Guitar techniques to learn.

finger picking should be subdivided... rhyming off a few types of finger picking:

Alternating (between I and m). tremelo, travis picking, etc.

see, i express my ignorance, can you explain these different techniques, i can guess at tremelo (like on a bass right?), and alternate seems sensible enough but i dont know bout travis picking.

could you link to a lesson or something?

tremelo picking is very fast picking. The best example I can think of is in Eruption. Theres a part that is just like 4 notes, but eddie plays them very fast, it's all on the high E string. 12, 16, 19, 17, 16, 17, 14,16,12,14. But he plays each note I think three times or 4 times maybe, very quickly. If you have the song you should be able to hear it.

Edit: On your list, I'd say vibrato followed by alternate picking is the most important. Vibrato adds a measure of feeling that is very important.

There's also legato, and you could subdivide that into pull-offs and hammer-ons.

Vibrato can be subdivided:

Classical Vibrato
Rock Vibrato
Circular Vibrato

Don't forget:
String bending
String skipping
Double stops
Alternating bass strum

Just about any of those techniques can be subdivided. Bends can be single string, two string, oblique... choked, released, reciprocating (up & down & up & down)... even something like tapped harmonics has different approaches - Hedges does it differently from Van Halen, etc.

You'll never come up with a complete list, because variations happen all the time. Heck, I was just rehearsing some stuff for a solo gig this weekend, and I came up with a new 8-finger percussive tapping thing that I may try out :)

You don't have to know every technique under the sun, it all depends on style really: blues and rock players should be experts at bending, sliding, legato and alternate picking, but sweep picking and fingerpicking are less important. Whereas Classical players would concentrate on fingerpicking, legato and Metal players might concentrate on sweep picking and legato.

The big one I would say would be that any technique you develop, you develop fully. Try as many variations as possible, do a drill ascending and descending, on all strings, really work up that finger agility!

If you always fall back on the same exact feel with your techniques, your playing will feel stale pretty quickly, and you won't fit into a lot of musical situations. Sometimes the music calls for a large, slow vibrato, sometimes it calls for a quick, small vibrato. Listen for which one you need, and develop competence in both!

Remember, it's all about the music, learn accordingly. 8)

i know about tremelo strumming with a pick, wasnt sure with finger picking....

the thing with me is im interested in most styles of music. what i was intending to do was spend a month learning individual techniques technique (unless i dont quite grasp it in which case 2 months).

Thanks for the help guys, i have a nice list to begin working on now :D

Theres always the whammy bar too!