listopad, 2021 - Nauka Gry Na Gitarze Ostrołęka

Developing An Internal Rhythm

6 listopada 202110 października 2023
by Piotr Sierzputowski

– by Vishal Kapoor, GuitarKL, in Kuala Lumpur, MALAYSIA

Rhythm is necessary for every part of your playing no matter what skill level you are at. Without a solid sense of rhythm, playing or performing with others, recording, and playing over a backing track would be close to impossible. If you are part of the rhythm section in a band, your rhythm needs to be tight so that other band members can latch on to something solid. Poor rhythm will throw other band members off. If you are doing any lead lines, your playing needs to make rhythmic sense relative to what the band is doing. Even when playing by yourself, you would sound kind of random and all over the place since rhythm is one of the main elements which both the player and the listener latches on to in any piece of music.

Here are some simple ways for you to develop a solid internal rhythm. Take note that everyone has different levels of natural intuitive rhythm even before they start actively working on it. The methods here might work faster for some compared to others.

Identifying the pulse of a song

Every song has a pulse. The pulse refers to the strong beats which stand out in a song. Typically they are accented by the kick and snare drum. If you were to tap your foot or bob your head to a song, the timing of it would be aligned with the pulse of the song.

Generally most songs have a time signature of 4/4. Explained in simple terms, the sound you would hear from that song repeats every 4 beats. This, along with the kick and snare drums, is the most obvious indicator to where exactly the pulse of the song is. You can train to develop your internal rhythm by simply identifying where the strong beats are in any song that you listen to. Tap your foot or bob your head to these strong beats. The cool part about training this way is that you can do it without your instrument and anywhere you happen to be listening to music!

Practice to a metronome

Practicing to a metronome benefits you in a number of ways, of which keeping time is one of them. A metronome traditionally is a device used to mark time at a selected rate of beats per minute (bpm) by producing a regular “click” sound. These days there are many metronome apps or online metronomes you can access for free.

To practice with a metronome, simply set your metronome to a moderate bpm. 60bpm is a good starting point. Then strum a chord to every “click” sound that you hear. Try as much as you can to strum exactly when the “click” happens. Pay attention to whether you tend to strum slightly before or slighty after the “click” and adjust the timing of your strumming accordingly. Do this over 1 chord initially. As your timing improves, try adding more strums in between each sound. The spaces between each of your strums should ALWAYS be evenly spaced. Be as creative with this as you can. Try strumming 3 times or even 4 times on every click. Remember the sounds indicate a down beat. So depending on how many strums you are playing per “click”, the first strum should always be on every sound. As your timing gets more accurate, you can expand your single chord to a full chord progression using the same method.

A metronome is only there as a guide for you to keep time. You can and should work on every part of your playing using a metronome, including scales, scale sequences, guitar techniques and phrases.

Playing to songs or backing tracks

Similar to a metronome, playing to a backing track allows you to gauge your rhythm and timing on a larger scale i.e. an entire song, rather than just a small exercise. Pick a SIMPLE song and play along to it as if you were performing or recording it. How this differs from metronome training is if you lose track of where you are, you will need to jump back into where the song has progressed to and NOT to where you fell off the wagon. This sort of training gives you the skills to perform and jam in a real-life situation. It is recommended that you train this way with chords first, only then work your way towards songs with more complex parts such as riffs and solos.

These are just a few of the many effective ways you can train to develop a strong internal rhythm. Do not rush this process or feel frustrated if you don’t get it immediately. Take your time and enjoy the process!

Learning to play guitar on your own can be frustrating and challenging, especially if you don’t know what to do. Having a great teacher makes the whole process more fun, enjoyable and gets you real results fast.

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Solve your guitar-related problems at GuitarKL, in Kuala Lumpur, MALAYSIA. Visit https://guitarkl.com to become an awesome guitar player.

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3 Things I Did Not Do That Made Learning…

6 listopada 20212 marca 2022
by Piotr Sierzputowski

– by Maurice Richard

I remember when I first started to learn to play guitar. I did not even own a guitar yet so I used my girlfriend’s.

She taught me a few chords she knew and that she had figured out easily but things did not go so well for me! I struggled with them.

That’s ok. I tried other ways. I found some books at the local music stores and started to use them to learn. Boring!!! So, I stopped that pretty quickly.

The Internet did not exist like it does today and Google was not even conceived yet, but since I was going to University I had access to sites that had guitar materials.

They were written by musicians and went straight over my head. Way too complicated and totally overwhelming.

You do not want to make the same mistakes that I did.

Here are 3 things I did not do that I would do differently if I could go back to my early days of learning to play guitar.

1. I Did Not Stay Committed

When things got boring or difficult I just stopped.

That’s not a very high commitment level. I could use the „I was young and stupid” argument here but in the end had I plowed through and stayed committed to learning I would have learned sooner.

I kept getting frustrated and stopping. Then weeks, months and sometimes years would pass by before I would try again and then stop and repeat the process.

When I look back it amazes me how much I could have improved even by doing the silly boring stuff and keeping my skills at least at the same level instead of constantly falling back.

So even if you are not making huge progress right now, or if some of the things you are learning are boring, do your best to keep going and not stop. Stay committed but look for better ways at the same time.

2. I Did Not Buy Myself A Quality Guitar

I just used my girlfriend’s guitar and as it turns out, it was not a very good one.

To my defense, I was totally clueless about different quality guitars. I thought they were all pretty much the same so I never even thought to go look at better ones.

My girlfriend’s guitar was a cheap one. The strings were very far from the frets which made it nearly impossible to push down and even hear a bad note or chord without a large amount of pressure.

This slowed me down tremendously and because I was using so much pressure it slowed my progress and caused really bad habits to creep into my playing which I had to fix later in life.

Because of that I experienced a huge amount of frustration when learning to play and it nearly caused me to quit guitar altogether.

Don’t make the same mistake. Go find a quality guitar that is easy to play.

Even better, start with an electric instead of an acoustic! That’s what I would do if I started again today!

3. I Did Not Look For A Teacher To Help Me

The funny thing is that for many years I had no clue you could get someone to teach you guitar.

I thought you had to learn it all on your own. I did not know anyone who had learned to play any other way.

Until I visited my wife’s aunt one day and her daughter had to go – for guitar lessons? I was amazed and felt pretty silly that I had never known this was possible.

I would like to say that I immediately went to look for a guitar teacher after that experience but I did not do that. I did not make it a priority and let it slip.

So, the frustration of trying to lean on my own continued. I did finally start to improve over time but it was not quick at all and it was still not that good.

The Key For Me Was Finding A Guitar Teacher

I came to a point in my playing where I was stuck.

I was not good at it, I was not getting better and I did not know what to do to move beyond it. I was becoming very frustrated.

I started to think that I was not made for this, that I was not born with the talent, and that I was never going to get better. I was getting closer to quitting guitar forever.

But then I remembered my wife’s cousin. So, I decided to try one more thing. I decided to look for a guitar teacher to help me.

Once I found this person my playing finally started to improve and I started to like it. I’m still with this teacher and I am enjoying the journey to more advanced skills!

About The Author:

Maurice Richard is a professional guitar teacher that operates out of the city of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. He has been a member of an elite guitar teaching mentorship program since 2007 and has taught hundreds of people learn how to play guitar the easier way.

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Some Straight Talk About Guitar Lessons

6 listopada 20212 marca 2022
by Piotr Sierzputowski

Fact is, not all guitar lessons or guitar teachers are the same. But why should you care?

Well, consider this, if you want to learn to play guitar like your favorite guitarists and are making the smart choice to take guitar lessons, how long should it take you to reach your goal?

With an average teacher, it could take you several more years to play like guitar idols, but it doesn’t have to take that long and it probably shouldn’t.

