What's Gerald Ross doing here?

SamWise

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In this video, Gerald Ross is playing an arrangement of The Peanut Vendor. At 3:33he plays something that sounds like a rasquedo, but isn't - it looks like he's maybe picking the same string several times whilst part-muting it with his thumb or something. Does anyone know what he's doing?
 
No, he does something like a roll. The more I'm listening to it, the more it's actually that he's arpegiating across the four strings, but muting all but the one that's actually going to sound. Whatever it is, it's definitely good picking.
 
Thanks - if more is not forthcoming here, I might do that.
 
Thanks for the good words about my right hand technique.

My basic "roll" is to hit the 4th string with my thumb, 3rd with my index, 2nd with my middle and 1st with my ring. I do this frequently instead of strumming across all 4 strings.

Remember, I use re-entrant tuning... this technique really shines with the high 4th string.
 
Are you palm muting the first three when you do that Gerald? They don't seem to be ringing out as much as the melody note? Thanks ever so much for answering, I've been having a lot of fun playing this tune the last couple of days, but I'd like to polish it as much as you have.
 
Before I execute the "strum" each finger is resting on it's appropriate string.

So, yes the strings are muted until plucked.

I "peel off" each finger as the string is struck. Make sense?
 
It does, but it sounded like you were also muting the strings after the pluck, for more of a thunk than a ring. It must be that you're simply picking the more gently than the melody note, so that it rings out above them.
 
I will frequently mute the strings after the "strum". This is very similar to a swing guitar rhythm technique where you strum on the 1 and 3 beats and palm mute the strings on the 2 and 4 beats while strumming.

This gives almost a snare drum type of sound and is very rhythmic sounding. On my Sabor A Mi recording it's hard to tell which instrument is creating this "click" sound - the guitar or the uke.
 
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