When pruning the first thing you want to do is take off any dead wood. Start at the top of a cane and snip off about an inch or so and look at the inside. If it is brown, tan or dried up looking it is dead. Go down another few inches and snip again. If it is still brown keep going down the cane in small amounts until the center is white or greenish and looks moist. From there down it should be alive. If you have gone all the way down the cane to the crown and found no white or green moist center then take the whole cane off as close to the crown as possible without injuring the crown. Do this with each cane. When that is done stand back and look at the shape of the bush and decide from there what else you want to take off for shaping. When you make your shaping cuts try to cut at a 45 degree angle about a quarter inch above an outward facing leaf node. Those are the points where new growth will begin. I don't worry about the speckled canes. It is usually from the cold or can be over wintering black spot. You've already used the neem oil so it should not be a problem. It usually disappears once it's warmed up.
