10 Things You Can Practice Without a Guitar in Your Hands

Although you might not always have a guitar to practice on the spot, there are many things you can still practice when you don’t have a guitar with you. As a matter of fact: really great musicians have gotten to the level they are at, because they are so passionate about music that they constantly found ways to practice things wherever they had some time to kill and wherever they were at, with our without their guitar. These exercises are also great in the unfortunate event if you were for example to injure an arm or hand. When that happens, a music student usually gets incredibly discouraged. No need to anymore, you can still progress strongly even if you can’t play guitar for a while: here are some of the many things you can practice without your guitar.

1. Memorize Key Signatures
   You don’t need an instrument around to memorize key signatures. Use flashcards! Make a stack of flashcards that covers every key/scale, and make a stack of cards for every key signature (a number of #’s or b’s). Keep both stacks separate. Shuffle one of the stacks of cards; then begin the drill. Card you just pulled says 3#’s; answer, that is A. Take next card, and so on. Figure out the answer if you are not sure. If you don’t know how to figure this out, have your teacher cover this with you, or read up on keys signatures. Do this till you run out of cards, then take the other stack, and do the same drill. Card you just pulled says “4b’s”, figure it out and when you are sure, blurt out the answer: “Ab scale”. You will be amazed how quickly you will have all key signatures memorized. If you master this, start doing the same drills again but for minor scales.

2. Sight Reading Notes & Rhythms
   Take any sheet music of any piece of music you haven’t seen before and practice sight-reading the notes or rhythmic placement of the notes. You could tap your foot or conduct the beat with your arm, and read or sing the names of the notes, or sing the rhythms. Practicing rhythms, you could say “ta” (1/4^th notes), “tata” 1/8^th notes), “tatata” (triplets), “tatatata” (4/16^ths), etc. This is great practice to get better at reading notes and rhythms on the spot

3. Listen to Music.

Given that music is a language, one of the necessary tasks to learn a language is listening to it. Listen analytically! What is the key? Is it a major or minor key? How many song sections? How long are they? What is the style? How does the song feel, the vibe? Why does it have that sound and vibe? Any guitar solos?

Listen to music you would not normally listen to. It will greatly expand your range of influences, your ear, your taste and your musicianship.

4. Get Familiar with the Fret Board
   Guess what? You actually don’t need your guitar to practice your fret board and to memorize where all the notes are located. You could practice this while being stuck in your car in traffic, or while waiting in line in the bank or the super market. Here’s how: pick any random note, for example F#, then from the bass string to the treble string, try to figure out all the fret locations for the F# notes by heart, staying within 12 frets. (2, 9, 4, 11, 7, 2). It is a very fun challenge, and it is motivating to see how much better you get at finding the note locations when you do this exercise regularly. Do this for all 12 notes. You will be amazed how strongly you’ll still improve doing those non-guitar drills that you can do anywhere, even I you cannot play as much guitar as you would like to.

5. Practice Rhythm
   Walking is healthy: it’s very good for you. Now: while you’re taking care of your body, you could train your mind as well in the meantime. And what better way to train your mind, than with rhythm exercises? Here’s how this works: use your footsteps, as beats in a metronome. Then count rhythms, on top of your steady walking pace. A quarter note, 1 note filling an entire beat, is the number “1”, 2 eighth notes, are counted as 1-2, a triplet is 1-2-3, sixteenth’s you count as 1234. So every footstep you set along your way, you basically on the spot improvise rhythms, counting for example: 1, 1-2, 1-2-3, 1-2-3-4, 1, 1-2, etc, any combination of 1, 12, 123, and 1234. The main challenge here: keeping the numbers in your triplet count (123) even, and feeling the difference between even numbered groupings (12, 1234) and odd numbered groupings (123). Once you get the feel for this: add triplets over 2 beats. (You then count 1-2-3 over two footsteps, called “quarter note triplets”). Then quintuplets (groupings of 5 notes, 12345), which you could count over 1 beat, or over 2 beats, etc. This is one of THE most efficient and effective ways to get the feel for combinations of even and odd numbered groupings of notes. More importantly, this exercise is so effective because it touches at the core of what rhythm is all about: it’s physical… it’s about motion. “Rhythm” is something you feel. You do this exercise whenever you’re walking, and I can assure you that you will be amazed at your accelerated rhythmic improvement. This will do wonders to your understanding of rhythm and your guitar rhythm playing.

6. Bar Chord Exercises.

Name any random chord, for example Bbm. Then name the fret numbers where you have the 2 bar chord versions of that chord. The answer would be: “Am shape bar chord on the 2^nd fret, Em shape bar chord on the 6^th fret.” This is like practicing guitar without your guitar, and the great thing is: you can literally practice this anywhere, everywhere, whenever.

7. Train Your Ear
   No guitar is needed to train your ear. You can just pop in an ear training CD or use online ear training resources to strengthen your aural interval and chord recognition. If you’re out and about: get one of the many ear-training apps for your phone so you can practice anywhere. This is one of THE most important things to work on as a musician. The better your ear, the easier it is to play with other musician. Having a well-trained ear also makes it easier to learn new scales, new songs, guitar solos, and so on. Your ear basically guides your fingers to the right locations when you can tell by ear what the notes are in a melody or in a chord. You should practice this every day, without any exception. This drill should be your priority.

8. Learn New Scales
   Learning a new scale doesn’t always have to include a guitar. Pick a new scale you wanted to learn. Memorize its structure and intervals. Memorize its scale formula. Memorize what the notes are. Mentally picture and visualize the scale on the fret board whenever you have a quick minute to spare. Try to see the fingerings and notes for that scale in every position visually on the fret board in your imagination. When after a long day of work, school or errands, you finally get home and you finally have time to pick up your guitar, you will be amazed and surprised to find out how quickly you will master the scale.

9. Brush Up on Music Theory
   When you are out and about with no guitar around, you can use downtime for memorization of music theory. Some of the things you can practice (besides the key signatures mentioned above):

·         Recite chords to songs you’re trying to memorize.

·         Memorize the notes in all major, minor, diminished and augmented triads.

·         Memorize I IV V in all 12 keys

·         Memorize the half step locations in all 12 major scales. (for example in the key of C, that would be E-F & B-C, in the key of A that would be C#-D & G#-A, etc.)

·         Memorize the 12-bar blues progression.

·         Memorize the chords in “Rhythm Changes”

·         Memorize all modal interchange chords.

·         Etc.

10. Improve Your Picking Technique and Dexterity Through Visualization.

Acquiring and possessing great technical facility on the instrument, is more mental than it is physical. Victor Wooten in his book “The Music Lesson” touches upon this. Neuroscientists discovered that imagining yourself doing a certain activity, still fires off the neurons in the brains that would fire if you were actually engaging into that activity. In other words: if you just imagine your fingers flying over the fret board super quickly like you’re playing a Randy Rhoads or Yngwie Malmsteen solo, then the neurons in your brain that would fire off if you were physically playing that solo, still fire off even if you are not playing it. That is why, once you acquired great technique, you typically don’t loose your technical abilities as quickly as most people generally think you would. Even if you never have time to practice as much as you would like to, your technique will not deteriorate if you occasionally visualize and imagine yourself playing technically advanced guitar parts. Dexterity, control and coordination are all controlled from the brain in the first place, not from the muscles.

You could literally practice on a daily basis for months on end on a certain picking technique exercise without seeing noticeable improvement. If that is the case: put the exercise away for a couple of months and don’t practice on it at all for that long. Instead: spent 10 minutes a day imagining and visualizing yourself playing that exercise super fast, way more quickly than you are currently physically capable off. However: in addition to imagining how you’re physically playing that line at the speed you are aiming for, you also want to feel the joy of that mastery, feeling a sense of happiness, awe and wonder over your accomplishment. Visualization of a goal + emotion attached to it = a sense that your goal is already accomplished. Your imagination will fire off the neurons in your brain that would fire off if you were physically playing that line, but without interference of the physical strain and pressure you put onto yourself when you are physically trying to push your muscles to accelerated motion while gradually speeding up your metronome. That strain works aversely on the results you are trying to get.

All this does not mean that you could become an amazingly technically advanced player without practicing dexterity and speed. It does however mean that you will get greater success and results when you take advantage of the power of your mind and of the workings of the brain. Nothing can substitute for practicing, but you might as well practice efficiently and use every trick and technique you can think off to speed up your results and boost your efficiency.

The road to mastery on guitar is a road with no end and no destination. There is always more to learn. As a result, the more quickly you learn and the more efficiently you learn, the more you get to discover and experience on your musical journey in this lifetime. The above ideas and exercises will help you deepen and enrich that musical journey, as you will have more time to play guitar, practicing the things you don’t need your guitar for whenever you have a minute and wherever you are.

10 Things I Learned the Hard Way About Guitar

This is one of these silly lists of 10 random things that I learned while being a guitar student. I wanted to share this with you because I figured you might be interested in avoiding some of the pitfalls I fell into. This list might potentially save you time and talent, and make you enjoy guitar even more than you already do.

1. “Playing” Is Not The Same Like “Practicing”
   We’ve all heard the fine arts joke: “How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, practice, practice!” There will never come a point when you no longer need to practice. Talented musicians might be able to play fairly well without regular practice, but not practicing means settling for being a mediocre musician at best. And yes: this is regardless of how much talent one possesses. You will find that guitar is much more fun when you practice more regularly. You will only feel like you’re in a rut with guitar, when you have not learned anything new in a while. Moreover: “practicing” is not to be confused with “playing”. You don’t hone your skills playing; you hone your skills practicing. “Playing” is having fun doing things you can already do. You are then in your comfort zone and not growing as much. “Practicing” is when you spend time working on the things you suck at on guitar. That is where you really become much better.
   
