Mike's Oud Forums

Right-Hand Technique

Ibn_Rushd - 3-10-2006 at 02:06 PM

Hello everyone,
I watched a nice clip of Naseer Shamma teaching Oud to a number of young oud players. He talked a lot about some right-hand technique called in Arabic "Al-Risha Al-Maqluba" meaning "The Inverted Risha" in english. Does anyone know what is he talking about? Any ideas?

dubai244 - 3-10-2006 at 08:28 PM

Hi,
Basicelly, If you hear the spanish guitar players, They play 100 tones in one Minute! Really Fast or the Rock Electrical Guitar players, they do same thing, This is actually " Inverted Risha"!!!
This technique is found in most world wide music. In arabic Music, this technique is played by turkish-for long time age, since "Athmans" age- and some neighber countries, such as Iran, kordistan and iraq. And it is found in Greece as well. Recently is started to spred in the region. The Players who are playing this technique in this region such as,Yordal Tokcan, Yorgo, Jameel Bashir,Munir Bashir & his Son, Sharif Moyideen, Naseer Shamma, Ahmed Fathi, Abadi Aljoher, Simon Shaheen and others ( such as me!)
In the Europian music, it is played by the most spanish classic-guitar players and good examples are Paco De lucia, Paco Pena and others. Even i heard it in Bethoven and Mazart music.
I feel really sorry that naseer tried to be smart and said that as if he invited. and he said that for advertiment thing...! although he dont need to say that, the whole world knowns who is naseer and the way he play oud!! really great.
To learn this technique, you have to have a good techer who is expert in this technique and you can not learn this by book or video. and you need alot of practice to able be in the a good level.
Thanks

amtaha - 3-11-2006 at 12:59 AM

I'm interested in hearing the resulting sound effect on an oud. Is there a composition or link that you can perhaps allude to?

I'm also wondering what would be the English term for the technique?

Thank you.

dubai244 - 3-11-2006 at 05:23 AM

Hi,
I want to clarify some thing here. The inverted Risha allows to play so many tones in very short time. Saying that, it doesn't mean that the oud will same as classic guitar or electric rock guitar.
I am really sorry i dont know any web site, but i am sure one of the guys have the CD for Omar Munir Bashir called" Flaminco Night". In this CD, you will hear omar playing flaminco with his oud & Classic Guitar and you will hear the inverted risha very clear. Actually, you can not play flaminco with normal risha.
Thanks

Risha Techniques ...

sydney - 3-11-2006 at 06:40 AM

Here you go guys.

This is a short clip showing

* The risha played in down direction - beginners use that style in the first couple of lessons.

* The risha played in down and up or inverted style.

Down/up technique or Inverted risha is easy to learn but needs good practice.

Inverted risha is what the right hand is all about.

Enjoy

amtaha - 3-11-2006 at 07:57 PM

Glenn Arthur Jr. in http://www.radix.net/~dglenn/chords/oud-for-guitarists.html discusses this.

... For both speed and tone reasons, I suggest approaching the instrument planning to use either alternate picking or "economy picking". Alternate picking means that on each stroke you switch between downstrokes and upstrokes. Economy picking is similar to alternate picking, except that when you change strings your next stroke is in the same direction your hand just moved.

He then goes on to give a detailed example.

(For example, starting a D-major scale on the D string, using economy picking you would play: D (3/open, downstroke), E (3/index, upstroke), F# (3/ring, downstroke), G (2/open, downstroke, A (2/index, upstroke), B (2/ring, downstroke), C# (1/index, downstroke), D (1/index, upstroke). Using strict alternate picking, each downstroke would be followed by an upstroke and vice versa.)

I still have a question though. In upstroking a course, do you pick both strings or just the lower one? My understanding is that, ideally, both the downstroke and upstroke should have an equal but opposing attack in order to produce the same sound.

sydney - 3-12-2006 at 01:18 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by amtaha My understanding is that, ideally, both the downstroke and upstroke should have an equal but opposing attack in order to produce the same sound.



Good on you mate

Ibn_Rushd - 3-12-2006 at 02:43 AM

Thanks you guys, especially Sydney. Khalas you next Foster's is on me.

Actually I was still confused till I read about the economy picking part. I immediatley recognized it since I played Flamenco for a while and new about it already. I never used it much because I always played finger picking style. When I used a pick I used alternate. It's amazing how the inverted risha winded up meaning this. Jameel once posted a clip by Simon Shaheen and he was talking about this but never made this connection.

Currently I use only the alternate picking, is that a bad idea?

SamirCanada - 3-12-2006 at 03:35 AM

Nice video Emad !
Bin Rushd: Is there any way you can post the clip of Naseer Teaching?

Ibn_Rushd - 3-12-2006 at 07:41 AM

No walla Samir, I stumbled across it on one of those Arabic channels that no one ever watches. It was quite old too.

billkilpatrick - 3-12-2006 at 11:06 AM

very interesting ... never heard of "economy" and "alternate" playing before. i have to say that trying to squeeze instinct into a prescribed patten of "up" and "down" - particularly as they should end up sounding the same - might lead me to madness but i'm willing to give it a try.

are their additional patterns of plectrum use - something like the various rasgueo recognized for vihuela, baroque and flamenco guitar and charango? ... possibly with regional associations?

grazie - bill

jshead - 3-12-2006 at 11:20 AM

what I remember from my classes with Simon Shaheen is you always alternate up and down except generally you play down stroke on main beats or when you think it sounds better that way.
Up and down strokes should sound the same. You do that by being sure to stroke across both strings of a course.
The most 'fun' is to down stroke on a lower string then up stroke on the above string.

Jameel - 3-12-2006 at 12:05 PM

For me the right hand technique is always an interesting subject. It's the focus of my practice, it always seems. I've seen Simon Shaheen and other players play a series of notes with all upstrokes. It gives a sort of twangier flavor to the sound. Take a look at this clip for an example.

jshead - 3-12-2006 at 12:48 PM

Right. if you think a series of upstrokes sounds good then you should do that.
My understading, which may very well be wrong, is that while down stroke is the dominate method for Arab oud that upstroke is dominate for Turkish. A turkish teacher I told me that and think also Simon. Wonder if there are any turkish players who have a perspective on that.

Nice Clip Jameelo

sydney - 3-12-2006 at 01:30 PM

I liked your example Jameel It shows the importance of both down and up strokes. Simon Shaheen has got a unique style and he knows exactly how "the strength" and when "the right notes" to use up strokes and down strokes.

I believe that if I played "Lamma Bada" twice for example, I will end up with two different styles where up/down strokes are never exactly the same each time.

It makes sense that down strokes would fall in the time of the main beat. It replaces the beat it self if there is no beat used. Clever players use the risha technique to replace the beat but it comes with practice.

There are many different names for the risha technique Economy is one of them, But I do not think the name economy is related to the oud rather it is kind of an advise to players.

What I used in my clip was 2 down and 1 up. It is a well known technique.

Microber - 3-12-2006 at 01:34 PM

I am learning oud since a few month only. But I played electric guitar since a long time. Then that technique is very familiar to me.
When I play electric guitar, downstroke and upstroke must not sound the same (for me...)
Both can sound with a different color. I think that can be very interresting.
As far as you play with two different rishas in the same time.
I am a too young oud player to experiment it.
Does someone do that ?

jazzchiss - 3-13-2006 at 02:41 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by dubai244
Basicelly, If you hear the spanish guitar players, They play 100 tones in one Minute! Really Fast or the Rock Electrical Guitar players, they do same thing, This is actually " Inverted Risha"!!!
......
In the Europian music, it is played by the most spanish classic-guitar players and good examples are Paco De lucia, Paco Pena and others. Even i heard it in Bethoven and Mazart music.


