The fact that he was vulnerable enough to try something on camera that he didn't necessarily "have down" yet, and work through it in front of everyone is incredibly impressive to me.

I love these videos so much. Martin is a god

This is something I've wondered how many people struggle with. It sounds like everyone does. It's one of the reasons I think guitar is one of the most difficult instruments. You can be amazingly great at one aspect of guitar, and still suck at something you're not familiar with. Once you're good at guitar, you learn things you're not used to playing much quicker, but you still have to learn it, and then it's not like riding a bike. You can't just learn something, and then not play it for years, and then suddenly access it at will. It's a never ending journey working on your guitar skills.

Did it. Not as clean as Martin and took me 20 min (with breaks) to dial in. But did it. I am 43 by the way and got most of my right hand technique from cracking the quote. Meaning built it up in the last years. IT IS NOT AN AGE THING! Thanks Troy!!!

Watching this makes me feel better about my skills with alternate picking. Watching someone in the level of Martin still have a bit of trouble with this is really inspiring. And you're right Troy, the guitar wasn't built for this kind of insanity. Haha.

One of my favorite musicians in the world. A master of the guitar.

I love Martin Miller's Ibanez Guitar. And I love his tone

Martin Miller is an excellent player .. I truly hope Troy will be able to get Guthrie Govan at some point.

Martin is ridiculously good.

This "picking mechanics" series of videos is purely fantastic, it will make history!

The further you go with technique in any discipline it becomes so fascinating

Martin is so articulate, and such a great resource as far as online teaching. His videos are fantastic for developing actionable practice routines.

Troy, your channel is beyond valuable because you're always turning other players on to new ideas AND players!! I love this guy's playing and his sound is just amazing! You're awesome Troy! Keep it up and Thank You!!

Congrats Troy !! Best in analyzing and helping guitar players !

Crazy to see such an amazing player have to work on something seemingly simple. It really highlights the importance of hand mechanics and need to apply that knowledge strategically when writing licks and playing . I love this channel.

the first clean tone you play... it's one of the best I've heard dude, u nailed it

Martin is a Monster

Stunning and inspiring, i struggled with picking for most of the 42 years ive practiced for so been a legato player mostly but watching Martin Miller and other top players is really good for my beginner picking technique, thanks Troy again, hooked to your interviews and the dissection and explanation of what ive been overlooking for all these years, 👍🎸🎸🎸

Man.. what a great player. You gained another fan, Martin.

This is the coolest and most authentic channel about learning the mechanics of guitar picking. More power to Troy Grady and I hope to see Brett Garsed on this channel too!

I've been at this for 2 years now, since going through the entire Troy Grady thing. I haven't kept up on the latest developments in the last year, but I've taught myself 2-way pickslanting, which totally blew my mind, concept-wise. Just a few days ago, I've found that adding a rotational component to the actual pickstroke (keeping the same 2-way pickslanting mechanic) you glide through the strings even easier, it gives my picking a more circular feel to it, reminscent of a figure-8, rather than just an up/down type mechanic. I call this idea the "quadrature phase rotation" as it keeps the same 2-way pickslanting idea but rotates the entire mechanic such that the tip of the pick is approaching the string at an angle about 20-30 degrees clockwise with respect to the top of the guitar forward; studying RF/Physics waveforms, quadrature was taking the entire wave function and rotating it by approximately 45 (obviously my idea is less than 45 degrees, but it's the same basic idea. Man, this picking stuff is so complex, I envy the people that figured this out automatically in their youth. It's taken me until almost age 40 to finally get to the point where I can actually play some of John Petrucci's scarier solos, and I can honestly say that this pickslanting stuff is what got me there. Before finding your stuff, I was doing 4hrs a day with a metronome for almost 4yrs and got absolutely nowhere.

0:35 Introducing the new Industrial-strength Martin Miller Signature Big Ass® capo. No job is too tough for this bad boy. In music stores everywhere.

It’s crazy to me how fundamentally profound CTC’s categorizing and itemization of picking techniques is contrasted to how many people recognize it. Ive watched every video they’ve put out and they all pretty much negate every guitar how-to thats out there.

