#170048  by Jon S.
 
In a 1978 interview, Jerry said, "The way I hold the pick is a bit strange, I guess. I don’t hold it in the standard way, but more like you hold a pencil. I think Howard Roberts describes it as the scalpel technique."

You can see this technique in the pic of Jer below and yet more so in the video below it of the jazz maestro himself.

By happenstance as a youngster first learning to play guitar, I fell into holding my pics similarly.

Speaking for myself now, one artifact of holding the pic in the Howard Roberts style is that you can, if you wish, scrape the string with your index finger's nail in the same motion just before your pic hits the string.

Yes, I know there are alternative approaches to generating pinch harmonics. But if you try what I just described with even a bit of gain, I think you'll see the technique can be used successfully to get some screaming harmonics.

This being said, I use the technique sparingly because it's havoc on your fingernail!

Image

 #170050  by 8-6-71 for me
 
Jon S. wrote: Mon Feb 22, 2021 12:31 pm In a 1978 interview, Jerry said, "The way I hold the pick is a bit strange, I guess. I don’t hold it in the standard way, but more like you hold a pencil. I think Howard Roberts describes it as the scalpel technique."

You can see this technique in the pic of Jer below and yet more so in the video below it of the jazz maestro himself.

By happenstance as a youngster first learning to play guitar, I fell into holding my pics similarly.

Speaking for myself now, one artifact of holding the pic in the Howard Roberts style is that you can, if you wish, scrape the string with your index finger's nail in the same motion just before your pic hits the string.

Yes, I know there are alternative approaches to generating pinch harmonics. But if you try what I just described with even a bit of gain, I think you'll see the technique can be used successfully to get some screaming harmonics.

This being said, I use the technique sparingly because it's havoc on your fingernail!

Image

I've never seen that before- thank you! So that's a vote for "pinch only"? :P
 #170051  by AaronW
 
I've always thought it had an octave up. I can mimic it with my Octron. To me it never sounded like pinch harmonics. But that's just me :smile:
 #170054  by Jon S.
 
>> So that's a vote for "pinch only"? :P

No. I was just sharing some info. on pinch harmonics. :biggrin: