First, the good news:  You can develop fast picking speed on guitar, if you have fully functioning limbs and a desire to succeed.  More great news: you do not have to practice eight hours a day to develop this skill.  However, improving your guitar technique very often requires you to work on refining some seemingly “simple” (fundamental) parts of your playing.  For many this may seem like “bad news”, because practicing such basics doesn’t seem “fun” (no matter how effective it may be), and so those who ignore such advice often continue to struggle without knowing the reason why.

If you have been practicing your picking technique for awhile but haven’t yet seen the results you were hoping for, then this article will help you with improving four very important areas of picking that most guitarists struggle with.  This is not a complete list of possible challenging elements of guitar picking technique (I will address more of them in a future article), but you will improve your picking speed on guitar by following the advice from this article.

I will describe below several very common problems that many guitarists have (and that I have had also in the past) with their picking speed.  I will also show you how you can apply the advice I give in this article to your playing.

If you want me to show you on video how to correctly practice and apply the ideas in this article to improve your guitar picking speed, watch a (totally free) guitar picking speed video lesson at my website that is available to my free newsletter subscribers.  Otherwise, I will do my best to explain these technical points to you using text alone.

Using a Thin Pick

All great guitar players prefer different picks in terms of size, shape and material (this is largely a matter of preference).  However all of the fastest guitarists use very thick picks (at least 1mm thick, and in some cases 2 mm or more is used).  Picks that are thinner than 1mm can be fine for strumming chords and other types of playing, but they won’t work for playing fast.  They simply aren’t strong enough to handle very fast playing.  Because the pick bends when you play a note, it takes an extra fraction of a second for it to come back to its natural point of “rest” and these accumulated delays (from each pick stroke) add up and make it impossible to play really fast.

So if you are analyzing the type of pick you are using, remember that the most important dimension of your pick is its thickness, rather than its size, shape, tip, or the material it is made out of.  Of course, these other things are also important, but they make a much smaller impact on your overall progress in building guitar picking speed than thickness does.

Angling the Pick in an Non-efficient Way for Speed Picking

Although there is clearly more than one correct way to angle the pick for playing on the guitar, when it comes to building speed, some ways are “more right” than others.  If your pick isn’t angled correctly towards the headstock of the guitar, then you end up using much more picking motion than is necessary to play (which of course limits your maximum guitar speed).  The angle of the pick to the strings determines how easy it will be for your pick to slice through the strings and how much extra movement will result from each pick stroke.  Many guitarists hold the pick too close to perpendicular on the strings and make the playing more difficult for themselves than it needs to be.

For maximum speed, the appropriate pick angle needs to be about 45 degrees towards the head of the guitar, but almost no angle at all up and down (in relation to the strings).  Angling the pick too far up or down will make one type of pick stroke (upstroke or downstroke) easier to play and the other more difficult to play.  This works fine for sweep picking or rhythm guitar playing, but for regular picking through scales, the angle needs to be more neutral (since both upstrokes and downstrokes occur with much greater frequency).

Of course there are many variations for the ways you can angle the pick which work great for specific musical contexts, and of course there are some really fast players who hold the pick differently from what I wrote above (Shawn Lane being one very famous exception, among several others).  However, the vast majority of the fastest players do follow the approach above, and if you are still struggling with your own picking technique, I recommend highly applying it to your playing, because it is one of the methods that has been proven to work for a lot of really great players.

If you are not 100% clear on what I wrote above about angling your pick, watch this free guitar picking video lesson and my explanations there will help you to see clearly what proper picking angles should look like for fast picking.

Not Holding the Pick Firmly Enough or Holding It  Too Tightly

Many guitar players mistakenly think that they need to hold the pick very lightly in order to pick fast.  The reality is that if you do this, your pick will likely fall out of your hand as you speed up.  On the other extreme, if you attempt to grip it too tightly, your entire arm will become so tense that you will not be able to play well (or play fast).  Rather than thinking about how much pressure to apply to the pick, find a position where the pick does not move at all in your hand, while at the same time you don’t have to apply a lot of pressure to hold it in place.

One of the ways of doing this is to overlap your thumb over the pick as you are holding it.  This will keep the pick very secure in your hand and won’t require a lot of pressure to hold it in place.

Also, I have found that using a large pick helps with finding the ideal way to hold it without applying a lot of extra force to do so and I recommend trying this out yourself.

Not Playing with Good Articulation

This problem comes from the belief that you must play with “as little tension as possible all the time” in order to play fast.  As a result, many guitarists develop the habit of picking everything with a very light touch and when they try to play faster, they are able to apply even less power to each note.  This means that the faster you play, the less your playing is heard.  Eventually you will reach a speed where your pick doesn’t even make contact with the string.

Fortunately, the solution to this problem is rather simple.  You need to begin putting greater focus in to this area of your playing even when you practice slowly, and you will see great results.  Remember also that the goal isn’t just to “pick the strings harder”, but you also need to avoid accumulating tension in your picking hand as you play.  This is possible to do by consciously relaxing before and after playing each note.  If you want to learn more about this idea, watch this video about building guitar speed.

Most of the truly great virtuoso players have the ability to playing fast and articulate at the same time…here is a short list of a few names.  Listen to their playing and compare the sound of their pick attack to yours:

• Paul Gilbert
• Yngwie Malmsteen
• Rusty Cooley
• Shawn Lane
• Al DiMeola

It doesn’t matter if you like their style of playing or not (since the topic here is strictly about guitar picking technique).  Listen to how strong their pick attack is, even when they play fast.  If you can detect a noticeable difference between their articulation and yours, then you have identified a very important source of your frustrations with your picking speed.

Think carefully about the points in this article and apply them to your playing. You will see great results when you do!

If you are unclear about any part of what I explained above and want to see me do it on video, watch this free guitar picking video lesson on my website that I send to all my newsletter subscribers.

About Mike Philippov
Mike Philippov is a professional virtuoso guitarist, music composer and instructor.  He is also a co-author of several instructional products, numerous articles and other free instructional resources available on http://mikephilippov.com

© 2010 Mike Philippov All Rights Reserved

Paul Gilbert is the first guitar player who comes to mind who uses this technique extensively. Some of his most terrifying licks are based on combining picking with hammer ons and pull offs. I am going to explain to you the basics behind this technique and then show you how to build up to playing cooler-sounding, more advanced runs and arpeggios.

The most fundamental patterns that we are going to build from will be Examples 1 and 2 below. If you want to see videos of me playing each of these examples (fast and slow), visit my site and watch them in the free shred guitar lessons section available to my free newsletter subscribers.

Example 1 (this is a repeating pattern to be cycled over and over):

Example 2 (also a repeating pattern to be cycled over and over):

Make sure that your accents are totally accurate and precise (as I play in the video and as shown in the tab above). The most important thing is the picking/articulation used here. It is NOT all legato, nor is every note picked. The key is combining the two techniques in a seamless way that produces a very “snappy” sound of the accents when they are emphasized with the pick in the midst of the legato notes rushing by.

To step things up, here is a new lick that builds from the previous 2 patterns. If you are familiar with Paul Gilbert’s playing, you will probably recognize the sound of one of his classic licks.

Example 3:

Again, pay very close attention to the picking markings indicated, so that you know which notes to pick and which ones to play legato.

You need to keep your fretting hand very relaxed while you play it, and at the same time focus on making the pull offs loud and forceful (more about this in a moment).

The next lick is one I came up with that combines picking and legato techniques using the basic ideas from the three earlier examples above and some small position shifts:

Long sequence (example 4)

Make sure that your accents are precise to achieve the right sound (watch the guitar shred video on my site to hear it played correctly slowly and fast). Also, practice a longer lick like this one by breaking it into manageable sections before putting it together.

It may look very difficult, but if you practice it only a few notes at a time, you will get through it without too much trouble.

Arpeggio with string skipping.

This particular method of playing arpeggios was also made popular by the great Paul Gilbert. Rather than using sweep picking, he used string skipping to achieve a more precise and rhythmic effect.

The technique is quite challenging at first, so make sure to practice the regular scalar fragments shown above.

I will show you one of my favorite licks to play that will be used in one of my songs in my upcoming album. It shows some more musical applications to this cool technique.

If you want to watch a free video lesson that goes into detail about this challenging arpeggio lick, it is available here.

As you practice these licks, keep the following things in mind:

1. Your hammer ons and pull offs need to be loud. As I wrote in my article on how to sweep pick, try to make them as loud as your picked notes.
2. It is very important to practice these licks both with distortion and without. This is important as practicing with distortion helps with increasing your dynamics, and practicing with distortion helps with controlling sloppy noise.
3. It is very effective to end the licks on a pinch harmonic (watch the video examples to see this).

Practicing this technique will help to open up a new range of sounds for your guitar playing. Be sure to begin applying these ideas to your soloing and improvising right away and you will greatly expand your creative possibilities.

Mike Philippov is a professional virtuoso guitarist, music composer and instructor. He is also a co-author of several instructional products, numerous articles and other free instructional resources available on MikePhilippov.com.

If you are articulating the notes you want to play accurately, but you are still hearing sloppiness in your playing then this article will greatly help you to improve your guitar technique by eliminating string noise.

To effectively mute guitar strings we do not want to be heard, we need to use two totally different sets of muting techniques: One to stop unwanted noise from LOWER (in pitch) strings; and another to mute the higher (in pitch) strings.

Although there is more than one way to mute guitar strings, some methods offer advantages that others do not and are therefore (in my opinion at least) better.

Muting The Lower Strings

Many guitar players use the palm of their picking hand to mute lower strings. Although this technique is pretty good at keeping most of the lower strings quiet there are two big disadvantages with this technique.

1. Muting with your palm will cause a slight delay in the muting of a string which has just been played a moment before. This delay causes brief moments of string noise. This happens for two main reasons:

• The flesh of your palm is much softer than the side of your thumb and therefore takes more time for your palm to actually stop the string from sounding.
• It is not easy to get your palm in the perfect position to consistently and reliably mute strings that are adjacent to the one you are playing in all playing situations.

2. When you use your palm to mute noise, the natural position of your guitar pick (when not playing) is now away from the strings. This is what I call your “Natural Point Of Rest”.

When your pick is at rest up and away from the strings (in between playing each note), it causes your picking hand to work harder and significantly increases the chance for sloppy playing, string noise and slower picking speed.

A great solution to these problems (and to improve your guitar technique) is to mute with your picking hand thumb for all lower (in pitch) strings like this.

Notice that the “Natural Point Of Rest” when using thumb muting is now ON the strings (as shown in the picture above). This greatly reduces wasted motion and enables you to pick faster with much less effort.

Muting The Higher Strings

Many guitar players are totally unaware of the possibilities for muting string noise from the higher (thinner) strings and this part of their playing is often one of the causes of sloppy playing.

There are actually two main techniques for muting noise from the higher strings that I teach to my students when training them to improve their guitar technique.

The first technique involves using the underside (the fingerprint side) of the fretting hand’s index finger. This part of your finger is used to “lightly touch” the higher strings that you want to mute. The key word in the last sentence is “lightly”. You do not want to press down so hard that these notes begin to sound like regular fretted notes. Simply rest your finger on them thus preventing them from sounding.

In addition, you can also mute these higher strings by using the unused fingers of your picking hand (fingers that are not being used to hold the pick, such as middle, ring and pinkie).

This extra layer of muting ensures that there is no possibility for the strings higher than the one you are playing to ring out and add sloppy string noise into your guitar playing.

When these ideas are combined with the string muting techniques of muting the lower strings, your playing will instantly become much cleaner than before. Now, every time you play, the only guitar strings that will be making sound are the ones you are playing!

If you have been working hard to perfect your guitar technique and two-hand synchronization (as mentioned in How To Improve Your Guitar Technique – Part 1), then you already know that if your articulation/synchronization is developed well but your muting is not, the result will still be sloppy guitar playing. So, when trying to improve your guitar technique keep in mind the five areas discussed in this series of articles:

1. Focused Awareness
2. Articulation – The First Half of Two Hand Synchronization
3. The Release – The Second Half of Two Hand Synchronization
4. Muting The Higher Strings
5. Muting The Lower Strings

To get more guitar playing help check out my 15 Free Guitar Tips.

About the author:Tom Hess is a professional guitarist and teaches electric guitar lessons online.

©2009 Tom Hess Music Corporation.
All Rights reserved.

In a way, sometimes it is possible to restrict your own creativity by being “too advanced”. When you have many techniques, areas of knowledge and skills to choose from and are forced to make soloing decisions quickly, you may often end up making bad musical choices which distort your creativity. Fortunately, there are solutions to solving this problem.

I want to offer you several suggestions on how to make the most out of any soloing situation you may find yourself in and give you general ideas which you can apply right away.

If you want to see and hear how all of the concepts (that I am about to describe) were put into practice, you can watch a free improvising video of me playing using the concepts I will discuss below. It is available, by the way, to my free newsletter subscribes.

You probably know that it is important to think of “melody first” when starting to solo, but I am going to tell you a bit more about how you can use melodic tools to establish a “basic framework structure” in your solos that will enable you to add faster parts later without taking away from self-expression.

So let’s imagine that you are about to start soloing. What should you do or think about first? Here are my recommendations:

1. Start simple. Don’t be tempted to shred too much in the beginning of your solo! This may seem like an obvious point to some, but I want to make sure we are on the same page. Think of melody first and treat your slower melodic lines as a “skeleton” and think of any faster fills as “fleshing out” the skeleton. It may be tempting to play fast too soon (especially if you are able to play fast), but when you begin any new solo it is much better to think of melody first.

Don’t get me wrong, I love to play fast and shred in my solos, but I always make sure that there is a melody in them first, before thinking about adding faster parts. In the video I mentioned a moment ago, I do play a fast lick leading into the main solo, but the majority of the solo is very melodic and slow on purpose. Even if you choose to play faster licks, they need to “lead into something” and serve a musical purpose.

2. Practice “saying more” with only one note. When I was taking improvisation guitar lessons with my awesome guitar teacher Tom Hess, one of the things he had me practice was playing only one note, using only bends and vibrato as my phrasing tools. This one technique has done an incredible amount not only for my vibrato, but for my overall creativity and expression. In fact, sometimes I even use this technique in actual soloing situations when it is appropriate to create actual phrases with only one note (more on this later, in “Point 4″).

3. To get the most dramatic effect possible from your solos, try to create a harmonic background that has a lot of extended chords (seventh chords, add note chords etc…). For example, in the solo that I improvise in the video, I play over one of my most favorite progressions, iadd9 – VI7 – iv7 – ii half diminished add 11- V7 add 13. Because the chords in this progression are “add note” chords or seventh chords, soloing over them lends itself very nicely to melodic playing.

Record this progression yourself and you can hear what I’m talking about when you try to solo over it (or you can download a free backing track that I use here.)

4. Take advantage of common tones. This is one of my favorite things to do when soloing melodically over chords that have a lot of notes in them (such as the progression used above). For example, the chords listed above offer several possibilities for common tones. Even if you did nothing else except hold one note (that is common to all chords) with heavy vibrato or bending a short distance away from that note while the chords change, you will still get a very cool sound. In the progression above, the note “C” is a chord tone in all but one of the chords, and you can take advantage of this when soloing to create passing tones, suspensions and other effects.

5. Repeat phrasing ideas in different octaves. It is a very cool thing to do that will help you get more expression out of shorter phrases, particularly if you make subtle variations in the phrasing using vibrato and other things.

After you have an identifiable melody in place, using these ideas listed above as well as others, it is relatively easy to add more advanced things from that point such as, targeting melodic notes with a faster scale sequence, using arpeggios etc… The good news is that if you approach soloing in such a way, your “shredding” will become very appropriate and will add to your self-expression rather than take away from it.

In the guitar solo video that I mention throughout this article, I tried to incorporate all of the five main points discussed here to show you how a basic melody can be developed. This outline, of course, is not the only method of creating solos (there are many more), but it is one of my favorites.

I encourage you to give it a try and have fun with it!

About The Author:
Mike Philippov is a professional virtuoso guitarist, music composer and instructor. He is also a co-author of several instructional products, numerous articles and other free instructional resources available on http://mikephilippov.com

© 2009 Mike Philippov All Rights Reserved

There are five main challenges that electric guitar players must overcome in order to learn and master guitar technique. These five guitar technique challenges are divided into three groups:

1. Awareness
2. Sounds you ‘want’ to hear (the notes you are attempting to play cleanly)
3. Sounds you do ‘not’ want to hear (the sloppy sounds you sometimes hear such as unwanted string noise)

Today we will take a look at the first two groups. In Part 2 of this article series we’ll focus on the last group of guitar technique challenges.

Focused Awareness – Many guitar players are not fully aware of every imperfection in their guitar technique. Some of these players do sense that ‘something’ may be wrong, but are not sure about exactly what their specific guitar technique problems are. Obviously, you cannot effectively correct a technical problem until and unless you know exactly what it is.

There are two main ways you can approach this:

1. Record yourself playing a something you want to improve on. Listen back (carefully) at 25%-33% speed so that you more easily identify any unclear notes, excess string noise, scratchy noises between the notes, inconsistency in your pick attack, etc.). You may or may not be able to hear everything on your own (many people simply can’t yet) and you may or may not be able to ‘correctly’ identify the cause of each imperfection present in your guitar playing. If you can that’s great, but if you’re not sure then…
2. Work with a guitar teacher to evaluate your playing and use that feedback to begin the process of making any necessary changes to your technique. Not only will a good teacher help you to play clean by telling you ‘what to do’, but also because he will hear problems that you may not really be hearing.

IF you have an excellent ear, you should be able to identify the fine details of your problem, if not, work with your guitar teacher.

Articulation – The First Half of Two Hand Synchronization

The second step is to focus on your articulation. Articulation is the first half of two hand synchronization. To play cleaner you need your hands to fret and pick each note at precisely the same time (simultaneously).

There are three critical things you need to do to improve your articulation:

1. Use a clean guitar tone when practicing (no distortion and NO effects!). Distortion and effects will mask any imperfections in your articulation, so do not practice with them when focusing on “Articulation” (the rules will change when we talk about “The Release” in the next section).
2. Play loud enough so that you can truly hear what is happening as you are playing.
3. When you are practicing something slowly MAKE SURE that you do NOT change ANYTHING about how you approach and articulate each note. Fact is, most guitar players actually play very differently when playing slow compared to when playing fast. If you change anything in the way you are articulating the notes (such as playing with a lighter touch, using a weaker or stronger pick attack, changing your hand position, pick angle etc.) you will NOT fully improve your technique because the sound you make when playing will be different and therefore harder to detect and identify any problems with your articulation.

The Release – The Second Half of Two Hand Synchronization

The third step toward cleaner playing is ‘the release’. For most guitar players ‘the release’ is the hardest problem to detect and correct. That’s generally because once players articulate a note cleanly, they ignore what immediately comes after (small sloppy noise in between the notes or two notes slightly ‘bleeding’ together.

And practicing your guitar with a ‘clean’ tone (no distortion) – as described above when focusing on articulation – almost always masks problems in the release phase of playing a note. This is why many people think their guitar playing sounds pretty clean when practicing without distortion but sense something is wrong when later playing with distortion… but they are not sure what the problem is… or worse, they actually do not hear the problem at all (but other people do). This is why focused awareness is so critical.

I use multiple steps to help my guitar students fully solve this problem (not all of which can be fully demonstrated or expressed in an article), but here are the absolutely necessary steps toward correcting problems with ‘the release’.

1. Practice your guitar WITH distortion (but NO EFFECTS!) now. (Notice, this is the exact opposite advice I gave you to identify and correct ‘articulation’ problems above).
2. Again you need to play your guitar loud enough to hear precisely what is coming out of your amplifier (other noises in the room can mask the subtle things you need to be listening for).
3. Practice slow (but as stated above, do NOT change ANYTHING in the way you articulate OR RELEASE a note compared to when you are playing fast!).
4. Listen for any subtle noise in between notes (you will probably notice a ‘scratchy sound’ just before you play the next note). If you have a hard time hearing anything then record yourself and listen back to the recording at 1/4 or 1/3 speed (I guarantee you will hear this short scratchy sound now!)
5. Now that you know what to listen for, you will probably notice it all the time whenever you listen very carefully… and THEN you are ready to being to correct the problem…

Fact is there can be several reasons why your guitar playing may not be clean during the release of a note, but the most common cause is this: When you release a note your brain is probably telling your finger to ‘lift off’ (make an upward motion away from the string you just played). This can cause all sorts of nasty technique problems (fatigue, slower guitar playing speeds, and sloppy guitar playing… among other things).

The solution is to stop your brain from sending your fingers instructions to ‘lift off; of each note and instead to simply ‘relax’. When your finger relaxes it will naturally, immediately and effortlessly ‘release’ the note you just played. There are two main benefits to this:

1. Because the motion is effortless, you can play faster and for a much longer time (and most importantly) with greater ease.
2. Because your brain does not give the finger the instruction to make a ‘lift off’ motion this actually prevents your finger from moving (or preparing to move) prematurely (which is a major cause of the sloppy ‘scratchy sound’ that may be present in your guitar playing.

It is now very important to realize two things. First you CAN solve these problems and improve your guitar technique. Second, it won’t happen over night, this will take time and some consistent practice (possibly over several weeks or longer). But the benefits of being able to play guitar clean are well worth the patience required.

To get more help with your guitar playing check out my 15 Free Guitar Tips.