   
2. Don’t Skip a Guitar Lesson
   Many guitarists will skip or cancel an upcoming guitar lesson intentionally, thinking they need more time to practice before they are ready for another lesson. Think about this: a 4-year degree program at a music college would turn out into a 20-year project if you would skip a week because you don’t have everything down yet from the previous week. I have news for you: “you will never master guitar”. You will also never become as good at guitar if you meet irregularly with you guitar teacher. After all, human nature dictates that skipping lesson weeks won’t buy you more time: it will only make you procrastinate more. When you skip a guitar lesson, you are wasting your time and talent. With more time in between lessons, you will forget part of the material covered, might have bad habits creeping in more easily, and could lose a chance to gain valuable insight on where you need further improvement. Every guitar instructor knows out of experience that the student who switches from meeting weekly to 2 –weekly, drops out within 2 max 3 months time after that. Months later that student typically starts up again: with huge regret over having dropped out.

3. Practice New Material at A Slow Pace.
   Einstein said half a century ago, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results.” Yet: it is amazing how often guitar students persistently keep retrying to play something they can’t play yet, at a pace that is way beyond what they are capable off. The fastest way to master anything is by doing it really slowly at first. This gives your brain and muscles the time to feel the motions, put all actions and decisions in the right order and process it all. This instills patience, self-discipline and control. Then you gradually speed up the action in small increments with a metronome, and keep pushing your dexterity, coordination, speed and control.

4. Make Extra Copies of Your Charts

You will see this happening over and over again: your band decides to add 10 cover tunes to the set of originals, and you will be the only one who is prepared and who comes with the chord charts written out. Not only that: they will all try to have a look at your charts. Your charts will pass through everybody’s hands at the rehearsal, and you will find that there are pages missing when you come back home after rehearsal. Or a new band you auditioned for, hires you and you have your first rehearsal. You’re nervous, and you forget your charts there after rehearsal, or spill a drink over them. It never hurts to have an extra copy of your charts in your guitar case, and one in your house. You can never accidentally forget to bring your charts to rehearsal when you always keep a copy in your guitar case, and anything can happen with those charts, you know you always have a copy at home still.

5. Don’t Travel on a Plane With a Hard Case

If you think air travel is easier with your guitar in a hard case, think again! Hard cases don’t fit in overhead compartments. If you travel with a hard case, you might be forced to check it in as regular luggage. When your guitar is checked in through baggage claim, there is a higher likelihood that it might get damaged, even if it is in a hard case. The solution: always take your guitar with you in a soft case, also called a gig bag. Those are smaller in size than hard cases. As a result: they fit into the overhead compartments. Walk through check in, airport gate and on the plane without saying a word about it, carrying your gig bag on your back or over your shoulder. Nobody is going to give you any fuzz about it.

6. Cut Down The Variables In How You Hold Your Guitar.

Always practice holding the guitar the way you would be holding it as if you were performing in front of 50,000 people already. You want to do so even if your goals on guitar are not that ambitious. More often than not, guitar students sit with their guitar resting on the leg that is on the side of their strumming hand. Meaning: right-handed guitarists rest the guitar on their right leg. In other words: the guitar is positioned on the outside of your body, instead of centered. However: if you have your guitar naturally hanging from your shoulder with a strap when you’re standing up, your guitar naturally wants to be in the center of your body. When then you take a seat, your guitar naturally always wants to go on the leg that is on the side of your fretting hand, the other leg (or in other words: centered with the guitar body between both legs). You will save yourself a lot of time when you get used to holding your guitar positioned between your legs when sitting, which is in the center of your body at any time. This cuts down the variables: your guitar will feel the same whether you’re sitting down or standing up. Time and time again guitar students have found out that they had to relearn or practice things when skills they had acquired practicing seated with their guitar on the outside leg, could no longer be performed as flawlessly standing up in a real life performance situation with other musicians.

7. Always Keep Spares
   Take spares of everything with you at all times because you never know what you might encounter or need in the moment. Keep an extra set or two of strings, extra guitar picks, maybe even an extra capo, cable, extra wrenches or string winder. It’s funny how that works: but you will find that you will only break a string, that one time you actually forgot to bring a spare set. It’s always good to be prepared.

8. Put Your Cable Behind Your Guitar Strap and Use Strap Locks.

One of the more embarrassing things you can go through as a guitarist in front of an audience: is suddenly going dead quiet in the middle of a guitar solo because you pulled your cable out of your guitar by accident. This would be the case when you step on your cable. That is not as embarrassing as having the hunch down to pick your cable up from the floor with a red face, followed by loud cracking noises as you nervously fumble to try to find the input jack on your guitar while your amp is still on. When that happens: I can assure you that you will never again forget to put your cable behind your strap. Doing so makes it impossible to pull the cable out of your guitar by accident. And trust me: you will most likely end up stepping on your cord at one point or another in every show you play. Not quite as embarrassing, but not really fun either, is when your guitar drops off of your shoulder because the strap somehow became unfastened. It’s annoying when your strap unhooks during a performance and you have to fumble to keep you guitar in your possession and not on the floor. There is simple solution: strap locks. They are cheap and make that your strap cannot unhook from the guitar without your intervention.