This will be an interesting video. The string tracking is a somewhat overlooked aspect. Martin actually does it a lot than he thinks when doing the two string outside picking. Almost to the point where the tracking takes care of the full displacement of the center of the motion (so he is basically just tremolo picking one string).

This is why I believe learning as many sequences as possible is a key factor.

The first 32 seconds of this video is one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard.

I really like this guy. Kudos for being ego-less enough to try something he doesn't know on camera. Nice playing too. Phenomenal touch on the instrument.

Martin is simply one of the best all rounders today. Can play metal all the way to fingerstyle jazz. A true guitar god

I love this guy , technique for days but he plays real music,beautiful songs, screaming solos and never forgets the most important lesson,,its all to entertain !

Thanks for putting me on to Miller. What a phenomenal technique he has.

You have gathered many awesome and diverse players already Troy. Your site is like no other. Keep it up.

holy shit, watching the great Martin struggle face pretty much hook me up instantly, this video is great, it reveals sooooo much

I love how the title is "Alternate Picking Anything" but within the first few seconds of the video he's already using hybrid picking instead of jumping the pick down there with pure alternate, lol. Amazing video and amazing player though. Just was a funny thing to see that right away, haha ;)

That would be great if you interviewed Anton Oparin. His alternate pucking is mesmerising.

Finally someone talking about this, who is really good. Was wondering if "good" players can just pump out different Rhythm that they haven't learned in exactly that way.

Great player, great channel. Thanks for all the great things you do for the guitar community, Troy, not to mention, the hard work developing your own playing, which is impressive as hell!

Tremendous player. His playing is so clean.

One thing that blew my mind about my own technique: I felt I was an even slower than other beginners at first and put that on the fact I'm a lefty that learned right away as a right handed (my parents asked my in order to buy my first guitar cause they were way cheaper) and I had an "open hand" picking technique not so far from what Martin does. Eventually I found I didn't have enough "tension" to go fast (that was wrong) and after a couple years I forced myself to learn picking with a closed fist and while I gained speed I always had to work extra for accuracy I thought. When I saw this video when it came out I saw Martin would reach speed without issues with his open hand and so I decided to try again and it turns out my brain has an easier time focusing on index and thumb movement when they are not as tightly squeezed and when my other fingers are out of the way, this instantly made my string skipping faster and more accurate and years later it made everything better. Thanks Troy for exposing all of that technical goodness to us for free!

I have no idea why anyone would down vote this video. One of the best in the business is giving us tips. How is that bad?

Amazing channel, so good I even watched the end of it.

First time I've heard this man wow? Absolutely brilliant

Martin keeps playing the intro to Steve Morse's Tumeni notes! T'is a good picking primer ;)

Just realized he points his pointer finger like I do Alot of teachers said I should have tucked it in! I've realized that we all learn from wherever we are comfortable.

Martin Miller is awesome! Mana is my favorite song! Great job Martin and Troy! Killin it guys!

That guy is a beast. Killer tone too.

always good to watch martin miller. really a big fan of this guy

Very nice video, really good insight on Martin's picking technique, kudos!

not only is his playing fantastic, the tone is as well!!!

Whoa!! This guy is phenomenal !! Enough said.

Wow! Thanks for having him!

Man martin is a real beast !!

I´m saving money for your course. I´m struggling to not spend that on another pedal... Killer videos!

Thanks Troy for this great interview!

Excellent! Really great right hand technique.

I immensfully enjoyed it

Studying IS enjoyment in my book.

As always, I'm imensefully greatful for this video 🙏

"alternate pick anything" video starts with hybrid picking. haha. :p

Michael Angelo's speed picking is insane

Thanks Martin for this great video!

What, in the drumming world, is called "Limb Independence". Or, in the case of the technique becoming difficult to play when changing the fretting, a LACK of limb independence. The body does a good job of hands / feet working together, and learns to do that proficiently. However, change an aspect of that (in this case, the fretting), and the body views that as a 'new task' that must now be learned. A good guess also is that even more subtle things like changing guitars will also affect limb independence, particular if there's a large difference in the playing characteristics of guitars. This proves two things: 1) Rote memorization of hand movements plays a larger part than, perhaps, previously understood and, 2) 'Mastery' may have as much to do with simple repetition and rote memorization as any 'inspired genius' in terms of playing.

Unusual choice of guitar for that style of music.

Finally I see someone else using a stubby picks. Was always afraid they'll stop production if no one well known uses them!!

Troy, please mass produce the Magnet.

Dear God! His hands are mesmeric!

2:19 And there you have it. You have to practice EVERYTHING. Every phrase you would regularly use with slight variations as you progress. Every time you change one note it will require more good ole fashioned practice.

de mis guitarristas favoritos Martin Miller... saludos desde Mexico

fantastic playing!!

Beautiful. I love my AZ too.

wow there are several bits where he plays the changes to the standard "my funny valentine", nice chromatic enclosures, etc... hints Misty at 10m. We need Wes Montgomery thumb tecnique :P that would be pure madness.

4:54 - 'These are lines, we're asking the pick to do a fairly 'complicated-mechanical-thing' in beat with the lick. Lovely.

Fantastic video. Thank you.

Would love to see Guthrie Govan chatting with Troy and his techniques put under the microscope like this. Would definitely have to resubscribe to CTC if/when that happened.

The only thing I learned from "Cracking the code" is that there is no code. Every guitarist hold the pick differently and play differently. Only way to get super good is to practice correct (having a good teacher is a must) and many hours every day. There is no easy way out. If it was everyone would be great at guitar

I’m trying to work out this Stephen Taranto luck where this two string outside picking mechanic is prevalent. It’s so hard to get clean and fast like Martin and Stephen can.

martin miller is the absolute man!

that's great but can he do a 5 note bend on that guitar and vibrato it? I think when the strings are heavier you can play better picking styles. Prob why you never see Holdsworth do much bending of strings. He has it set up for speed. great clean sound. so round and smooth without raspy high end but he's using that dbl in neck pos. he's amazing at picking. His timing was so spot on.

Not a huge fan of the Ibanez s-style, but the intonation seems amazing on that guitar.

Truly an inspiration. 🙏

Beautiful action on that guitar. Not too low like typical shredders like to have their string height...nice and high enough for clean bebop fusiony jazz, imo faster, rhythmically technically and theoretically more precise than most "metal"

Awesome playing

Very nice technic a real guitar player bravo

Love this video ...big thumb up and suscribe !!

Martin is awesome!! If I may request, please get Andreas Oberg to analyze his picking technique.

Get Malmsteen on, I wanna see him alternate pick with his teeth

Martin is really awesome, his technique is spot on. BTW, when will the Joe Stump interview be up?

Can you do interview with Julian Lage?

@ 07:52 oooft, that sounded nice.

He's doing far, far, far better than I could, but there's still some "string hopping" once he removes his pinky. It's tiny compared to mine, but I can still see more "up and down" than when his pinky is anchored.

Is he saying at 8:27 that 3 reps per exercise, pattern, etc. its enough? Many guitarist are in the void of more is better so If he says that, that some serious insight, mature and fresh. Great player, great video.

beautiful player

What should I say about his picking speed a woodpecker pecking a tree or a hummingbird flapping it's wings....a great guitarist who has mastered the legendary alternative picking😎😎

I get so much out of this series. Thanks!

He’s astoundingly good, love everything about his playing!

Haha playing guitar is funny like that he says....hmm let me figure this out.....so true. So frustrating at times too haha. Great job love your content Troy picking is so important can make you sound great or sloppy.

10:45 actually a lot of pulloffs going on there, not all alt picking but man he's got it sounding very equal so you can't really tell unless you slow it down and examine.

Is he playing tumeni notes by Steve Morse?

Obviously minimizing pick-slanting for the one not per string is helping. The change in pick hold seems a bit of a cumbersome movement to activate, though.

You kind if mentioned it at the end, but just making sure, does this specific talk have tabs and lick breakdowns like the first interview?

What a monster!