In Part 2 of this article series we’ll focus on the last group of guitar technique challenges.
About the author:Tom Hess is a professional guitarist and teaches electric guitar lessons online.

©2009 Tom Hess Music Corporation.
All Rights reserved.

These four problem areas typically do not occur in isolation. Typically if you have one of the four problems described below, you have the others to some degree also. The good news though is that once you work on fixing at least one of these problems, the others tend to improve as well (it works both ways). As you read on, you will understand why.

If you want me to show you on video how to correctly practice the following ideas in this article, you can watch a (totally free) 20 minute sweep picking video lesson at my website that is available to my free newsletter subscribers. Otherwise, I will do my best to explain these technical points to you using text alone.

Separating the notes

Many players struggle with separating the notes of arpeggios, because they do not release the fingers from the notes that have already played, which results in all of the notes of the arpeggio ringing together. Although this follows the theory of “minimum motion” for the fingers, it breaks the most important rule of clean sweep picking: each note must have definition and clarity! So on one hand, it is tempting to want to minimize the motion of the fretting hand fingers as much as possible, and on the other hand, you also need to make sure that the notes are sounding cleanly.

The solution is to find the balance between releasing the fingers from each note right after you have played it, but doing so without letting the fingers come up “too far” away from the strings. Obviously if your fingers move too far away from the strings, it makes it difficult to bring them back down to play when needed. That being said, you need to lift the finger off the string slightly after it has played (so that it stops ringing), and also mute that same string with your picking hand (more about this later).

Remember that economy of motion is a “relative” concept and not an “absolute” concept. So even though releasing the fingers from the notes they have played is not an “absolute” application economy of motion, it is necessary to do this in order to play the technique cleanly. This advice may seem like perfect common sense when you read about it, but MANY guitarists have a difficult time with finding the right balance between the economy of motion and playing cleanly (in this part of guitar playing technique especially, but also with other techniques).

Rolling

One of the biggest sources of confusion of the rolling technique is that it is often confused with “barring”. When you play barre chords, you fret notes of two or more strings at the same fret with the same finger and you let all the notes ring together. When you perform the rolling technique, you have to actually physically “roll” the finger across strings by bending it backwards. As a result, the notes sound separated.

This technique is best shown on video or in person, but basically you play the first note of the roll with the tip of the finger, and then bend it backwards fretting the remaining notes of the roll with the soft fingerprint. You then reverse the motion when you descend. Your first knuckle of the finger becomes the pivot point that bends or collapses allowing you the flexibility of fretting the notes cleanly. If you are unsure about how to specifically practice this motion, I can show you precisely what the finger rolling motion should look like in the free sweep picking video at my site.

The good news about the rolling technique is that although it is hard in the beginning, it is actually one of the absolute easiest things to do on guitar once you get better at it. But in order to make sure that you do master it in minimum time, make sure to follow the guidelines above.

Pull offs:

Many players neglect isolating and practicing this part of the arpeggio in the shapes that require a pull off on the top string. As a result, the weak pull off distorts the rhythm of the notes and the arpeggio doesn’t sound clean. The picked notes usually sound rushed, and come out much louder than the pull off (which is barely audible). The solution is to practice just the pull off part of the arpeggio with the amp off. You should be able to hear the pull off very clearly even with the amp turned off. If you apply more force to make the pull off loud when you practice with no distortion, then after you turn distortion on, it really becomes a lot easier to play the entire arpeggio smoothly and cleanly.

Try to match the volume of your pull offs as closely as possible to that of your picked notes. This will not be entirely possible, but by constantly striving for it you will make great improvements in your legato playing in general and in this area of sweep picking specifically.

Muting excess string noise

Conventional wisdom suggests to practice sweep picking with a clean guitar tone in order to make it easier to hear imperfections in your technique. This is true on some level, BUT practicing only with a clean tone makes it hard to hear excess string noise that can occur either from letting the notes ring together (problem 1 described above) or from not muting the strings that are not supposed to be playing.

In reality, it is even more important to practice with distortion because only then will you become aware of any excess noise that may be present and correct it. If you have limited time to practice, then definitely you should practice with distortion only. This one practicing tip (which I learned from my guitar teacher, friend and mentor Tom Hess) helped me to greatly improve my own sweep picking in a short amount of time.

When you do become aware of the sloppy extra noise, it becomes much easier to fix it and mute it (using a variety of techniques in your picking and fretting hands).

Think carefully about the points in this article and apply them to your playing. You will see great results when you do!

If you are unclear about any part of what I explained above and want to see me do it on video, visit my website and I will show you the free sweep picking lesson on video that I send to all my newsletter subscribers. You can also contact me by e-mail at mike@mikephilippov.com with any questions.

About Mike Philippov

Mike Philippov is a professional virtuoso guitarist, music composer and instructor. He is also a co-author of several instructional products, numerous articles and other free instructional resources available on http://mikephilippov.com

Fact is, one of the biggest reasons why so few people become great guitarists is not because they lack talent – their shortcoming lies in not knowing all of the things they need to do or practice in order to reach their goal. People usually have more than enough things to practice (licks, techniques, exercises, scales etc.), but they struggle most with creating an overall plan to get them the result they want.

Taking your guitar playing ability from wherever it is right now to exactly where you always dreamed it could be in the shortest amount of time can be done. Having a well-structured, yet flexible, guitar practice regimen is a key first step to do this.

I know… I know… You’ve heard this before, it seems ‘obvious’, so why talk about it again here?

Well, unfortunately, many guitarists have misconceptions about having an efficient and effective practice schedule. Others have tried it for a while but either didn’t stick with it, or had an ineffective practice plan to start with.

Have you ever believed any of the following myths?

Effective guitar practicing routines are boring; they take all the fun out of playing guitar.

I started putting myself on a practice schedule for guitar, but it was hard to stick to it.

Practice schedules are too rigid and they restrict, or put limitations on, my creativity.

A guitar practice regimen is too structured for me, I want the freedom to allow myself to drift into random things when playing guitar.

Practice routines for guitar just don’t work. I can make more progress without one.

I can’t stand to practice the same things in the same way each day.

Now think about this:

The truth is, ‘bad’ practice routines are awful! However, efficient, effective and flexible ones have the power to totally transform your guitar playing, musicianship and your creativity in a shorter period of time. Imagine how much better your guitar playing life will be like after you fully reached all of your musical goals!

Good practice regimens won’t hurt your creativity. The opposite is true because you are gaining the tools to become more creative. And your schedule can include ‘creative time’ to work on writing new songs, improvising, etc.

It’s not boring to practice that which directly relates to the very things you want to achieve as a guitar player and musician. Yes, practicing the same exercise for thirty minutes is boring, which is why you shouldn’t design a guitar practice schedule in such a way. We want to create a structure that works, not one that will drive you crazy.

You do not need to spend all your guitar practice time with a fixed schedule. If you have ninety minutes to practice, invest forty-five to sixty minutes working from your planned guitar practicing regimen. Use the rest of time to freely do whatever you feel like playing that day.

The best routines are not the same each day. A good guitar practice workout schedule should be effective, efficient and flexible.

A practice schedule is a roadmap to the freedom of being able to play whatever you want! But this doesn’t mean that you don’t have any room to have fun, be creative, and enjoy playing guitar in the process. The only difference is that now you will be enjoying the process more while you get better, and avoid mindlessly playing around on the guitar with no direction or sense of purpose. As a result, it will take you much less time to become the exact kind of excellent guitar player you want to be.

The best way to think about an efficient practice schedule is with an analogy of a map. When you prepare to travel somewhere, you first analyze where you are (Point A), and then prepare the most direct and time efficient route of arriving to your destination (Point B).

Eight Steps to Creating Your Own Guitar Practice Routine

Step 1. Get very clear on what your LONG TERM guitar playing / musical goals are. Beware of distractions – there is a big difference between ‘short term goals’ and ‘distractions’. True short-term goals should be consistent with your long-term goals. If they aren’t, then you might be simply distracting yourself from what you really want to achieve as a guitar player and musician. When creating your practice routine, focus mainly on long-term goals.

Step 2. Balance your existing strengths and RELEVANT weaknesses. Seek to turn your strengths into super strengths and ‘only’ work on weaknesses that are truly ‘relevant’ to your goals (see Step 4 below).

Step 3. Be realistic about how much time you can practice each day. As mentioned above, you can and should allow ‘free time’ in your schedule to learn, practice, or do other things with your guitar outside of your written guitar practice regimen.

Step 4. You must be 100% sure you really know all the musical elements which are needed to reach your long term goals, AND you need to be clear about which of these elements are the ‘primary’ and ‘secondary’ priorities for you to focus on right now in order to reach your specific goals. To get help, I have created a totally free resource for you to use http://tomhess.net/goalsmanifestation.aspx

Step 5. Contrary to popular belief, creativity CAN be taught, learned and practiced. Always include creativity development into your practice schedule (or work on it at least in your free time).

Step 6. Application is key! Be sure to add time each day to work on applying your skills even if you have not mastered them yet! It’s a big mistake to work only on mastering something before seeking to apply it.

Step 7. Don’t create the same schedule for each day of the week, your schedule should be based on larger period of time (I use an eight-day practice and learning schedule for my students – works much better compared to a routine that repeats itself each day). Maybe two or three of the days are the same, but the other days are a little different (yet still based on the above steps mentioned).

Step 8. Create three to five different eight-day practice regimens. Use each one twice (sixteen days) before working with the next one. Be sure that when you create them that each are based on the first seven steps above.

What’s Next?

1. Get committed!
2. Stay committed! Follow through with your plan and watch your guitar playing get better and easier. If you find it hard to stay committed, focus on the ‘reasons’ behind the goals you have set for yourself, in other words, keep in mind “why” you want to reach those goals. How you will feel after you achieve them and are able to be/do/have what you want as a musician.

Can you relate to that? I sure can! I just described myself fifteen years ago.

There are specific reasons why guitar players go through such frustration and disappointment. Here are eleven key mistakes players make and repeat over and over again that you should definitely avoid.

1. Teaching Yourself.

Many people attempt to teach themselves. Yes, it’s true that some well known players were ‘somewhat’ self taught, but I do not suggest following that strategy even if your favorite player was self taught. If you are 100% sure that you can build powerfully effective learning and training systems on your own, that’s great. However, if you are like most of us, doing it alone is the hardest, most time-consuming, stressful, and frustrating way to learn anything. This is a mistake that you should avoid. Some guitar players think it will impress others if they say, “I am a self taught player”. That statement might impress a few inexperienced people, but being self taught is not a ‘badge of honor’. Would you rather impress others with your playing or with an unimportant statement about your playing? I’m not criticizing self taught guitar players, I’m only saying that there is no advantage to being self taught… and no, it is not true that being ‘self taught’ makes us more ‘original’. In fact, the opposite is usually true.

2. Taking Lessons from Ineffective Guitar Teachers.

Unfortunately, most electric guitar teachers receive ZERO training on how to teach guitar. What is worse is that the vast majority of teachers do little or nothing to improve their guitar teaching skills. Want some proof? Use google’s keyword tool . Type in this keyword phrase: ‘improve guitar teaching skills’, ‘guitar teaching skills’, or ‘guitar teaching training’ and you will find that less than 10 searches per month are done for these topics at google! Of course there are some highly effective teachers around, but there are a whole lot more ineffective teachers. Here is a free resource on how to tell the difference between the good teachers and the mediocre ones, Free Guide: How To Choose A Guitar Teacher.

3. Seeking New Guitar Information (tricks, tips, tab) Without A Proven Strategy To Reach Your Specific Musical Goals.

We need information, advice, help and music to play, but without a proven strategic learning and training process that is specific to you, your skill level, your musical style and what you want to be able to do as a guitar player, information won’t get you where you want to go. It is better to first seek help in developing a customized strategy for you to become a better guitar player. After that strategy is in place then it is time to deal with learning the right information.

4. Not Knowing Specifically What You Want To Be Able To Play.

Most guitar players are not specific enough when they think about (or tell others about) what they want to be able to do with their guitar. To say, “I want to play whatever I wish to play” is too vague. How can you (or your guitar teacher) develop a specific and effective guitar training strategy unless the goals you have are specific? It’s like saying you want to be a great athlete, how can you effectively train with such a vague goal? Sure there are things you can do to become faster, stronger, more flexible or whatever, but it’s much easier if you first get specific such as, I want to train to be a gymnast, or a long distance runner, or a body builder. Yes you can still improve without a strategy, but it will take a lot longer and be much more frustrating. You can always change your goal later if you discover you want to do something else instead.

5. Not Enough Focus on Things That Matter Most To Making You a Better Guitar Player.

Have you fallen into the trap of practicing guitar without focusing on the specific things that can quickly begin to improve your guitar playing? Many people really do not understand and apply this concept in enough detail…. for example, I have a student named Mark who used to take lessons from another teacher. Mark was studying sweep picking arpeggios with his previous teacher, and was making some progress. However Mark did not understand what ‘specific’ things he needed to focus on first before attempting to master the sweep picking arpeggios he was practicing. This was holding him back and making him feel very frustrated. Mark’s previous teacher only knew how to ‘teach’ arpeggios and general sweep picking concepts. He did not really know how to “train” Mark with the specific things to focus on and how to overcome the challenges Mark was having. If you would like to see a small sample of this, check out this short sweep picking video guitar lesson.

6. Too Much Focus on Things That Are Not Core to Your Goals.

In addition to not focusing on specific things, many guitar players focus on the ‘wrong things’. Some enthusiastic guitar players become temporarily obsessed with things which are distractions from other things that could be helping their playing much more. Here is an example: I used to get so frustrated and angry when I could not play something perfectly, I’d lock myself in my practice room and say, “I’m not coming out of this room until I master this damn lick if it takes me the next nineteen hours! No breaks! No food! No human contact! I’m gonna nail this!” And I did master it. On the surface, it might seem like I was on the right track and practicing in a good way…. But in reality, I was spending my time only to stop being angry and frustrated. I was not investing my practice time wisely by focusing on the things that mattered most to making a better guitar player. In other words, my perseverance was commendable, but my strategy to master important long-term goals was weak. I allowed myself to be distracted. I don’t make this same mistake anymore, and I urge you to also avoid it! Focus on the things that really matter for your guitar playing right now. If you are not sure how to do this, seek out a proven guitar teacher today.

7. Focusing On the Right Things, But in the Wrong Order.

This is a common mistake that even many advanced guitar players make which causes a lot of wasted time and frustration. Imagine you want to improve your ability to create your own cool guitar solos. Let’s assume that you are advanced enough to truly understand all the primary and secondary elements of composing guitar solos (or you have a guitar teacher to help you). Each of the many elements needs to be learned and/or practiced in order to easily create awesome solos that you like. Where should you begin? What should you focus on first, second, third? Which of these things should you practice simultaneously? There is always a specific order in which musical skills should be learned and mastered in order to EXPLODE your musical skills. Unfortunately, that order is totally different for every person, style of music, musical goal, skill set and knowledge, so giving an example here would be pointless. My advice, find the best teacher you can and study with him/her in order to be able to do what you want to do with your guitar much faster and easier.

8. Not Isolating Problem Areas.

Few guitar players are aware of the small things that hold them back in big ways. Because these little imperfections seem insignificant to us, we often ignore them. The truth is, small hinges open big doors. In the video mentioned above I explained how allowing your pick to lose its momentum when you are ‘not picking’ a note on the guitar makes your playing slow and sloppy…. which will make you feel very frustrated. This is why I was sure to make a special point to help you avoid that mistake. Check out the small sample sweep picking video guitar lesson for more details.

9. Learning and Practicing Guitar In A Step By Step Linear Process.

Does following a linear step by step approach to learning, practicing and mastering guitar seem like common sense good to you? Yes it does… And that is why guitar players who follow such a path are NOT great guitar players. I’m going to let you in an insider’s secret… The truth is, following a linear approach to learning, practicing, and mastering is the NUMBER ONE REASON WHY “GOOD GUITAR PLAYERS” STRUGGLE TO BECOME “GREAT GUITAR PLAYERS”… I originally thought I would write an article on this one point alone, but I think you will learn this concept better from another short video I recorded while I was doing a recent guitar instructional clinic tour a few months ago. Check out this free sample from my “How to Master The Guitar” clinic.

10. Practicing Guitar in the Same Way Your Favorite Guitar Players Practice.

Have you ever read about how your favorite guitar players practice and then tried to repeat the same practice routine? Yes, I’ve made this mistake too! It seems natural to use a similar guitar practice schedule that our favorite players are using. This is a mistake, because your current guitar skill level and knowledge of music is probably very different from your favorite player. His/her challenges and needs are likely not the same as yours.

Professional guitar players practice for different reasons than most amateur players do. For example, before recording a new album I will practice very differently compared to the period before going on tour. Once I’m actually on tour my practice routine changes drastically again. The rest of the year my practicing schedule changes yet again. This happens because in each case my challenges and goals are totally different. When my guitar students ask me, “Tom, how do you practice guitar?” I’m careful not to let my students assume that they should practice the same way that I do. Your practice schedule and strategy needs to be built around YOU and you only! If you need help building your own practice schedule, email me directly.

11. Learning From Too Many Different Sources of Information.

There will always be many learning opportunities and various paths to take, but it is critical that you do not get distracted into following a piece of advice from one person, then another piece of advice from another person and then follow more resources from somewhere else and so on and so on… while different people may have some good ideas to offer, the fact is, distraction is a big reason why many guitar players who are actively learning, don’t really move forward quickly… these people are always busy following totally different resources, teachers, philosophies, instructional videos, free online guitar lessons, but all of this leads them to take one step forward, then two steps to the right, then one step forward, then three steps to the left, then one step backward, then two to the right, then one step forward and then another step to the left…

An illustration of this is shown below. The first path is obviously the most direct way to arrive to your goals. The second path is the inefficient approach filled with many distractions that come from various pieces of advice from many sources:

Once you have an effective strategy to become the guitar player you want to be, ALWAYS stay focused on it (unless your goals radically change)!! The very best way to do this is to have ONE primary guitar teacher who helps you to become the musician you really want to be.

This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t take advice from other people too, but you should have one ‘primary’ source of information, training and coaching, and see the other advice as an additional resource, but do not become distracted by it.

Download this free guide How To Choose A Guitar Teacher to find a guitar teacher with proven teaching strategies, proven training strategies and proven results so that you become the awesome guitar player you want to be and play the guitar the way you’ve always wanted to play.

©2009 Tom Hess Music Corporation. All Rights Reserved

While it may be rather difficult to increase the total time you have available to practice guitar, it is very possible to maximize the results you get from the practice time you do have available. Here is what you need to do to get maximum results…

The Essentials

To get any significant results in your guitar playing, you need to focus on two essential elements: the efficiency of your practice, and its effectiveness. Being efficient means being skillful in avoiding wasted time and effort. Being effective means having the ability to achieve the desired result.

Imagine that you are trying to dig a swimming pool by using a teaspoon. Sure, you are being effective (the pool is getting dug), but it is going to take you years working at this rate to complete the job, because you are working with very low efficiency. A much better approach, one that will help you avoid wasted time and effort, would be to use a powerful excavator to do the same task in minutes!

In order to become truly great guitar player in a minimum amount of time, you should strive to maximize both efficiency and effectiveness, as they are equally important. However, the focus of this particular article will be entirely on efficiency, and I will discuss effectiveness in a future article.

I want to share with you three powerful ideas and practice strategies that can be used to maximize results from your practicing by increasing efficiency. They can and should be applied regardless of how much time you have to practice, and especially when time is limited.

1. Transferability

Many guitar players become discouraged if they cannot find a large enough block of time (for instance, an hour or more each day) to practice. I often receive questions from students such as: “Tom, I only have twenty minutes to dedicate to practicing guitar each day, and I want to make the most progress possible. What should I be doing?”

In this case, I suggest to practice something which has a high level of “transferability”. A skill is “transferable”, if working on it will simultaneously make you better in other elements of guitar playing. Examples of transferability include, but are not limited to: left hand technique, right hand technique, two-hand synchronization, shifting from string to string, muting string noise, fretboard awareness, improvisation. If what you are working on helps more than one of these elements at the same time, then you are practicing something that has some degree of transferability.

There are two primary factors which determine the transferability rate. The first factor is the number of other areas which are benefited. The second factor is how strong that benefit is.

One example of a technique with high transferability is string skipping. It involves the technique on both hands, challenges your two-hand synchronization, and forces you to focus on muting unwanted string noise. This is a good technique to work on because its benefits directly “transfer” to other elements of guitar playing.

Legato technique, on the other hand, has a much lower degree of transferability. It mainly focuses only on left hand technique (and some elements of muting string noise as well). So when time is limited, working on legato playing is probably not going to bring you as much benefit compared to practicing string skipping.

By investing your practice time among high transferability items, you will get a lot more from your practicing. I want you to become aware of this idea and think about it as you are selecting the most important items to work on when your practice time is very limited.

To help you fully understand and apply the transferability concept into your guitar practicing, I have created a short (and free) guitar practice video.

Teaching my philosophy of transferability has been a key factor in the great success I have had with training many of my students to become great guitarists in a short amount of time.

2. Blueprint to Success

Another way to dramatically improve your efficiency is to use a practice schedule that is targeted and relevant to your goals. Think of a practice schedule as a blueprint to your success. If you have been stuck at the same level for months or years, if you have the desire to move past your current plateau, and if you have limited time to practice, consider creating a schedule. It will keep you focused on what you need to do, and will help you to become more organized and not waste time when practicing.

