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SECOND QUARTER: TECHNIQUE EXERCISES

August 14, 2020 By Jim Beckwith

 

In the second quarter, we increase the practice time to a total of

15 minutes. The extra 5 minutes will allow you to work on your

technique, which is an issue for most of us. Although I am giving

you 3 exercises, feel free to pick whatever 1 or 2 you most need

work on. You only have 5 minutes and you can always come back

later. The remaining 10 minutes of your 15 minute practice

session can be split between bar chord/root review and just

playing. I keep emphasizing knowing the roots because every-

thing else in my system,( which you will learn in the 3rd and 4th

quarters), is located off of these roots. The faster you can locate

these roots, the faster you can locate everything else and when

you’re jamming with other musicians it will not look good if

you have to stop and look at your notes! OK, that ends the

lecture, let’s start with the technique.

TECHNIQUE EXERCISES: There is a ton of material out there

to practice, it would easily be possible to come up with a 1 or 2

hour a day technique program. However with my philosophy

of least time and effort, I only use 3 exercises, because in my

experience most guitar players have 3 main problems:

-they can’t stretch far enough

-they can’t play and pick fast enough

-they keep picking the wrong strings

We’ll start with stretching.

1-STRETCHING: You must have a certain amount of flexibility

and reach in order to play more complex chords, scales and 

riffs. I generally start this exercise on the 9th fret. (my cheesy

home made tab follows this description).

Place the 1st finger on the 1st string, 9th fret. Place the 2nd

finger on the 2nd string, 10th fret. Place the 3rd finger on the

3rd string, 11th fret. Place the 4th finger on the 4th string 12th

fret. Congratulations! You are playing a D major 7 chord.

Pick each note until the entire chord is clear, then; move only

the 1st finger from the 1st string 9th fret to the 8th fret and

keep all the other fingers in place and pick each note, making

sure all 4 notes sound clear. Then move only the 2nd finger 

from the 2nd string 10th fret to the 9th fret, keeping all the

other fingers in place and the notes clean. Next move the 3rd

finger from the 3rd string 11th fret to the 10th fret and pick

all 4 strings and finally move your 4th finger from the 4th

string 12th fret to the 11th fret and pick. If you did this

correctly, moving only 1 finger at a time while keeping the

other 3 in position and picking all 4 notes cleanly, it

probably hurt a little and sounded terrible until you moved

all 4 fingers down. (now you’re playing a Db major 7 chord)

Once you can do this cleanly, moving only 1 finger at a 

time, continue by moving the 1st finger from the 8th fret

1st string to the 7th fret (keeping all the other fingers in 

place). Then move the 2nd finger from the 9th fret 2nd

string to the 8th fret, etc…. The goal is to walk your way

all the way down to the 1st fret, moving 1 finger at a time

and picking all the notes clean. Good luck!

(tab)

1–9—->8——8——-8——-8——->7—–7

2—10—-10—>9——-9——–9——–9—->8

3—-11—–11—–11—>10——10——10—–10….etc.

4——12—–12——12—-12—–>11——-11—–11

That wraps it up for this post. The next post will 

add the other 2 technique exercises and complete the

syllabus for the second quarter. Remember, 5 minutes

learning the stretching exercise and 10 minutes of

chord/root review and jamming. We’re still building

the habit of regular practice.

 

 

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