Let’s say you’re a beginner right now and your favorite guitarist Kirk Hammett from Metallica. With the right teacher, dedication and practice, it may take you 5 years to get from zero to hero.

But with an average guitar teacher, it may take 10-15 years to reach the same point… ouch!

The American Academy of Guitar Mastery says, “The vast majority of guitar teachers don’t even give you the bare minimum of what you need to reach your musical goals quickly. And virtually none have any actual training or certifications. In short, the standards of excellence in the guitar teaching industry are very, VERY low. We don’t think that’s right, so we did something about it.”

We couldn’t agree more! That’s why we have proper guitar teaching training and certifications from the Elite Guitar Teachers Inner Circle. Training for guitar teachers is absolutely critical and frankly, it’s a shame that most guitar teachers have no actual training or certifications whatsoever.

Think about it, why would you want to take lessons from a teacher who does not have training on how to teach guitar? We think you deserve better! So we give you better!

Let’s go back to the example mentioned earlier about the difference in time to reach a big goal from a really good teacher versus an average one. Now factor in the huge cost savings. Yes, a better teacher may charge a bit more, but the amount of money you save over the long term can easily run well into the thousands of dollars!

Guitar teacher training is not the same as a music degree from a university… it’s much better than that. When one goes to college for music, the grand total amount of time spent on teaching guitar is exactly zero at the vast majority of colleges and universities in the United States offering music degrees. In fact, even those who graduate with masters degrees still have exactly zero training and experience teaching guitar effectively. Hard to believe, but it’s an absolute fact! I know, I was shocked too when I learned this many years ago!

You’re in good hands here, not only do we have training, we have the best training in the country and on top of this, we never stop learning and improving everything we do… that means you can expect the best from us.

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Benefits of Playing with Other People

6 listopada 20212 marca 2022
by Piotr Sierzputowski

As a musician, you spend a lot of time practicing alone. Whether it’s in the basement, in your room, or in a practice studio, most of us feel more comfortable when we are doing things the way we want and at our own pace. However, there are a lot of benefits to playing with others. You will find that playing with others advances your own guitar goals and helps you become an even stronger guitar player. Here are some ways that playing with others benefit you:

It helps you keep a steady rhythm. When playing alone, you are the one who sets the tempo. Therefore, if you rush or drag in your rhythm, it may not be very noticeable to you. But when you are playing with others, it forces you to listen to those around you and keep in time with the other players. This in turn will make you more aware of your habits to rush and drag and will strengthen your rhythm when playing alone too.
It shows you how your part fits in the big picture. Guitar riffs are cool on their own, but when played solo, something just seems to be missing. They run the risk of sounding boring and repetitive when there is no rhythm guitar, bass, drums, or vocals. When you play with other people, there is the magical feeling that your part belongs in the whole. This is when the “real music” happens.
It helps you become aware of your weaknesses. Nothing is more eye-opening in guitar playing than when you start to play with someone else and realize that they know something you don’t, or have a skill you don’t possess. It not only humbles you as a guitar player, but makes you aware of the areas you need to focus on while practicing.
It helps you get over stage fright. Playing with others inherently involves playing in front of others as well. The more you play with others, the less nervous you’ll be playing for an audience. Getting over stage fright in guitar can help you get over stage fright in other areas of your life as well, like public speaking and presentations.
It teaches you to be flexible. When you’re alone, you can stop and start a song as many times as you want. If you mess up or don’t like something you played, you can immediately stop and fix it. However, when playing with others, you learn to be flexible and roll with whatever comes your way. You learn to adapt to the people around you and improvise when necessary. This is a good skill to have in life in general.

For these reasons, you should try to play with others as much as you can. Stepping out of your comfort zone is extremely valuable for growth and you will see your versatility as a guitar player expand immensely. When you can’t hide behind your bedroom door, you find that you are capable of more than you thought.