I think is quite crazy to talk about Spanish players playing ‘inverted risha’ because they play without any plectrum.
Flamenco guitarists have essentially the same right hand technique than classical ones, plus some effects like ‘rasgueado’.

Microber - 3-13-2006 at 02:50 AM

I agree with you Jazzchiss.

peppeo77 - 3-13-2006 at 03:33 AM

Well, I agree that the flamenco style is played basically with the nails of the right hand. Their impressive speed is due to their practice on this style (most of them use just 2 fingers, instead of the three you use on the classical guitar style). The inverted risha in the western guitar style is called 'alternate picking', and the rule is very simple :one stroke down and one stroke up! Many teacher disagree on using 'economy picking', though I think it depends on what you have to play (if it's something slow in a speedy tune, I like to use economy picking too). Anyway I found out that an ordinary oud player has got a more defined techique than a professional guitar player here in italy... :) expecially if we talk about alternate picking...or inverted risha.
Salamat, ciao, giuseppe.

billkilpatrick - 3-13-2006 at 07:40 AM

on the following site:

http://www.xs4all.nl/%7Eamarin/Page1.html

there are photographs of lute related paintings from the medieval/renaissance periods. the following are examples from the list in which the european lute is played with plectrum:

http://www.xs4all.nl/%7Eamarin/Page1-Pages/Image53.html

http://www.xs4all.nl/%7Eamarin/Page1-Pages/Image81.html

http://www.xs4all.nl/%7Eamarin/Page1-Pages/Image78.html

http://www.xs4all.nl/%7Eamarin/Page1-Pages/Image160.html

http://www.xs4all.nl/%7Eamarin/Page1-Pages/Image171.html

recently, i've tried both "economic" and "alternative" styles of picking on my oud and found that "alternative" (more or less what i've instinctively been doing since i first started playing the oud) works very well with a flexible plectrum held in the traditional "risha" posture but that "economic" makes my head hurt.

conversely, "economic" works very well, albeit slowly, when the plectrum is held like a pen (depicted in one of the examples listed above) and that "alternative" - particularly with a rigid plectrum - produces something like a plucked lute sound. rhythm suffers, however.

for me, tremolo is easy in the former and slow and clumsy in the latter.

- bill

Brian Prunka - 3-13-2006 at 02:08 PM

My experience is that economy picking on the oud really only works for successive downstrokes, rarely for sucessive upstrokes.
In fact, a kind of "un-economical" (if I can call it that) picking occurs a lot, where you use two downstrokes in a row when crossing from a higher string to a lower one (say from g to d).


In my lessons with Simon, we have dealt with this is great detail. One of the things he stressed was that picking is dependent on both sound and on which strings you're playing on. You should work to get your upstrokes to sound just as strong as your downstrokes, and be able to control the volume so that either one can be louder or softer.

As for strings:

there are 3 ways you can play successive notes on the oud, as far as strings go:
1. same string
2. lower string to higher string
3. higher string to lower string

there 4 ways you can play successive notes, as far as picking goes:
a. down-down
b. down-up
c. up-down
d. up-up

this yields 12 possible types of motion, when both picking and strings are taken into account:
a1, a2, a3, b1, b2, b3, etc.

the most common (because easiest) of these are:
a1, a2, a3: down-down, any string combination
b1, b2: down-up, same string or lower string to higher string.
c1, c2, c3: up-down, any string combination

Simon recommends practicing all of these a LOT, just on open strings (i.e., no left hand) or with simple patterns (such as skipping strings).

the other 4 kinds of motion are significantly more difficult and are rarely very practical in very fast passages
b3: down-up, higher string to lower
d1, d3: up-up, higher string to lower (this is useful when some notes in a phrase are hammered-on or pulled-off), or same string.
d2: up-up, lower string to higher--this is probably the least practical.

so, it's not really so simple as "alternate" vs. "economy"; there are 8 types of common motion and 4 uncommon types. All professional oud players that I've heard use the 8 common types of motion, which include both "alternate" and "economy" motions.

A good exercise for strengthening your upstrokes is this:
(with a metronome on the beat; d=down, u=up; CAPS represent emphasis)
4/4 ||: D u D u D u D u | d U d U d U d U :||
||: U d U d U d U d | u D u D u D u D :||

Brian Prunka - 3-13-2006 at 02:12 PM

by the way, dubai244, 100 notes a minute is really slow :D
I can play almost 600/min on guitar, somewhat less on oud . . . and I'm not particularly fast . . .

dubai244 - 3-13-2006 at 09:38 PM

hi, Brian
I wish to be like you man .... i am trying now a days to increase my speed by practicing some turkish music and listening specially to Yordal Tokcan. I guess he is the best in Inverted Risha. All his music and Taksims are based on Inverted Risha, without it, you can not play any of his music.
Could you please make me a favour? I have little idea about how to read music notes and tones, and i learn them as (Do , Ray, mee , faa, sool, La, Seee , DO), But i dont know what (A, B, C .....etc) means ?
Is it DO=A , B=Ray ...etc???!!
Thanks for sharing you experience................;)

Do Ree Mee

sydney - 3-13-2006 at 10:47 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by dubai244
I learn them as (Do , Ray, mee , faa, sool, La, Seee , DO), But i dont know what (A, B, C .....etc) means ?


A = La,
B = se,
C = do,
D= ree,
E=mee,
F= faa,
G=sool,

amtaha - 3-13-2006 at 11:19 PM

The structured discussion of picking is both illuminating and exciting.

Thanks Brian.

zalzal - 3-14-2006 at 01:47 PM

a video posted by Jameel in professional clips forum:

http://www.9sekiz.com/yurdaltokcan/content/html/videolar.asp

Nice view on Yordal Tokcan inverted risha

billkilpatrick - 3-15-2006 at 01:37 AM

in the april 2004 issue of "lute news" from the lute society of great britain, in an article entitled "playing the lute of medieval europe," professor joseph baldassare mentions 3 styles of plectrum technique:

- traditional oud style position with the tip of the risha held between the pad of the thumb and index finger with the remaining length of the shaft gripped along the inside of the palm. there's early european iconography showing this.

- illustrations for a second technique exist in some 12th and 14th cent. iconography in which the risha is held in a similar manner as the tradional position but with the hand placed below the strings, palm facing up with the plectrum at an angle to the strings. the risha is held between the thumb and index finger but the shaft passes along the length of the index finger, covering the knuckle - a bit like holding a pen.

- a third technique discussed in the article, prevalent in 15th cent. court settings, places the hand over the strings with the palm facing the body of the instrument. the risha is held between the thumb and index finger or middle finger with the shaft passing between the middle and index finger near the base. this has been referred to as "fan picking" and is usually illustrated with a small plectrum - a barbless ostrich feather, baldassare suggests - but can also be seen with larger quill or horn shard.

each of these techniques is discussed in terms of proper use of down and up stroke but as i'm too cheap to join the lute society and receive their news letter, i only have part 1 of the article.

in any case, may i suggest that for those way down here at my level of play, "doing what comes naturally" is the best way to play your instrument and any discussion of proper technique - while interesting - is secondary to that.

- bill

Ronny Andersson - 3-19-2006 at 02:39 PM

Here a video showing some risha/playing technique:
http://www.iraqioud.com/picts/ron3.wmv

billkilpatrick - 3-19-2006 at 02:56 PM

thanks ronny but my steam driven imac can't handle it (installation failed). if you've any information of early european documentation for plectrum use, please let me know.

mega-galactic ciao - bill

Ronny Andersson - 3-19-2006 at 02:59 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by billkilpatrick
thanks ronny but my steam driven imac can't handle it (installation failed). if you've any information of early european documentation for plectrum use, please let me know.

mega-galactic ciao - bill


steam driven..cool, sure I read your post on lute list about eagle quill and a reply is on the way...

LeeVaris - 3-19-2006 at 03:54 PM

Very Cool Ronny...

I sure wish I could see your whole right hand though. The risha seems to have a fairly steep angle relative to the strings - are you holding it with the back end coming between the ring and little fingers or is your whole hand covering the risha?

That Fawsy oud sounds great! :airguitar:

Ronny Andersson - 3-21-2006 at 10:14 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by LeeVaris
Very Cool Ronny...

I sure wish I could see your whole right hand though. The risha seems to have a fairly steep angle relative to the strings - are you holding it with the back end coming between the ring and little fingers or is your whole hand covering the risha?

That Fawsy oud sounds great! :airguitar:


Thanks Lee, yes the whole hand is covering the risha; they are no technical advantages with holding it between the ring and little finger. The angle is step due to my right hand position that is more paralell to the bridge. I play with a eagle risha which is a soft risha and very expressfull to play with. I'll post a more detailed video which demonstrates also some right hand finger plucking.

Lael - 11-21-2013 at 02:51 PM

Hello All,

New here but have been reading threads since July. I am primarily a guitarist and contra-bassist (s string). Been studying since 1986. In July I finally made the long desired switch to the Arabic Oud. As a lead guitarist I am comfortable with and aware of the various picking styles and have always focused on economy of movement. About two months ago I was accepted as a student with an Iraqi oud master. we meet every couple weeks. He has me doing some right hand exercises with maqamat practice that are hurting my head.

Down up Down Down repeat.

and

Down Down Up repeat

The problem I am running into is that at times It causes an upstroke on the first note on the next course when applying to playing straight maqam practice.

Anyone tracking what I am saying here? Any ideas would be great.

Lael - 11-21-2013 at 03:40 PM

Interesting. Keep in mind that i am new to the oud. I just met with my teacher again. I understand now (again) that "rules" are to be broken here and there; That being that when you start a new course you begin with a down stroke (general rule in Arabic style if I am correct). I was struggling with having an upstroke on the first note of a new course while performing an add a note and drop a note maqam exercise with a repeating Down Down Up stoke pattern. In example:

FYI: I am tuned FADGCF and executing this in Maqam Kurd Re ( Phrygian D)

re mi fa
mi fa sol
fa sol la
sol la si
la si do
si do re

Ascending and descending

I was finding that I was having an upstroke on the first note of a new course..hence breaking the down stroke rule. Yet this is exactly what was expected of me to do...work on that upstroke on a new course.

Again...I am new to the oud and just trying to figure it all out.

Lael - 11-21-2013 at 03:41 PM

BTW. realized that I am off topic of the last post...a mistake on my part.

Jody Stecher - 11-21-2013 at 03:56 PM

Respects to your teacher. He/She has chosen exercises to help your right hand attain complete freedom to easily do what you want it to do, or to do what the moment of music requires. A downstroke on each arrival at a new string gives a characteristic "old fashioned" sound which is both lovely and not heard as often as it used to be. It was common in 19th century Italian mandolin playing as well, and in other traditions of double course instruments. But it's good to be *able* to not do that. And some passages of oud music require continuous down-ups, or other patterned movements that may involve an upstroke as the first sound on a new string. These exercises will help you to be able to do these things easily. Good for guitar as well.
Quote: Originally posted by Lael  
Interesting. Keep in mind that i am new to the oud. I just met with my teacher again. I understand now (again) that "rules" are to be broken here and there; That being that when you start a new course you begin with a down stroke (general rule in Arabic style if I am correct). I was struggling with having an upstroke on the first note of a new course while performing an add a note and drop a note maqam exercise with a repeating Down Down Up stoke pattern. In example:

FYI: I am tuned FADGCF and executing this in Maqam Kurd Re ( Phrygian D)

re mi fa
mi fa sol
fa sol la
sol la si
la si do
si do re

Ascending and descending

I was finding that I was having an upstroke on the first note of a new course..hence breaking the down stroke rule. Yet this is exactly what was expected of me to do...work on that upstroke on a new course.

Again...I am new to the oud and just trying to figure it all out.