A (Somewhat) Definitive Guide To The Matthew Garrison Technique And Playing Ramps

#142
OK, made myself a ramp yesterday out of a transparent plastic sheet used to label peoples' offices at work. I got it from a co-worker named John McLaughlin, so that's what my ramp says now! :D

I can't believe how much easier it makes many things. I could never do TIMR before, and all of a sudden it's almost as easy as TRMI. I think I'll drill both to get as flexible as I can.

I have a question for you all. Until very recently, I've always used almost exclusively rest strokes. It's easier to mute and tends to get a thicker, more powerful sound. It seems that the thumb/finger techniques we are talking about really only work for free strokes, is that true?

I tried adapting this kind of picking to rest strokes, so the thumb comes to rest on the next higher string and the fingers come to rest on the next lower string. I haven't been able to get that to work without contorting and moving my hand a lot. Is it a fool's errand?
 
#143
Free strokes is primarily how people do it- I've attempted playing it with all rest strokes, and it was neither easy, fluid, or fun. I do rest my thumb on the next string quite often after plucking with it, similar to using a floating thumb technique to help mute the lower string, but performing rest strokes with the other fingers was always counterproductive. When I want a really thick sound, I often do rest strokes using just my ring finger. For the most part though, my free strokes don't sound much different at all compared to my rest strokes- that may be a combination of the fact that I've practiced it a lot and because my rest stroke playing was never that thick/thumpy to begin with. You'll find that your hand placement and the attack you use/setup you have will alter the sound quite a bit when using free strokes, so may have to work on finding a setup/attack that gives your free strokes a similar tone to your rest strokes.

I cover several ways of muting when using this technique in a couple of videos- here are the links if you haven't seen them yet:
 
#145
#146
OK, so I mostly built the Willis ramp from his video. I haven't finished sanding the radius profile into the wood, but it already feels great. My ramp for some reason won't sit 100% flat and stable, so if I push hard on one corner, the opposite corner rises a bit. A bit frustrating. I put a bit of this blue putty stuff (made to attach knick-knacks to furniture) along the sides of the ramp on the pickguard and that works nicely to stabilize it.

It feels awesome as I said, already my bass feels weird and clunky when I take the ramp off. I don't want to use the vinyl shelf paper to coat it since the wood feels so good, but I guess I'll have to finish it to protect the surface. Does anybody know the easiest and cheapest way to finish the surface so that it is protected but still feels like wood to the touch? Also, I used poplar which is a pretty light colored wood. What stain/product would I use to give it an orange cast to match the light part of the sunburst on my bass?

By the way, I am one of the least handy people out there. I desperately want to have a woodshop and become a luthier, but my natural talent is in short supply. :bawl: Nevertheless, this was an easy and very fulfilling project. The height of the ramp is not adjustable, but it works very well.

If anybody is interested, I can post a picture.
 
#148
Here they are, I hope the size and quality aren't out of line. You can see the blue putty, which is kind of ugly, but it gives it that DIY look!

IMG00081-20100223-0910.jpg


IMG00082-20100223-0910.jpg


IMG00083-20100223-0912.jpg
 
#149
My take on this technique recently has been to use groupings of 123 and 1234. I find it much easier that way because I can always aim for the 1 with my thumb. Depending on the rythmn that I'm doing, it will a different combination. For xample 123 for triplets. 1234 for 16th. Sixteenth note triplets is 123 123. Quintuplets is 12 123. 8th notes 1234, etc.

I find it also helps with my consistency of sound. Anyway, anyone does this too?
 
#150
smeet said:
Here they are, I hope the size and quality aren't out of line. You can see the blue putty, which is kind of ugly, but it gives it that DIY look!

IMG00081-20100223-0910.jpg


IMG00082-20100223-0910.jpg


IMG00083-20100223-0912.jpg
Click to expand...
Very interesting. Except for the putty, I think it looks great. The putty is there just to keep the ramp from rocking back and forth you say? I wonder if you can putty UNDER one of the corners that comes up and stop the rocking.
 
#151
Tom7 said:
Very interesting. Except for the putty, I think it looks great. The putty is there just to keep the ramp from rocking back and forth you say? I wonder if you can putty UNDER one of the corners that comes up and stop the rocking.
Click to expand...

The rocking that happens is tiny, less than 1mm. The putty is so thick that it would change the height of the ramp. I could use a lot less putty or use a different color. I could also put a bit of tape under the offending corner to thicken it up. I'll probably do one of those things but for now it works as is. I'm going to Home Depot to look for stains and finishes this weekend.

Does anybody know the best stain and finish to match the light part of the sunburst on the bass? Bearing in mind that the ramp is poplar and the bass is ash.
 
#152
smeet said:
The rocking that happens is tiny, less than 1mm. The putty is so thick that it would change the height of the ramp. I could use a lot less putty or use a different color. I could also put a bit of tape under the offending corner to thicken it up. I'll probably do one of those things but for now it works as is. I'm going to Home Depot to look for stains and finishes this weekend.

Does anybody know the best stain and finish to match the light part of the sunburst on the bass? Bearing in mind that the ramp is poplar and the bass is ash.
Click to expand...
When it comes to stains, all my work is unintentional, and usually done on silk ties, so I'm not help there. If it were me, I'd bring a photo of the bass with the ramp on on my digital camera, bring the wooden ramp itself in, and show both to some people who work there and get their opinions.

But back to the ramp, what if you sanded on the OTHER two corners, the ones that aren't lifting. Wouldn't that flatten out the ramp?
 
#153
Good idea on bringing it into the store.

Tom7 said:
But back to the ramp, what if you sanded on the OTHER two corners, the ones that aren't lifting. Wouldn't that flatten out the ramp?
Click to expand...


I'm a bit afraid to do that, I don't know if it would fix anything... The bottom of the ramp seems completely level, and appears to sit nice and flat on the bass. And yet, when I push on it at certain times, it shifts a bit. The corners that shift also aren't completely consistent. It's almost like it is "catching" on something, but I can't figure out what. I may have to take the pickups off to really see what is happening.
 
#154
OK, I finished the ramp with a combined poly-stain product, worked well, looked good, etc. But...

I noticed my E and B strings sounded kind of dead, and after playing around with strings/pickups/etc., I realized that somehow the ramp was deadening the sound, both electronically and acoustically. Taking off the ramp opened up the sound and made it much more resonant. :atoz:

So I am rampless once again. Using the ramp opened up my technique, so I'll probably use it for practice, but sadly it degrades my sound too much to use it when playing with others.

Has anybody else had this issue?
 
#155
Not at all- I have a ramp right ON my pickups, and it doesn't affect the sound at all. Was your ramp pushing on your pickups? There's really no reason for it to affect the sound unless it's physically interfering with your pickup's magnets.
 
#156
Yep, it doesn't make sense... The ramp was touching the pickups but not pushing on them. It's wood so no interference is possible. It sounded like putting a mute on an acoustic instrument. The effect was audible acoustically also (no amp), so that is in fact what was happening.

My bass might be chambered (it was made during Sadowsky's transition period, so nobody including Roger knows for sure). That may make it more susceptible to the ramp's sitting on the body physically changing the resonance.

Either way, it was a dramatic difference in sound so I can't use it for now. :meh:
 
#157
Even if it were chambered, I don't see how much effect it could have- the pickguard would have a far greater effect of the sound as it's much bigger and screwed down at almost a dozen points, and I wouldn't imagine that would have a huge effect. Strange.
 
#158
Bryan R. Tyler said:
Even if it were chambered, I don't see how much effect it could have- the pickguard would have a far greater effect of the sound as it's much bigger and screwed down at almost a dozen points, and I wouldn't imagine that would have a huge effect. Strange.
Click to expand...
I'm with Bryan on this one; I am very surprised that your ramp had any audible affect on your tone.

My Fbass AC6 has chambers, and this ebony ramp doesn't change the tone at all that I can detect.

I have it attached with tape on the SIDE EDGES of the ramp, so it is actually taped to the pickup and the fingerboard, not to the body of the bass.

Tom7%20-%20Fbass%20AC6Ramp3.jpg


Likewise, my plexi ramp on my Fbass VF5 has no audible affect on my (nonchambered) VF5... which has dual single coils (and a pickguard) like your Sadowsky.

Tom7%20Fbass%20VF5%2003.jpg
 
#159
Hey, I agree with you, but still, I messed around with the setup and stringing for quite a while before realizing that whenever I had the ramp mounted, the instrument sound closed and muffled.

The wild card here I guess is that I could be getting fooled by my ears or by my technique changing when I play with the ramp on. All I can say is, I really really don't think that is the case. Anyway, I'll revisit this over the coming weekend and see if I can figure out what's really going on. I'll report back with any discoveries.

By the way Tom7, that AC6 is beautiful! :eek:
 
#160
Oh, I didn't mean to imply that the sonic change wasn't happening -- I bet it is -- I'm just surprised it is.

In fact, you make me want to remove my ramps and listen more carefully.

Fortunately, I have recordings of these two basses from before they were ramped, so I can redo them with the ramps and listen more carefully... that way I don't have to take the ramps off and get them on again.

But you really make an interesting point about the difference the technique makes in the tone. That's something we probably don't talk enough about really.

There are somethings I play in some styles just for the tone, not so much for the speed or other benefits of the technique.

And thanks for the compliments on my AC6. I do appreciate it. Usually when a TBer talks about my AC6, it is to lament that I covered up the pretty rosewood with that ebony block. :-/
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom
Back