9. Being Prepared is Better Than Being Talented
   Bach supposedly said in his time: “It’s 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration”. Now if HE said it: there probably must be something about it worth considering. The same can be said about talent. Talent does not get you anywhere without development and training of that talent. You might be the most talented guitarist ever but if you’re not prepared, your talent will get you nowhere. Being prepared means: having charts ready before going to rehearsal, having the material mastered, having practiced enough, having your act together, having answers to questions that might arise, and being organized. People like it when you show up prepared. Being prepared by the way: also makes you appear smarter. I can’t begin to count the times people mistook my being prepared for being talented. You are and feel more confident when you are prepared. Everybody mistakes this for being more talented.

You Will Never Fool Your Teacher
Your teacher can always tell instantly how much you practiced in past week. Not only that: a great teacher will also be able to tell by your vibe, whether you’ve been slacking on practicing because you were exceptionally busy or because you tend to slack and procrastinate. He will also feel your nervousness, even you if you try to hide or control it. A pro teacher is trained at reading people and their energies. He more than likely understands and knows you much better than you think he does. 

10 Good Reasons Why You Want To Master Triads.

All too often music students think off triads (3 note chords) as being too basic. They want to rush to “the cool stuff”, those fancy 7^th chords. Well folks: “triads” ARE the cool stuff!

They are the basic foundation of our harmony. After all, the definition of a chord is: 3 different notes played simultaneously. Here’s 10 examples showing that “basic” in this case does not mean “boring”.

Triads are important chords to know about. You should be able to effortlessly find any inversion of any triad on any string-set. Here’s 10 reasons for you to want to practice them.

1)     Jump (Van Halen, the keyboard part)

2)     Fool in The Rain (Led Zeppelin)

3)     Reggae

4)     Back in Black (ACDC)

5)     The intro to Free Ride (Edgar Winter)

6)     “We Are Family”, “Get up (Like a sex machine)”, and other funky songs.

7)     Soul Man (Sam and Dave), and other soul music classics.

8)     The melody of The Star-Spangled Banner

9)     Fret board mastery

10)  Coming up with more melodic improvised lines.

10 Mistakes That Slow Down Guitar Student’s Progress.

Everything is mental. Your progress is for a great deal dependent upon your mind, mental state, thoughts and beliefs. In order to maximize the outcome of your musical development, it helps to be positive and adopt a mindset geared towards progress and towards learning without pressure.

1. Not Keeping Your Focus
   It’s hard to get anything done if your mind is constantly diverted away from what you are working on. Shut down your phone if you have to, refrain from checking your Facebook, and force your attention to stay focused on what you are working on. In doing so, you will get much more done in much lesser amount of time. One of the things that help is to imprint in your mind how important the exercise is that you are focusing on. It is easier to keep your attention on a task when that task feels like something that is very important for your future. Another thing that helps is seeing things in the right perspective. If you see where the task you are working on fits in, into the bigger picture of what your goals are, you are probably going to feel more driven to get that task done. Chop big projects up into smaller tasks. It is easier to keep your attention on smaller tasks. Learning guitar is a big project. Have short drills that you can do in 10-15 minutes. By the time your focus is about to waver, you are already on to the next exercise.

2. Practicing Inefficiently
   The smarter you practice, the better your progress is going to be. A primary example of inefficient practice: trying to conquer something you can’t play well yet, at a speed that is way beyond what you are capable off. That is a huge time waster. Slower is faster. The more slowly you practice something, the faster you are going to master it. Another example of inefficient practice habits: doing the same drills for too long at a time. It is much better to practice something 3 times in a day for 10 minutes at a time, than practicing it for half an hour. Limit your practice time to 15-minute sessions for most guitar exercises. Sigh-reading and technique exercises can be worked on in longer stretches. Practicing rhythm and technique without a metronome is another example of inefficient practice. Your rhythm playing and technique are much more efficiently trained with a metronome. That steady pulse/beat is necessary to guide you in training your time feel and your technical abilities. Without a metronome: you are merely wasting precious time and talent.
   
   
3. Not Having Clear Goals or Direction
   If you’re not sure that the direction you are moving to, is where you really want to go to: are you still progressing? This is a valid question when you consider that life passes by very quickly, and that there is an endless array of topics to learn when it comes to guitar and music. Following questions are helpful in defining what you want to learn. Why do you play guitar? What kind of guitarist are you hoping to become? What is your favorite style of music? What do you love playing the most? Who are your favorite guitar players? How do you see yourself as a guitarist 2,3,5,10 years from now. The answers to these questions will reveal your direction. Once that has been established: you can set your goals to get you forward in that direction. Someone who wants to become a jazz guitarist is going to have a very different learning experience with very different goals than someone who wants to become a killer shred metal player. Someone who wants to learn classical is going to have very different goals and exercises than someone who merely wants to learn how to strum songs. Someone who is hoping to write songs and become a good songwriter is going to have different goals and training than someone who wants to improve his music reading or who wants to start up a cover band. Know what you want to learn: then research how to get there, so you can set goals to move you forward on your journey.

4. The “I’m a Perfectionist” Trap
   This is a tremendous mental obstacle for many people, that does a lot of damage to their progress. First off: striving for perfection is useless because there is no such thing. “Perfection” is in the eye of the beholder. It is subjective. Moreover: that frame of mind puts so much pressure onto the person who claims and beliefs he’s a perfectionist, that the unnecessary strain he causes hampers his progress. After all: it’s hard to move forward when you’re terrified you might make a mistake on your next move. I’ve got news for you: nobody cares about perfection. By the same token: nobody likes being around someone who is so hard on himself. People just want to have fun and listen to some good music, and they much rather prefer to spend that time with someone who is relaxed and self-loving. Lastly: there is also the danger of the “I’m a perfectionist” statement to turn into an excuse you use to justify your lack of practice, progress and focus. That really will get you stuck in your progress. “Oh well… It’s hard for me to get myself to practice enough because I get so bugged by all these mistake I am making… which is hard to deal with for a perfectionist”. Ah excuses: Don’t use them… pick up your guitar and have fun with it!

5. Excuses and Negative Beliefs
   Let’s elaborate a bit more on excuses. Excuses are born out of negative beliefs about yourself. Nothing good has ever come out of anything “negative”. Beliefs such as, “I learn differently,” “My hands are too big/small,” “I’ve never been good at theory,” “This is hard,” “I can’t do this,” “My mind works differently,” “I should have started younger,” and “I have a problem playing this” will get you absolutely nowhere because they keep you captured and enslaved. Those are merely stories you tell yourself, not reality. “Excuses” are what you get when you turn those stories into reasons that you try to come up with to explain why you could not achieve your goal, or find enough time to practice, or get something done. Excuses drag down your inner power, and weaken your results, strength and progress. Why would you even get started practicing that 1 song that has a bit of a stretch in one of the chords, if “your hands are too small anyway” (which hands never are, unless you really make yourself believe so)? If you catch yourself holding on to a belief that will decapitate your progress, start changing these negative thoughts into positive ones such as. You’re never too old, your hands are definitely not too small or too large, you have enough brain to learn anything in any possible way, and you can do this. And nothing is ever “hard”, but everything can be “challenging”. Replace the negative words with positive ones in your language. Nothing is ever “a problem”, but always merely “a situation”.  
   
   
6. Not Pushing Hard Enough
   Pushing yourself to go above and beyond your comfort zone is going to skyrocket your progress. You are capable of much more than you think you are. The longer you stay in your comfort zone, the more you are missing out on making amazing discoveries on your musical journey. Nobody ever learned or progressed to higher states of being and abilities by staying in his comfort zone.  Constantly expose yourself to adventures and experiences where you have to find your way and resolve hairy situations you never encountered before. The cool feeling of achievement that kicks in is priceless. It surely beats having an easy life, where everything comes natural to you, and where you already know now how your life is going to look like 10-20 years from now. Take lessons, dare to go down, dare to make mistakes, book shows on very tight deadlines, jam with people who are much better, play a style you suck at and book a show in 3 days where you have to play that style, start a tribute band covering the music of a guitarist who is beyond your capabilities, etc.

7. Self-Teaching
   Self-study is a complete waste of talent. Even if your goals are modest: it pays off to achieve these goals in a more efficient way and in much shorter time. A teacher who does this for a living, will inspire you more deeply, hold you accountable, save you lots of time and hassle trying to figure things out, save you a lot of time not having to unlearn things over time, and provide you with the resources to learn what you would like to learn. Time and time again: students who previously were self-taught and decided to start taking lessons: acknowledge to their first teacher that they are having so much more fun because they learn so much more and so much more quickly. Even only trying to find the resources: can waste so much of your time. There is so much information out there online about guitar: having to sort through it could almost become a day job. Not to mention the fact that you are still not sure then how accurate the information is. Everybody and his grandma posts stuff on the Internet. The time you spend trying to find the information and exercises you are looking for: could be time well spent actually practicing your guitar, which is where the progress lies. 

8. Being Flaky
   Skipping lessons, showing up late, procrastinating, watching TV while you could be learning: all of those are discipline issues. If it is hard for you to get yourself to practice guitar and be diligent: then maybe guitar is simply not your thing. Things you really like doing; you naturally will want to do all the time without any pressure. If it feels like “work”, then it is not your thing. If you do really like playing guitar, and you want to get a lot better at it, but you still have a hard time being diligent or punctual: then it is time to address those is traits in your personality, because you will at some point feel a decline in your love for guitar. Part of what makes guitar so much fun, is learning new things and seeing yourself getting better at it. You don’t quite have that happening if you don’t spent enough time with your guitar on a regular basis. 

9. Over Analyzing
   I always liked the “analysis-paralysis” idea. A great deal of time can be wasted over over-analyzing things. Especially people who are more left brained (engineers, scientists, accountants…) tend to fall in that category. It never ceased to amaze me how very intelligent people, contradictory to what you would expect, more often than not tend to be the ones who struggle the hardest with guitar. If you are a more left brained oriented person, then guitar will be great for you as it will lead to a more balanced brain usage. “Over analysis” is not exclusive to logical and analysis minded people though. Relinquish the need for control (which is what over-analyzing is all about, it contains the word “anal” after all), and simply start strumming and having fun without wondering why or how things are working. Trust that the inner workings will reveal themselves over time, as they always do. Guitar and music are as much about “feel”, “motion”, “flow” and “intuition”. Play, the rest will figure itself out.
   
   

Buying a Cheap Guitar
Though having an expensive guitar is not necessarily going to help your progress if you don’t practice enough, having a poorly made guitar is not going to motivate you to practice either. After all: the cheaper the guitar, the poorer the craftsmanship, the harder the instrument typically is to play. You do not need a top-of-the-line guitar to become a good guitarist, but it surely helps to have an instrument that works with you, not against you. When your guitar is harder to play due to poorer craftsmanship: you might become demotivated. You might start thinking guitar is hard, or not for you. Before you start putting yourself down, take some time out to visit a guitar store and try out the things you are struggling with on a more top-end of the line guitar. You might be surprised to find out that you are a much better guitarist than you think you are, on a better-built instrument. If money is an issue: try eBay or Craigslist and buy a used guitar. Learning guitar is much more fun on a great guitar that suits you well.

7 Ways to Get a Great Guitar Tone, No Equipment Necessary!

Though great guitarists typically use expensive, state-of-the-art gear, they would still sound great playing much lesser quality equipment. Great music isn’t produced as much by the equipment that goes into the musician’s hands as it is by his personality, heart, technique and energy. Here are a few great ways to learn how to improve your sound and tone without using any extra equipment!

1. Technique.

I am sure you’ve heard it said before, that your sound is in your fingers. While that is a bit of an oversimplification (it is always easier to sound great on an expensive rig), technique for sure is one of the determining factors in creating great quality of tone. Following are a couple of the very common mistakes that diminish the tone quality on guitar.

·         Pressing too hard on the strings: the intonation goes sharp and everything sounds out of tune when you do so.

·         Not playing on your fingertips: this too can affect intonation, fullness of tone, and dexterity.

·         Hold the pick too tightly: this creates a forced sound. It also makes that you hear every individual string attack when you strum. Always hold your pick very loosely and relaxed. Don’t press on it.

·         Hitting strings too hard: keep a moderate attack. It makes the notes sound plinky when you pick them hard, as you hear too much pick attack mixed in with the string vibration.

·         Hitting strings too softly. That too is common. You want to make sure that your string has enough vibration to sound full and big.

·         Bad finger position: make sure your fingers are right behind the frets to avoid any string buzz against the frets.

·         Not playing with vibrato: this makes the sound lifeless. All life vibratos and is in motion: gently and slowly moving the string up and down after playing a note, adds life and air to that note. In addition: not controlling your vibrato can be distracting. A nice vibrato is typically slow and controlled, otherwise it sounds quivering and distracting.

·         Tension in the fretting hand: takes away fullness of sound. While this is very subtle, a tense hand is a bit like a tense vocal chord: you create a more nasally sound that lacks warmth.

·         Not using the tone knob and volume knob: it is mind blowing how often those are overlooked. A volume knob, does not only affect the volume: it also affects tone a bit.

Other things that help: heavier gauge strings, thicker/heavier picks.

2. Proper Set Up.

This certainly helps to make the instrument sound its best. Hand this over to a guitar repair professional.  He will make sure that the intonation is optimal, that any string buzz is fixed, that the action is optimal, and so on. Tip: when your strings go out of tune after using your tremolo bridge, lubricating the nut with graphite powder will improve tuning stability.

3. Develop Your Personality.

It’s been said before, that you can tell a musician’s personality by how he plays 1 note. How does he hold the instrument? How does he carry himself? Is he sitting slouchy or is he rather sitting straight and uptight while playing, or something in between? Is he expressive, or self-conscious? Is the guitarist impatient? When a guitarist has a tendency to place his phrases ahead of the beat, what does that tell you about him as a person? When on the other hand, a guitarist sounds very relaxed, playing all his phrases very freely behind the beat, guess who is going to be the easier, more fun person to get along with? When a guitarist has a tendency to cut his phrases short, or rush the time, or play with a nasal sound, or play unexpressive, coldly technical stuff that does not grab you… all these things say a lot about the guitarist. Does he play because he is in love with music, or because he has something to prove? You can tell those things about someone in how he phrases and sounds. All that being said: it is impossibly not to put your personality in your playing, cause your sound is the result of your personality. Without going at great length into spiritual meanings related to music, the message is clear: your sound will change and improve as you keep working on and developing your personality. If you want to improve your groove, work on becoming a more relaxed person. If you want to sound more emotional, deep, expressive and passionate, learn to dare to be vulnerable, which comes down to learning to let go of the need to be controlling. If you want to play more from the heart, get rid of your ego. If you feel you’re in your head too much, overthinking things constantly: learn to become the kind of person who focuses on the moment instead. If you have a weak, wimpy tone, become a more confident person. You can be whoever you want to be, and your sound is going to keep improving as a result of the choices you make.

4. Understand the Story

Loosing yourself into the music you’re playing rubs off on your listeners because you become the music. You are thus no longer ego: you are sound. One of the ways you can accomplish that; is by knowing the history of the song you are playing. Think of how it would affect your performance of Eric Clapton’s “Tears in Heaven,” if you found out that Clapton wrote this piece after his 4-year old son Conor died from falling from a window of a 53^rd floor apartment. Do you think you’d play the song differently, if you knew that and kept that in mind while playing the song? Do you think you’d play it with more depth and expression if you tried to imagine the pain of losing a son, while playing this song? Projecting emotions into what you’re playing is a skill that will take your music from sounding mediocre to a level where it will touch people.

5. Practice
   
   

Practicing is key. Your “own voice” is gradually going to reveal itself to you as you keep practicing. Your technique, your coordination, muscle memory and touch, vibrato, expressiveness, sensitivity, timing, attack, flow and feel improve through practice. These are only some of the elements that make up your sound and tone.

6. Feel and Imagination.

Steve Vai is one of the guitar players who experimented with the power of his imagination as a means to evaluate how this was going to affect his phrasing, feel and tone. As an example: close your eyes and imagine yourself being alone in this expansive, huge desert, with just your guitar. Feel the open space, feel the peace that comes to you, the silence, feel the sun caressing your skin, all around you, nothing but space, quiet, no one else in sight. Then pick up your guitar, and express that space, the vastness, the soothing loneliness, those feelings coming to you, with all your heart, without any thinking, without judgment. The only things that exist are: your imagination, you and the desert, and your guitar. Notice how your sound will be different. The more you loose yourself into the imagination game, the stronger your tone will be affected. Never forget: “everything is mental”.

7. Get Educated and Live A Life!
   
   

Sure practicing is important. Sure spending as much time as possible with your guitar is important. Meanwhile: you also need to live life, go through break ups, have fights and arguments, see Van Gogh paintings and visit museums, smell the roses, fall in love, go hike, get drunk, feel deep joy and sadness, travel, read and study, because all those things are all going to show up in your playing and in your tone as well. The richer your personality and your life experiences, the better your sound is going to be. 

5 Ways to Overcome Nervousness in Guitar Lessons

Nervousness is a common occurrence when you are new to guitar lessons. You are making yourself vulnerable to a stranger in hopes that this teacher will be able to help you. The key to a productive guitar lesson is deciding not to be nervous, although this is easier said than done. Nervousness is something brought on by your mind and negative thought patterns. Choosing to be nervous in a guitar lesson can often discredit the improvement you are trying to make in your performance. Here are a few key things to help you gain more from your guitar lessons!

1. Tell Your Teacher

The most basic thing you can do to help overcome being nervous in a guitar lesson is to tell your teacher you are nervous. Once this has been established and said aloud, it clears the path for open communication. Being able to communicate with your guitar instructor will help you feel more comfortable, which in return will calm down your nerves when your teacher reaffirms with you that what you are feeling is completely normal and that he understands you. Though your teacher can tell when a student is nervous (which is pretty much all students he meets), it still helps for you to voice that in your lesson, as your openness about your vulnerability creates a deeper connection between you and your teacher. By telling him you’re nervous, he will be able to reassure you and you will feel less pressure.

2. Be Prepared
   Being prepared for your guitar lesson is an essential part of having an effective and productive lesson. The more you practiced your lesson homework prior to the lesson meeting, the more relaxed you will be during your lesson and the more you will get out of that lesson. Now, your teacher very well knows that you could have a bad week, or an intensely busy week, which made it hard for you to find enough time to get all the material mastered for that week. No problem: tell him that when you walk in, and you will feel a burden fall of off your shoulders instantly. Being honest and open upfront is one of the best ways to battle nervousness before it kicks in.

3. Get Comfortable Outside Your Comfort Zone
   Growth does not happen while you are in your comfort zone. In order to learn how to improve your skills and knowledge of the music you are playing, you must push yourself to do things that are uncomfortable such as for example; hosting mini performances at your home. When you become less nervous practicing in front of more people, you will also become less nervous during guitar lessons. Your teacher’s job is to constantly challenge you out of your comfort zone, giving you tasks you cannot pull off. He is there to help you and support you. He is taking you out of your comfort zone to push your musical growth and to improve your playing ability. Keeping in mind that he does so because he cares about you and your progress, takes care of the nerves.

4. Your Teacher Was Not Born a Teacher
   When your teacher started out playing guitar he certainly didn’t pick up a guitar and automatically was born an incredible guitar teacher. He had to go through music lessons for many years and has been in the exact same position you are in now. A great guitar teacher never stops studying and practicing either. He continues to practice and learn more about guitar so that he can better help you, but he once sucked at it too: so it’s safe to assume your teacher has experienced his fair share of nervousness himself. Remember that your teacher is there to help you become a better musician, not judge and criticize you. You don’t have any reason to be self-conscious: it is your guitar lesson… you are supposed to suck really badly in your lesson.

Enjoy Yourself
One of the many great ways you can calm your nerves while in a guitar lesson is to remember to enjoy yourself. When you’re focused on the fact that you enjoy playing guitar, most of your nervousness will slip away. The more you focus on the feeling of joy of learning new things that you are feeling, and on the joy of hearing yourself instantly sound better through the advice your teacher gives you in the lesson, the less nervous you are going to be. Build a relationship with your guitar instructor and have fun with him! 