Northville Guitar Lessons is a guitar school providing guitar lessons in Livonia, Plymouth, Novi, Canton and Northville Michigan .

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CHORD THEORY AND ITS IMMEDIATE USEFULNESS

6 listopada 20212 marca 2022
by Piotr Sierzputowski

– Autor: Dennis Winge

Unless you know why it’s useful, the subject of chord theory could seem a bit bland. Imagine being able to figure out many, many possible voicings (ways to play a chord) for virtually any chord without having to consult one of those “1001 Chord” Books for Guitar. Let’s face it: you can’t really learn from those books anyway. You can look up the chord in question, choose a voicing, and memorize it, but two things happen: a) you will always wonder if you chose the best voicing b) (much worse) you will always be dependent on the book.

When you learn how chords are constructed, you can make judgements in real-time on fingering adjustments to make to get the chord you are looking for. Understand that on guitar, the intervals of a chord may not be in the same order as they appear from low to high on a interval sheet. For example, a D chord consists of the notes d, f#, and a which is the 1, 3, and 5 of D major. But in practice a regular open D chord is “spelled” d, a, d, f# which is the 1, 5, 1, 3. The chord still has the intervals of a “root position” D triad (i.e. 1, 3, 5), but the order of notes is jumbled up so we can play it a lot more easily.

Now suppose you need a Dm(maj7) which is a minor chord with a major 7th. Later in this presentation you will learn that a minor third is a half-step (one fret) lower than a major third, and a major 7th is a half-step below a root. So first you take a D chord and lower the third of the chord (the f# on the first string) one fret to get Dm:

Then you lower the root of the Dm which (is on the 2nd string) one fret to get the major 7:

If this is confusing at all, just trust the process that is about to unfold for you. Using the standard notation, tablature and diagrams on the following pages, you will be able to play the notes of each chord separately on one string, and then play a common fingering for that chord. The advantage of playing chord tones on 1 string is that you can see the spacial relationship of the notes to each other so you can move notes around according to your needs (as in moving the major 3rd of D down one fret in the Dm(maj7) example.)

So first play each note separately, then play the chord. The numbers right below the notes indicate the interval of that note within the scale. (For example in bar 1, c is the 1st note of the C major scale, e is the 3rd, g is the 5th.) I have also included the octave of the root, denoted as “8.” Playing the root an octave up helps you see the relationship of the last note of the chord (most often the 7th or b7th) to the next root (as in moving a root of the Dm chord down one fret to get the major 7th in the Dm(maj7) example.)
It is also possible that, for fingering convenience, a note or two may be left out. For example, some of you may notice that on the C6 chord, there is no 5th (the note g) in the voicing. This is not cheating. It’s more important to play the ‘good’ notes well and in a timely manner than to go for something less convenient for an interval that doesn’t add much to overall flavor of the chord. (In this case, the 6th really defines the C6 chord so we choose that note a over the note g which is the 5th.)

As a final word, it would a great exercise for you to take different roots (ex: A, D, G, etc.) and make the intervals on 1 string for all the chords in that key. Then, try to come up with fingerings on your own before consulting your teacher for common ways to play them. Doing this will really solidify both your chord theory and your fretboard mastery.

About the author: Dennis Winge is a professional guitarist living in New York with a passion for vegan food and bhakti yoga. If you are interested in taking Guitar Lessons in Newfield, NY, then be sure to contact Dennis!

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HOW LISTENING TO MUSIC IMPROVES YOUR GUITAR PLAYING… SERIOUSLY

6 listopada 20212 marca 2022
by Piotr Sierzputowski

– Autor: Jennifer Barlow

You might be thinking, “How can listening to music help to improve my guitar playing, surely that’s not possible”, and you would be right… if you were just listening passively.

Think back to when either you’ve been at a social gathering where there have been multiple conversations going on at once. If you try to listen to 2 conversations, you end up unable to take part in either. You have to actively listen to one conversation at a time, you have to chose what you focus on.