This schedule must be specific to your musical goals and yet flexible enough to adjust to your progress and any possible changes in your musical ambitions. If you are struggling with creating an efficient practice schedule on your own, you can find help here, and you can also find many good discussions of practice schedules right here at Guitar Noise, such as this article (A Question of Balance).

3. Divide and Conquer

Another piece of advice that I want to give to you is to become more specific about isolating your technical challenges. This will allow you to get to the core of your playing problem(s) and avoid wasting precious time practicing the parts of the music you can already play well.

For example, when you practice an ascending scale sequence like this one,

you may have trouble with fretting hand accuracy every time you have to shift from string 5 to string 4. Here is where the practice efficiency breaks down for most players. They will attempt to practice this entire sequence over and over, trying to iron out the difficulty. Even though you will still be practicing the hard part of the sequence when you do this, your efficiency will be greatly compromised for the following reasons:

1. The number of times per minute that you can play your specific problem area will be a lot less, simply because you are also playing additional notes.
2. Your attention will not be fully engaged on the problem at hand because you will have to think about playing additional parts of the phrase. This means that your hands will need to play your specific challenge even more times before you can overcome it.

This is similar to the example of digging a swimming pool with a teaspoon, and obviously this is highly inefficient.

If instead you took the time to define the problem (such as the shift between the two strings and the transition from using your fourth finger to using the first finger), and focused on practicing that section only without playing the rest of the phrase, you will practice the problem area many more times per minute! This is something you should do regardless of how much practice time you have, and especially in situations when time is limited.

After you have practiced the problem in isolation, you should put it back into the context of the whole sequence, and practice everything together to see how well it holds up. But working on the problem in isolation (dividing and conquering it!) should be the first step.

Think about each of these three practice tools. If you were already familiar with them, have you been applying them every day? Obviously, if you have already been using these concepts and are seeing good results, then continue doing what you were doing! However, if you are not yet applying these ideas, and/or are not progressing at the rate you would like, then you should think hard about how you can implement these tools to improve the efficiency of your practice. If you are still stuck after trying to apply them on your own, ask someone for help!

If you follow the advice given in this article, you will soon find yourself making more progress in thirty minutes than most people can achieve in two hours of practicing!

Learn more about efficient guitar practicing by watching this free guitar practice video.

©2008 Tom Hess Music Corporation. All Rights Reserved

Many players acknowledge that a metronome is necessary for developing accuracy and control needed for high levels of playing. However, a lot of guitarists do not understand how to use this tool for maximum effectiveness. I often receive questions regarding how to practice with a metronome for higher speed development, and I want to address some of them in this article. I should mention that the practice approaches I am about to describe should be integrated into your practice routine and balanced by other musical elements. You want to make sure that all of the musical skills relevant to your goals are constantly improving and do not become out of balance in one area.

One of the most common questions that I receive about using a metronome is “what tempo should I start with?” It is difficult to answer this question in a general way. The answer (“your” answer) will depend in many ways on your current skill level as a player, the specific technique/exercise in question, and the note values being played (sixteenth note triplets will require a slower starting tempo than regular sixteenth notes for example). So become clear on these elements before you begin.

In general, before you start a metronome routine it will be helpful to make a list of specific techniques/problems you want to address, and write next to them the target speeds you want to achieve. Next, you want to establish your current top speed at which you can play a certain technique comfortably. Write this down as well. All of this will help you assess your current skills and show you the gap that must be bridged before you can play at the level you desire. The more you understand about your current playing ability and the specific technical challenges you are facing, the easier it will be to overcome them. The metronome is only useful as a tool for “fixing” problems after you become aware of “what” problems need to be fixed! Please do not skip this step.

While writing this article, I came across a useful free resource that evaluates your technical skill level in greater depth. For the curious, here is the link I found: How Close Are You To Mastering Electric Lead Guitar Technique?

After you become clear about your current skill level and your goals, you will be ready to pull out the metronome. I generally recommend starting to practice at about 30-50% of your maximum speed. Your first objective should be to simply teach your fingers the motions and learn to be relaxed while playing the phrase or exercise. You also should make sure that your playing is totally clean and precise at this initial stage. If it is not, it will become much harder for you to develop the level of control necessary to play easily and cleanly at much higher speeds.

The next question I am often asked is “how much can I increase the speed and when do I do it? This is another issue that does not have a clearly defined answer, but I will share with you the approaches that I use. You should increase the metronome speed when you are able to play at the slower speeds easily, cleanly and accurately, and CONSISTENTLY. This means you should be able to easily play the passage more than once, instead of “nailing it” only one time. At that point it is safe to increase the metronome tempo by 1-10% of the previous speed. The closer you get to your maximum speed, the smaller the increase in speed should be.

Another common question is: “What if I get stuck at a certain speed?” In order to move past a sticking point on the metronome, you need to become clear on what exactly is going wrong with your playing at your maximum speed. Analyze where the mistakes are happening. Then slow the metronome back down to about 60-80% of your maximum speed and drill the exercise again, this time focusing more on the points where you noticed mistakes at your top speed. Make the motions more efficient and more relaxed in these spots. After doing this for a few minutes, move the metronome back up. The maximum speed should now feel easier.

This process described above is a general approach that I recommend starting with. There are several variations on this method, and they mostly depend on the specific skill level of the player. Sometimes, a different, more advanced method can be more appropriate. One of such tactics is described in this article.

In addition to the challenges of not knowing how to use a metronome, many players fail to develop high levels of technique because they believe in a common myth that persists among guitarists. Some people believe that having great technique automatically means that the player’s music begins to lack in feel or emotion. As a result, many choose not to pursue the really high levels of technical development, partly because of fear of becoming “sterile/soulless shredders”. This could not be more false. Great technique is only a tool, nothing more. You use that tool in a way that suits your musical desires. Also, do not forget that there are several DIFFERENT kinds of emotion (in other words, there is MUCH more to emotion than “bending a note”). Players such as Rusty Cooley, Theodore Ziras, and Paul Gilbert may be on a completely different side of the technique spectrum from Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton, and BB King, but all play with extreme emotion that is appropriate for their style and their musical vision. It is up to the listener to discern the emotion in the music. Just because one can only perceive emotion in a limited number of styles, does not mean that emotion is lacking in other types of musical contexts.

So my advice to you is to let go of any negative misconceptions you may have about speed and seek to acquire as much guitar technique as you need to play what you want to play. Admittedly, not everyone likes the sound of fast/virtuoso guitar playing, but if you do, then you are feeling EMOTION! This should reason enough for you to move forward with getting to that level yourself.

Use the process described above, believe in your own potential and you will surely begin to see much improvement in your playing!

About Mike Philippov

Mike Philippov is a professional virtuoso guitarist, music composer and instructor. He is also a co-author of several instructional products, numerous articles and other free instructional resources available on http://mikephilippov.com

Let me show you why…

There was a time many years ago when I was not enjoying practicing. My learning sessions were not fun and I began to think of them as an unpleasant chore. I tried to make practicing more enjoyable, but my efforts slowed down my progress more than they helped. I responded to this by becoming more self disciplined and practicing very hard every day hoping that bigger progress would come.

Unfortunately that didn’t make me much better at playing, and only made the learning process feel even less fun. I talked about this to the teacher with whom I was studying at that time and he made me realize that practicing shouldn’t be seen only from one perspective, such as all fun or all discipline. The key to success is the right balance of both elements in practicing. Once I understood this, he and I could start working on creating the appropriate practice schedule and improving my mental approach to practicing to finally get me on the right track to becoming the musician that I am today. In other words, I learned that there is a way to do serious practicing that produces real results while enjoying that process at the same time. This success comes partly from the practice routine itself and partly from your mindset and attitude during the process.
You will get more from the rest of this article, if you have a better understanding of how effective you are now at making serious practicing “fun” without reducing the results. To test yourself, take this short survey.

Let’s now take a closer look at each of the two components that you must balance in order to enjoy the process of practicing and see consistent progress. I will also share with you the common mistakes people make that lead to an imbalance of these two elements.

Serious/Purpose driven practicing (Self Discipline)

Many people assume that sheer self discipline and persistence will make them as good as they want to be. Unfortunately, most guitarists do not understand how to discover and sustain “the right kind” of discipline.

In order to sustain your motivation for a long time, your work must be “fulfilling”. If you don’t know the reason why doing something is in your very best interest, you will not be fulfilled and will be unlikely to continue for long. On the other hand, if you do feel the reasons very strongly, you will be able to pull out the needed intensity and discipline from within yourself without trying very hard. Start looking at practicing as something you do in order to achieve a benefit (become a better player). This will automatically create a meaningful reason (beyond simply having fun) to be involved in the activity and not treat it as a chore that you dread doing every day. This may seem obvious and insignificant, but even a small change in thinking will bring about big changes in results!

Some people stereotype this kind of practice as boring or “requiring too much work”. However, it is not the practice approach that is “boring,” it is often your mental state during practice that makes the process seem tedious. Of course, sometimes the opposite problem can occur and your practice approach may cause you to mindlessly go through the motions of practice. It is very difficult to get yourself to enjoy such activity. In this case, your learning strategy would need to become more effective. For more information about this, read this article.

One of the biggest mistakes regarding focused practicing that I see regularly is excluding variety and fun from the learning process. This happens frequently, especially when you are not under the guidance of a teacher who fundamentally understands this issue. You may think you are doing all the things necessary for fast progress, but your practice approach could still be susceptible to improvement. One such change may be including more variety into your practice. This will help avoid mental burn out and frustration.

Incorporating variety into your practice does not mean a lack of focus, or doing things that are inconsistent with your goals. It simply means that you have multiple approaches for learning, applying and integrating musical skills. I call this “intelligent” variety. This is much different from “random” variety that involves mindless jumping from one item to another in your practice, with no sense of direction.

Another issue that makes it difficult to see discipline as “fulfilling” is that results usually do not occur immediately and the small gains made along the way might seem insignificant. This delayed gratification will make it hard for you to practice well on a consistent basis unless you learn to enjoy the process (more about this later).

Improper application of the idea of variety can also lead you to working on weaknesses that don’t really matter. For example, let’s assume that your goal is to become a highly advanced metal player. Since this style doesn’t require you to fuse elements of other musical genres, it wouldn’t be worth your time to work on finger picking or Segovia fingerings for scales, for example. This is because these skills are not necessary for you to reach your goal. So don’t waste time on them! It will take you so much longer to reach your goal if you keep getting distracted by working on unnecessary playing elements.

Enjoying the process (having fun while practicing)

Many guitarists think (on some level) that one cannot have fun learning guitar and get results at the same time. This thinking arises from an idea that “having fun” means random, disorganized practicing with no clear direction and no goals. While it is true that such an approach will not produce significant results, it is still very possible to have fun while working on your playing. Having fun means being able to enjoy the process of practicing. There are many things that go into this, and here is a short list:

• Experiencing consistent, measurable results throughout the learning process
• Having confidence that you will reach all of your goals with time.
• Avoiding boredom by knowing when to make adjustments in your practice schedule.
• Fueling your desire to reach your goals by surrounding yourself by what inspires you!
• Practicing application and integration of new skills (together with the old skills). The ways in which we practice mastery, application and integration are totally different and naturally provide a source of ‘intelligent variety’ into your practice routine.

If I told you that you would get to experience all of the above (and much more) by creating an intelligent, relevant and flexible practicing program, wouldn’t you suddenly feel motivated to practice longer and harder in order to see these results? If you answered yes, then you must understand everything I wrote above about how discipline naturally develops from fulfillment!

Summary: 7 Steps to Effective Balancing of Discipline and Fun

1. Make your practice fulfilling! Without the feeling of accomplishment, your motivation and desire will fade. If are having trouble achieving fulfillment, try the following:
   • Soak yourself in inspiration – Think back to what made you want to play guitar. Relive the excitement you felt when you got your first instrument. Finally, look ahead to the day when you will have the skills you desire! Focus your mind on the satisfaction of reaching your goals instead of obstacles!
   • Become self-reliant – even if you are working with the very best teacher, you are still practicing on your own most of the time. You must make sure that whatever instructions your teacher gives you (or that you assign yourself) get carried out correctly and consistently!
   • Never give up! Remember YOU CAN learn to play guitar as well as you want to, if you have all of your fingers, a strong desire to improve and follow an effective approach to practicing! Never give up!
2. Have specific goals. You have to be absolutely clear about what level of playing you want to achieve and what you plan to do with these skills once you have them! This is not only critical for guitar playing, but also for everything in life. You need to identify where you want to arrive before you can get there. This means keeping the goal in the FOREFRONT of your mind in order to enable yourself to harness the power of your intentions and desire. Set goals for your practicing, find out how to reach them, and take consistent action to get yourself there.
3. Incorporate intelligent variety into your practicing. Doing this will help you prevent boredom and burn out. At the same time, by “structuring” your variety in an intelligent way, you will be able to make consistent and measurable progress. Both things can be achieved if your practice schedule is efficient and effective (and proper mindset is applied).
4. Find an effective way to measure your progress. This is useful for many reasons. First, it is fun to compare your current skill level to your playing from several weeks, months or years ago, and second, it will help to keep you on track toward reaching your goals. Few people do this consistently; most wander aimlessly with no clear sense of direction. This leads to inability to make significant progress.
5. Keep your mind focused on the item you are practicing until you go on to the next thing on your practice schedule. Don’t switch between different things at random. If you understand the reason why practicing a specific item is important for your goals, this becomes easy to do.
6. Design an effective and flexible practice schedule. You need to organize all the things you want to learn in a system that is effective enough to bring results and also one that can be adjusted to introduce variety. If you cannot do this well on your own, there is help for you here.
7. Find ways to apply your musical tools. The easiest way to have fun while practicing is through application of skills to real music. This sounds obvious, but far too many students think that practicing should be all about “learning new things”. Because of this, they don’t schedule time for application, integration and mastery of what they already know. As a result, many end up with lots of isolated things “they can do”, but no ability to actually use their skills. Learning more things is important but it shouldn’t be your top priority all of the time. It is also not much fun to practice things that you can not really integrate with your other musical skills in a real musical context. Great players aren’t great because they ‘know more’, it’s usually because they can integrate and apply more than the common player.

Above all else, remember to keep at it! Use the advice from this article to make your practicing both fun and focused in order to decrease the time needed to reach your goals! If you haven’t yet taken the survey mentioned at the beginning of the article, you can do so here.