5 Tips to Make Your Practice Time More Efficient.

Life is short and passes by very quickly. Meanwhile: playing guitar is super fun, and gets more fun the better you get at it. That being said: it probably does not have to be pointed out how much you are missing out on, if you have inefficient practice habits. Fortunately, there are several techniques to improve efficiency and get stronger, faster results. When you are able to spend less time covering more material and seeing more results, you will find yourself willing to practice more often because that amazing feeling of achievement is priceless. Here are five great ways to make your practice sessions as efficient as possible.

1. Focus.

Shut down your computer and your phone if you have to. Don’t check emails. The ability to keep your attention to the task at hand is one of the most important skills to have. It is a skill that you can train. How do you train anything? Simple: you just do it, and correct your attention back to the task if you feel yourself getting distracted.

When you’re practicing: zoom in on the core of the challenge you are dealing with by removing all the other activity or interfering actions. As an example: don’t keep repeatedly playing an entire song if there is only 1 bar in the song you have a hard time executing correctly. Other example: if you have a certain rhythm you are trying to figure out or that keeps tripping you up, then don’t try to cover the whole measure/rhythm all at once, but work it out in smaller sections, 1 beat at a time. In other words, focus during guitar practice entails:

1.     Isolate the obstacle.

2.     Break things down in smaller segments.

3.     Slow a technically fast paced passage down to something you can execute

4.     Repeat the action over and over again.

5.     Get rid of actions that are not necessary to get the job done. (i.e. only move fingers that need to move, don’t make extraneous strum motions, don’t play anything rhythmically fancy with your strumming arm while you are playing chord changes you have a hard time fingering correctly, so you can direct more focus towards your fretting hand, etc.)

You then slowly and attentively keep repeating the challenging action, till it becomes effortless and natural. At that point, you start adding the other elements back in: your other hand, the rest of the song, more complicated strumming, etc.

2. Short Drills.

Researchers in the fields of neuroscience and psychology know for a fact that the brain works in “little chunks of information, regular intervals”. What this means specifically is that our brain works optimal when we feed it smaller segments of information, and then feed that information to the brain at regular time intervals on a daily basis. Unless the activity is more physical than cerebral, such as for example technique exercises, avoid practicing more than 15 minutes at a time on anything very concentration intense. It is generally accepted in neuroscience that after about 15 minutes, ones concentration level starts dissipating. If you practice in short 10-15 minute drills, you benefit of 2 major advantages:

1.     You keep your concentration at peak performance: by the time your concentration is about to start losing its peak, you are already off to the next drill.

2.     You become a more complete musician. Practicing short drills: you lift yourself up in more different areas of your musicianship in a shorter amount of time. As an example: when you have half hour drills to practice, you only can do 2 exercises in an hour, when you have 10-15minute exercises, you can fit in 4-5 drills in the course of an hour. There is so much to practice on to become a really great musician, it’s endless: ear training, technique, songwriting, scales, improv techniques, fret board knowledge, theory, harmony, styles, etc. Having short drills: you get more of these covered in a shorter amount of time.

3. Alternate Between Cerebral and Physical Activity.

This is another great way to get more done and keep your concentration up. When you had a couple of concentration intense guitar exercises in a row, break it up with technique exercises that train your speed, dexterity, control or coordination. Speed and muscle coordination exercises require a different kind of concentration that is not as mentally demanding. By the same token: when you feel like your arm is about to fall off because you worked your muscles hard, go back to doing something that requires more brain power than physical strength and endurance.

4. Use a Metronome
   
   

The metronome is an indispensable tool for training your rhythm and technique efficiently. You cannot really train your time feel efficiently any other way than with a metronome (or drum machine). Top musicians spent a great deal of their time honing their speed and technique as well as their timing and rhythm feel with this tool. You can also use a metronome to practice your sight-reading skills. Set the metronome at a slow, comfortable tempo; then read the music along the tempo of the beeps. You can evaluate your music reading progress based on the speed/tempo you are able to read new music at without making all too many mistakes.

5. Slower Is Better.
   
   

It is unbelievable how much valuable time most guitar students waste trying to tackle new material they keep struggling with, at a tempo that is way above their abilities, and persistently so. “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results” (Einstein). If after 8 tries, you still have not made it to the end of the bar of this 1-bar complicated rhythm you’re trying to execute, chances are you are probably trying to play it way too fast. 9 out of the 10 times, the student then gets incredibly frustrated, while the solution is really simple: slow down, pace yourself, and give your brain the time to put all elements in order.

This also goes for technical prowess on guitar. The quickest way to being to play really fast is by playing really slowly for a longer period of time. After all: speed is the byproduct of… accuracy. Someone who can shred fast scalar lines does not move all that much quicker than you do with his fingers: he moves LESS. Practice very slowly, then gradually increase tempo a couple of bpm at a time. The slow pace improves muscle memory and control. It also gives your brain the time to process information adequately, which it can’t do when that information is fed to the brain at a rushed pace.