Listening to music works in the same way, when you actively listen to music, you focus what the different instruments are doing and really listen to them. Ask yourself questions like:

“How loud or softly are they playing?”
“Is the instrument playing fast or slow?”
“What rhythm is the instrument playing? Can you clap it / sing it back?”
“What does the singer’s melody sound like against the chords in the song? How does it make you feel?”
“What instrument is this? Am I listening to the singer, guitar player, what part of the drum kit is that?”
“What section of the song is this? Is it a verse, chorus?”

When you listen to music in this way, you will find yourself able to learn songs faster, make your guitar playing sound more expressive and ‘alive’ because now you will be thinking musically.

This is one way that you can start to increase the speed of your guitar playing improving. The more you can think about it day in day out. The more your brain is going to try to figure out the other pieces of the puzzle. And before you know it, it will be translating to your guitar playing as well.

A lot of students also struggle to practise guitar when they are busy, this is a way you can sneak it into your everyday activities. It could be listening while you are working, travelling to and from work. There’s a lot you can do for your guitar practising without your guitar being physically with you.

Between now and next week, spend some time listening to your favourite songs and ask yourself these questions. Yes this is real guitar practice. Part of your journey to playing guitar how you want is physical (with your hands), but a bigger portion of learning to play an instrument is mental (what goes on in your head).

Even if you don’t have much time to pick up the guitar, that’s perfectly fine. During these periods of time, practice in the way I mentioned above.

Keep improving, keep progressing one step at a time!

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Guitar Tuition East London is a pure guitar school based in East Village, Stratford, England that teaches students of all ages who are passionate about playing guitar. With lots of beginner guitar players struggling to learn guitar on their own, their beginner guitar lessons in London focuses on beginner guitar students having a lot of fun and building up the confidence so that they can have a skill for life.

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HOW TO BE A MORE ORGANISED GUITARIST?

6 listopada 20212 marca 2022
by Piotr Sierzputowski

– by Michael Gumley

Are you constantly late to gigs and rehearsals? Are you struggling to find the time to practice everything you need to? Are you sick of letting yourself and others down? When it comes to being reliable, musicians aren’t known for their organisational skills and guitarists have an especially bad reputation. In this article I’m going to talk about how you can implement some basic ideas that will help you get organised and increase your productivity.

I find it amazing how musicians can invest thousands of hours into getting good at their instrument yet invest little or no time into being organised. This is what I call the ‘Artist’s Curse’ and doesn’t just appear to be limited to musicians with writers, painters and actors all displaying a lack of organisation in their life. Whether you’re trying to make it in the music industry or just find enough time to practice everything on your plate a little bit of organisation can go a long way towards making you more successful and easily make you stand out from the crowd.

Below I am going to present some easy to implement ideas that anybody can do. Before you get your back up and make excuses come to the realisation that there are thousands of other artists competing for the same opportunities so if you don’t take the steps below to get ahead, somebody else will.

KEEP A CALENDAR

This might seem like a simple idea but is overlooked by so many people. Go out and buy yourself a physical calendar and hang it on the fridge. Every time you have a gig or rehearsal put it on the calendar and make the effort to be punctual in your attendance. You can even take it a step further and get a calendar app that send you notification straight to your phone reminding you on the day or even the hour of your appointments. There really is no excuse with all the technology you have these days.It doesn’t matter how good a musician you are if you develop a reputation for being late or a no-show your fellow musicians will stop working with you.

PLAN OUT YOUR PRACTICE FOR THE WEEK

This is a big one for me. I like to spend 30 minutes every Sunday planning out my entire week. This includes all of my appointments and what I will be working on business wise for each hour of each day. I also go into specific detail with my guitar practice. I work out how much time I have on each day (eg Monday 1 hour, Tuesday 30m, Wednesday 2 hours, etc) and a list of things I need to work on throughout the week (legato, tapping, melodic minor scale usage etc). I will then assign each practice item to a 10-30 minute time slot within the time I have allocated for guitar practice. Go out and buy a diary or weekly planner sheet or download one of countless apps that can help you do this.

HAVE A DESIGNATED PRACTICE AREA

Set aside a room in your house specifically for practice. Keep this room clean and tidy and have all of the materials you need on hand. If you don’t have the luxury of a spare room make sure the room you do practice in has enough space for a chair, music stand and your guitar. Put a do not disturb sign on your door during practice time and let everybody know that you’re not to be interrupted while the door is shut.

ORGANIZE YOUR EQUIPMENT

This is a big one. In addition to you guitar you should have spare strings, spare leads, string winders, a cleaning rag, a basic guitar tool kit, a metronome and a timer. Keep all of your sheet music in a neatly arranged folder and any books you are using on a shelf nearby. The last thing you want to do is waste 5 minutes looking for your sheet music or breaking a string and having to miss out on practice entirely. Being organised is the difference between wasting time and effective practice, it will also save you when something goes wrong during a gig.

Hopefully you already implement some of the ideas I have presented here, but if you don’t there is no better time than the present to start. Use these ideas to get more out of your time. Not only will you benefit from being more organised but you will develop a reputation as a reliable musician and will see more and more opportunities flow towards you.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michael is a heavy metal guitarist from Melbourne Australia. He plays in progressive metal act Hybrid Nightmares and is the owner of Brimstone Bookings. He aims to help aspiring musicians develop the right mindset necessary to succeed in the music industry. If you want to be a professional musician then Melbourne Beginner Guitar Lessons will teach you all the skills you need to kickstart your music career. Don’t learn the hard way, visit Michael’s website and make massive progress in record time!

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How your hand posture can hurt your progress with…

6 listopada 20212 marca 2022
by Piotr Sierzputowski

– By Michael Korte

Your hand posture can make a big difference in how you are progressing with development of your technique.

A lot of guitar players think it does not matter. I think it does. Some think “just do what feels comfortable” but if you have no idea what you are doing, you are getting used to a wrong posture, that will inhibit your advancement to higher levels and eventually feel not as comfortable anymore.

If you do what feels naturally comfortable, you are just letting your fingers go wherever they please and into direction, you are already used to having them. For example, if your thumb automatically goes pointing parallel wise to the guitar neck, you limit your ability to play fast because for some positions you just cannot play comfortably and relaxed, especially for those stretches when you want to learn and apply the 3-note-per-string system for scales and if you want to be able to shred arpeggios elegantly.

What you need to do instead is, having your thumb pointing upwards to the ceiling and in a right angle to the guitar neck, place the thumb print flat on the back of the guitar neck and let your fingers „fall” as perpendicularly as possible on the strings, for when you are playing scales without any phrasing. This also works well with chords.

For chords, there are some things to pay attention to. For most open chords, you can apply the hand posture I explained above. For Barre Chords you MUST even apply this posture, else you just get cramps in your hand.

For playing chords you could try a different approach and see what feels best for you. That is:

Using your thumb as a kind of hook on your guitar neck, so that it sticks out over the upper side of the guitar neck. This also gives you more stability if you want to apply phrasing elements like string bendings and vibrato to your solos.

The right posture for these guitar playing techniques is, to switch from the posture for the scales I mentioned first, to the thumb hook position.

What is important here now for a good and stable vibrato and controlled bendings, is to twist your forearm around the pivot point, where the inner edge of your hand meets the guitar neck’s lower side as a pivot point.

That way you are using a much stronger muscle, that you can control better against the string tension, compared to if you use your fingers only, which yields a nice shape for your vibrato curve.

Practice switching back and forth between those two positions for the right application in the right situation. It should give you quite a boost in your playing, if you haven’t played this way before.

About the author:

Michael Korte teaches kitaratunnit in tampere, Finland, and is passionate about showing his students ways to improve their playing and creativity.

