In this lesson Leonel talks about picking and gives two exercises to develop independence between the right and left hands.

If you don’t have the Cuban Masters Series - Cuban Tres, get it. All the exercises and more are in it.

Transcript

When we talked about the tres tuning, I forgot to mention an important fact. When the tres appeared as such, in the realm of the peasant world, it was only strummed downwards.

Through the years, and with the evolution of Cuban music, the technique changed. Nurtured with many influences from American music, and in order to achieve perfection, the players have changed and thus simplified the instrument’s technique. This is why nowadays the strings are played with a downward-upward movement.

For example, this is a technical exercise for the tres… (plays the tres)

This exercise must be practiced as much as possible, without over-exercising the hands. The goal of this exercise is to achieve independence between the right and the left hand. After a while, the player will easily be able to acquire the alternate picking technique…

This is another exercise for the right hand… (demonstrates with the tres)

We’ve already seen the right-hand movement…

Video

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Cuban Masters Series - Cuban Tres