!