He focuses on combining technique, theory and creativity into one big picture, so that his students can become balanced guitar players and play as best as they can at any time.

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Guitar playing techniques

6 listopada 20212 marca 2022
by Piotr Sierzputowski

The guitar is truly a great instrument. Not only that it is very practical, but it also gives you tons of possibilities when it comes to playing.

Many people think that playing the guitar is all about learning a couple of chords and strumming the strings. Only the guitarists know how far this is from the truth.

Now, don’t get me wrong, in the beginning, you will probably stick to the chords. This is simply because first, you need to learn the basic stuff, such as the notes, chord positions, elemental music theory, etc. Also, you need to acquire the motor skills for playing – to automate chord changing, to learn how to pick the right strings and overall, to get the basic “feel” for playing. After that, you will slowly start to add new techniques to your playing arsenal.

If you are unsure about any of these techniques, I would advise you to ask your guitar teacher to help you. If you are wanting London guitar lessons, then find us at Guitar Tuition East London

Ok, so let’s see some of the most widely used playing techniques.

Vibrato

This is probably the first technique that you will learn, as it is a very simple one. When you play a note, all you have to do is to gently move the sting up and down while still holding the note. This technique is used for single-note licks.

However, if your guitar has a whammy bar, you can apply vibrato even to chords. After you play the chord, you should just push the whammy bar up and down.

Hammer-on / Pull-of

This is a more complex technique than the previous one. In order to use it, you’ll need to “separate” your hands. This means being able not to play simultaneously with both hands. Believe me, it sounds simpler than it actually is.

The point is to play a note without picking the string. In the case of hammer-on, you produce a note just by pressing the string. Of course, in order to achieve this, you have to press the string harder and faster than usual. One of the best examples of frequent usage of a hammer-on is the song Schism by Tool.

Pull-off is the opposite of a hammer-on. In other words, you play a note by moving the finger off the string. However, when you do this, you can’t just lift your finger, as you won’t produce any sound this way. What you should do, is pick the string while you are moving your finger. Like in the case of hammer-on, you have to move your finger fast.

Bending

This technique is used in practically every guitar solo. It is very similar to the vibrato, but in this case, you can bend the string slowly. Also, by doing so, you are actually changing the pitch of the string. It all depends on how high you bend the sting; you can bend it to the half of the note and even the whole note.

So, if you, for example, play the A note and want to go to the B note, you can just press the string at the right fret but you can also bend the A note until you reach the B note.

Muting

Muting is mostly used by guitarists who play the electric guitar. When you add the distortion to your tone, it sounds pretty loud and aggressive. If there is a part of a song that needs to be quiet and calmer, you can put the right side of your palm on the strings and thus, mute the strings. You do this with your strumming hand.

Of course, you will still hear every note you play but it will be suppressed, which is great for building the dynamic of a song.

A similar technique is the so-called dead notes. In this case, you completely mute the strings with your left hand (if you are right-handed and vice versa) and when you strum the strings you’ll get that “chaka chaka” sound. The guitarist that often uses this technique is Tom Morello. For example, you can hear it in a song called Born of a broken man.

Pick slides

This technique is present in a lot of rock songs. It is very noisy and aggressive and is usually used when you want to emphasize some parts of a song. The good news is that this is a very simple technique to perform. All you need to do is to slide down the strings with the edge of your guitar pick.

Conclusion

When you start playing the guitar, you should always keep in mind that the beginning is always the hardest part. If you remain persistent, you will learn the basic stuff in no time. After that, you can start to apply these techniques and make your playing more interesting.

Article by Guitar Tuition East London, a London guitar school in England who offer extensive acoustic and London electric guitar lessons to adults and children. Ranging from beginners to advanced guitar players who are interested in performing, songwriting and improvising. With the most important ingredient, a passion for playing the guitar.

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Have a question/suggestion for this article? Let me know – I’d love to discuss it 😊 Fill out the form below to contact me:

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HOW TO ORGANIZE YOUR GUITAR PRACTICE LONG TERM

6 listopada 20212 marca 2022
by Piotr Sierzputowski

– Autor: Eric Dieter

The longer you play guitar, the more information and practice materials you’re going to get. How do you stay consistent in the practice room while still managing to cover new ground and learn new songs? I’m so glad you asked…

STOP FOCUSING ON THE SONG

I like to think about myself as a video game character interacting in a musical world. Every time I practice something, I gain a little more stat points in that area. My stats heavily influence how I choose to play the game and vice versa. The problem that many guitar players have is that while they may think about their stats, they think about them in terms of songs rather than skills.

Why is this a problem? Imagine it takes you 3 weeks to become a “level 17” at any one song. What will you be able to play at the end of those 3 weeks? Precisely one song. Most players will recognize a need for variety in their practice so they may seek out a 2nd or 3rd song. Problem solved, right? Well not exactly.

Assuming you don’t have infinite practice time, every minute you spend working on one song is a minute you can’t practice other songs. As time goes on, one can imagine the difficulty finding time to practice 20-30 songs. Furthermore, when you stop practicing any particular song, your stats on that song won’t just sit still; they will backslide. Neglect a song for too long and you may forget how to play it altogether. How frustrating!

Another point of note is the importance that gets placed on song selection in this scenario. Once you complete a song with this mentality, it becomes far more important to choose a new song that is the right difficulty level so that you can learn something new that’s not too easy or way too difficult. I’ve seen a lot of students spend too much time and energy worrying about what song to learn next.

Extract the Skills

What’s the solution then? Each song itself has a set of skills that are required to execute it. Consider the classic song “Iron Man.” What skills are needed to play that song? Your answer will vary depending on your skill level.

Beginners may only recognize a few skills such as “Well, there are chords, my pick is getting stuck, and I have to do it all pretty fast.” Great! Work on those stats rather than any particular song. As you improve on guitar, your eye for skills will get better. You may decide to create sub-categories for skills. Some examples:

Picking
- Alternate Picking
- Picking 2 notes at a time
Power chords
Open Position Chords
Timing
Moving quickly up the neck on one string
Staying on finger tips
Playing close to the fret

PICK SKILLS TO DEVELOP CONSISTENTLY

The skills that you choose to work on is not as important as staying consistent with practicing them (I highly recommend working with a guitar teacher that can help you make the best decisions).

The beauty of this method of practice is that you can swap out the song with a new one, but still focus the same skill over long period of time. This is how you improve- consistent and repetitive work. Looking at my list of examples above, can you see how you can apply most (if not all) of the above skills to ANY song? Even if the new song you’re learning doesn’t have power chords, can you turn the regular chords into power chords? Can you take a small snippet of the melody and turn the melody notes into power chords?

CONCLUSION

Just like in a game, you don’t have to be a perfectly balanced character. You might be the type of player that likes to boost just one or two stats really high. That’s perfectly fine. You can always go back later and revisit the skills you neglected on the first play through.

A moment ago I asked what the outcome would be if you worked on one song for 3 weeks. Now imagine you extracted the skills from that song and worked on those skills for 3 weeks, applying those few skills to as many situations as possible? How good do you think you’d be now?

Go find out!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Eric Dieter is a professional guitarist and guitar teacher in Lancaster, PA. He has appeared on dozens of international albums as a session guitar player and tours with the synth-pop and prog-rock band. Eric has studied guitar at Millersville University and Berklee College of Music. Additionally, he holds a degree in psychology and a certification in hypnosis, making him uniquely qualified to train the minds and hands of aspiring musicians. Contact Eric if you are looking for guitar lessons in Lancaster, PA.

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Have a question/suggestion for this article? Let me know – I’d love to discuss it 😊 Fill out the form below to contact me: