GUITAR BLOG INSIDER...

Things I Wish Someone Told Me About Practicing Guitar
There are certain principles of conducting guitar practice that can be incredibly helpful when learned and applied early on. 

If players can develop these practice traits early enough, their playing skills will develop much more rapidly than through trying to learn through one's own methods...

These days YouTube is a flood of guitar methods and instructional material. There's hundreds of teachers, teaching songs and describing licks. There's enough lessons about the Minor Pentatonic scale to sink a battleship, and the worst part is with the severe drop in ad revenue for YouTube creators over the last few years, the YouTube videos have turned into a tsunami of click-bait merchants instead of information givers. 

So, in this day and age how can you learn the guitar properly? I'm still convinced that it comes down to what I like to call "Personal Excellence." Now, what I mean by this is focusing on excellence. And, I believe it needs to involve two simultaneous directions of study. 

One side of this approach has to do with a proper step-by-step curriculum that can guide the student through material in an orderly manner. 

The other side is what we'll call electives. These are somewhat random topics, but they each need to be based upon exposure to guitar playing; terms, theories as well as, advanced musical topics and guitar techniques. 

The electives also need to be taught in a way that properly covers each topic at hand. The terms, theories and the concepts of each elective must be organized correctly, or they will fail the student.

I've structured my own Creative Guitar Studio curriculum in this way, by using the core curriculum, (Introductory, Intermediate and Advanced courses), to lay down the foundation of a "step-by-step" learning method. And, I've used the "MasterClasses, GuitarBlog Lessons and QwikLicks," to act as the course electives. This has allowed students who are members of the site to learn guitar in the most comprehensive manner possible with online lessons.

Things I Wish Someone Told Me About Practicing Guitar

Most guitarists spend a huge amount of time on everything except rhythm guitar. 

They put time into chords, scales and noodling around for fun. 

So much so, that they don`t have the time to work on some of the things that really count – like rhythm guitar...

If guitarists were more efficient with their time and with what they study, most would be much better players in a much shorter space of time. One area that generally lacks  efficiency is rhythm playing, and in particular – strumming.

Whether you're a pop player or a metal player, at some point you are going to want to strum the guitar. Ask yourself, how many strum patterns you actually know how to play?

In my experience of teaching beginners, intermediates and players who have mastered many areas of guitar is that they don`t know what or how to strum.

What often happens when I ask a student to play me a strum pattern is, I either get a blank look and they say they don`t know any, or they give me a blank look, think of a song in their head and then play the strum pattern from that song.


There is an importance for every player to study guitar strumming and rhythm technique. Every player needs to be able to call on a variety of different strum patterns at will.

Most guitarists can do this stuff with chords i.e. They can play minor chords for sad sounding music, or major 7ths for a more jazz feel, but they will often have troubles doing this with strum patterns. In the long run, rhythm is often more important than the chords.

That being said, it is relatively simple for most guitarists with even just a bit of playing experience to learn specific strum patterns and practice them, and call on these at will when a certain song or style requires it.

Not only will it make you a better sounding guitar player, but your understanding of rhythm will improve, your timing will improve and your ability to create rhythm parts of your own will increase dramatically. Plus, as you do more work as a guitarist, you will need a larger repertoire of strum patterns to call on.



Simple strum patterns - strum like a rhythm master...
To keep it simple, begin with just 3 strum patterns. These are 3 of the most commonly used patterns in rock, pop and indie music although they are used frequently in genres ranging from folk to metal as well, so it is essential that you learn them.

Have a listen to all the strum patterns in action. These are short chunks of songs or riff ideas that I have created over time using examples of all the strum patterns. If you can`t read the strumming charts below, take a look at our guide on how to read strum patterns.

Strum Pattern 1 – Pop /Rock Strum Pattern


Pop:


Rock:



Songs that use this Strum Pattern:
 Van Morrison – Brown Eyed Girl
 Green Day – Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)
The Calling – Wherever You Will Go
Foo Fighters – Times Like These
The Fray – How to Save A Life

As you can hear the same strum pattern gives you a very different sound depending on what `groove` you are after. The overall feel is same for both the pop and rock versions but the end result is pretty different.



Strum Pattern 2 – The Indie Rock Strum Pattern



Pop:


Rock:



Songs that use The Indie Rock Pattern
Blur – Country House
Eagle Eye Cherry – Save Tonight
Red Hot Chili Peppers – Dani California
Shawn Colvin – Sunny Came Home
Oasis – D’You Know What I Mean?



Strum Pattern 3 – The 16th-Note Groove Strum Pattern



Pop:


Rock:


Songs that use The 16th-Note Groove Pattern
Oasis – Live Forever
Passenger – Let Her Go
Bob Dylan – Knockin` on Heavens Door
Ed Sheeran – Skinny Love
Radiohead – Fake Plastic Trees


I hope this guide helps put you on track to learning how how to strum a guitar like a rhythm master!

Music is creative. Playing an instrument is not. Playing an instrument is all about slowly building a daily climb towards mastery and it must be viewed as a tactile endeavor...

Taking this climb without a map will lead to nothing but being lost, so know what you want, know how to study it, and know what is important to learn and how you can formulate a plan for a top-notch study system to achieve it.

Guitarists are famous for wasting time at the practice space, where 99.9% of guitarists strap on the guitar, turn on the amp and just play! But, what the heck are you playing? Even better question - what in the world are you STUDYING???



If you practice without intent, the results will be utterly pointless. However, if you instead practice with a goal and a clear map - well planned out to achieve specific results... to achieve your goal - you'll discover huge - no massive progress.

The way to do it is to first stop practicing in a manner that wastes your time, and find another goal for practice that revolves around real STUDY and then reach that study goal. The second thing is to form a plan that gets you focused on your goals daily, weekly and monthly. Then you'll really begin to see incredible progress from your guitar playing.

Below are four reasons why you are not totally slaying it on your guitar. Fix these elements by including them in a solid study system and you'll step-up to the next level of playing.



1). PLAYING GUITAR FAST:
Everybody wants to play faster. Playing fast is cool, it makes all of your greasy-haired bros think you’re the dude, makes all of the other guitar players in the world think you’re the Messiah, and it makes you feel bad ass.

Some players have built much of their fan base from blazing the heck out of their guitars and melting the faces of much of the first three rows of every concert.

So yeah, we all get it. We like to play fast. Now, the bottom line with speed is there is absolutely no secret to playing faster. None. Musical technique is purely physical and therefore has nothing to do with anything but time, dedication and obsession. Period.

Like all techniques, playing fast guitar licks deserves absurd quantities of repetition for mastery. Your muscles, your mind and your hands must NOT THINK. Your brain should be completely devoid from the process. It’s not about thought or art. It’s about the cold and perfect execution of a technique, nothing more.

To get to this point you need a lot of time and a lot of dedication. From the ages of 12-18 most dedicated speed guitarists (Steve Vai, Satriani, MacAlpine) practiced nothing but scales for 12 hours daily with no breaks, with no time for anything except sleep for 4 hours nightly. For 6 years. That should give you an idea of what it takes to play fast.



2). LOST ON HOW THE NECK IS LAID OUT:
I can think of 20 versions for playing the “E” chord off the top of my head. Can you? How about scales, I know the entire neck in every key - do you? What about arpeggios, know any?

Learning all of your chords, scales and arpeggios all over the neck will make you utterly invaluable as a side man and as a composer. Plus, it will land you every single gig that you can think of. ...Why?

Because when somebody says, my song is “E-A-C#min-B” and you go “Sure, cool” and bust out some seriously beautiful, tasteful, voice-lead, grooving awesomeness, and then they go “Whoa man, you’re a flippin' guitar genius” you’ll be thinking to yourself “I hope this band gets on Conan with my awesome playing so I can play all of my sick, tasty chord inversions and passing licks for all of America."

But really… It’s a tragedy that guitarists don’t know this stuff… Don’t be one of those guys. And while you’re at it, it wouldn’t be harmful to be able to read some music off of a chart either. You know, to be a musician, you should have a little experience there. These things will lead to MD (Musical Director) jobs. That’s when you stop asking Mom and Dad for cash and buy some furniture for your own cool pad.



3). CAN'T STRUM YOUR WAY OUT OF A WET PAPER BAG:
You know your hand moves, right? You know it’s not some sort of immovable, Sword in the Stone type of thing, glued down for all of entirety, yeah? Move that thing. Your hand and subsequent pick position have massive effects on the sound of your playing.

Play a chord and just move your pick from the bridge to the neck position of your pickups, slowly so as to hear the difference between the two and all of the variations between. Hear that? Sharper near the bridge, warmer and more bass responsive near the neck? That’s because as you move closer to the neck pickup the overall tension on the strings reduces, which creates a softer, warmer sound.

Now play a groove and do the same. Hear how something this simple can have such a tremendous sonic effect? It seems almost stupidly obvious, but an incredible amount of guitarists never do this, choosing instead to think that pedals are the only way to change sound. Consider this always.



4). YOU SUCK AT TIME /RHYTHM /GROOVE:
The hippest harmonic stuff played out of time is worthless in 90% of the gigs you'll ever play for good take home pay at the end of the night. The most basic stuff played with unshakable time and groove is undeniable. It will get you solid gigs that pay the bills, pay the rent and allow you money to spare. The hippest stuff played with unshakable time and groove is transcendent, and it's palatable for the bulk of the public to enjoy.

Nobody gives a hoot about your technique, your sound, your guitar, your look, your 6-pack abs or your awesome voice if you can’t do any of this rhythm stuff over a groove and lock into it. Sadly, this is something that most guitar players are horribly lacking for ability in.

And, by “time” I don’t mean sort of time. Or playing aimlessly, kind of, like, you know, whenever you’re not paying attention to something else while practicing paying attention to time, the metronome just on in the corner of the room while you pump out your licks like you’re on a job interview for Guitar Center or Keyboard City.

No. I mean practicing the ability to be inside of the music, to be an integral part of what is happening around you, to be able to play even the simplest thing with a laser-like, knife-sharp groove that needs to not one other band member to make people want to get up and move on the dance floor.



Either Nail Your Rhythm or You Will Always Loose Out...
You should have the metronome on, eyes closed, standing up and getting inside of that pulse like you could eat it, chew it, punch it, sweat it. Feel it like it’s right there, like it’s tangible.

To do this requires that you never practice chords, scales or soloing without a metronome or a drum machine on in the background. For a long long time... roughly 15 years.

Every amazing player I've ever met never picks up a guitar without a metronome or a drup loop or drum beat on in the background. To every phenomenal guitarist, the sound of the metronome /of the BEAT, is the sound of practicing.

Great musicians love that sound. It sounds like home, like progress, like movement. It’s the sound of a friend. That’s where you want to be, because once you’re there, you’ll have a time feel that will crush all others around you.

And once you have this, a simple equation arises: Drummers and bass players get way more gigs that guitar players You have a time feel that drummers and bass players love When people ask their drummer or bass player “Know any ripping guitarists” they go “totally yeah” and they call you.

December 23, 2016:
Pentatonic Scales for Rock Guitar

PART ONE: In part one, the first example uses a two-string recurring interval pattern. The pattern of the lick moves along the second and third strings and is created out of Minor 3rd's and Major 2nd's in the key of "G Minor." Example two, is organized around the Minor 3rd and Major 2nd geometrical patterns in the key of "D Minor" on the fingerboard. These intervals are stacked on adjacent strings and produce double-boxes establishing a unique fret-board layout of three and four fret regions. 

Watch Part 2 of this lesson in the members area where we'll work on an interesting double Pentatonic scale idea that uses 4-note sequencing. Plus, we'll also check out the sounds of the major tonality with a Mixolydian based phrase that applies sweep picking. Paid members can download the handout and the MP3 jamtrack in the members area at: CreativeGuitarStudio.com

Most musicians fail because they do things that  accomplish very little (even if they invest a lot of time). 

This causes most musicians to waste years of their lives only to end up frustrated and disappointed with nothing to show for all their effort...

Here are five reasons why people have not become a successful musician yet...

1. Your Job Situation Prevents You From Your Music Career
It’s just not possible to grow a successful music career if you spend every minute of your free time exhausted because you work a full time job 40 hours a week.

You must develop a strategy for smoothly transitioning out of your day job. One way to do this is to reduce the hours you spend every week at your day job from forty to thirty five and spend the difference working on your music.

As you begin making additional music related income, you can cut down the amount of time you spend at your regular job and gradually phase in more of your music income.


2. Your On Stage Performing Skills Are Severely Lacking
Amateur musicians have not mastered the ability to perform well in live situations.

It’s not enough to just stand on stage and play your instrument swaying your head a little. Pros are able to put on shows that motivate people to see the band play again, sell their music, their merchandise and take the band to a higher level in the industry.

Anytime you play on stage, it should motivate your fans to tell everyone they know about how awesome your band is.

3. You're Holding Yourself Back
Musicians often complain that they don’t have enough opportunities, but if they were only given a chance, they would take advantage of it. In reality, musicians often pass on big opportunities because of their own fears and insecurities.

The main idea here is that these kinds of musicians complain about not having opportunities for developing their careers, and eventually they go on to reject the big chance to break into the music industry. Maybe you've met these musicians, who years later, are still telling of the sad story about how they never got the chance to become highly successful even though they had this big break and it all fell apart because of this or that.

Don’t become another one of these unsuccessful complainers. Don’t put things off and allow inaction to be the main factor for why you never became a success. Don’t allow fears of failure to become the destroyer of your dreams.

Take action and begin recording your new music, start playing in a new band, improve your songwriting skills, improve your guitar ability.

It will take a lot of powerful action to move your music career forward, but first you'll need to build your musical assets, then work with a mentor or teacher who will show you how to reach them.If you ignore advice from successful people and do not bother to continue to educate yourself musically, you will stagnate and you will fail.


4. You Already Gave Up...
One of the worst ways to ruin your chances for success in music is to listen to the advice of people who have never been successful professional musicians. These people will tell you things like:

“Music isn’t a real job.”

“You want to become a musician? Dream on!”

“To be a musician, you have to accept being a starving artist.”

“The music business is too risky, get a job doing something more stable.”

“Do music on the side, in case it doesn’t work out.”

Reality is, the music industry is a very safe industry to work in (for musicians who follow the correct steps for earning a good living in music). The majority of the true professionals in the music business are NOT playing on street corners… they make a good living doing what they love to do and are simply not known in popular media.

Actually, it is a lot easier to earn a great living in the music business than most people think (while also having that income be very consistent and secure). That said, endless amounts of musicians pay attention to the ignorant advice of others who have never even worked in the music business. As a result, they think their musical dreams are impossible.

To transform yourself into a highly successful professional musician, you need to listen to people who have accomplished major success in the same areas of the industry you want to work in.

There is no reason to accept the well-meaning (but misguided) advice of your peers, friends or family who only repeat myths and platitudes about success the music industry without any true experience in this industry.

Remember, your favorite bands and musicians all started at or below where you are now in your music career before they went on to become legends. The only thing that keeps you from achieving what they’ve done is your mindset.


5. A Lack of Understanding of How To Earn Money In this Business
Amateur musicians spend tons of their time recording tracks for their albums and improving on their instruments, yet have no clue how to earn a living from all these things.

These musicians usually invest thousands of dollars, and months of their time into writing and recording music, then finally release it online where no one (except for their friends) hear it. They become disappointed, their music careers come to screeching halt (before even getting started) and they never again try to accomplish anything significant.

You will not earn a good living as a professional musician by taking isolated actions. Professional musicians make money by developing entrepreneurial mindsets (and taking massive action), growing strategically by learning to interweave many different streams of income and by working with an experienced mentor to understand how to create their own opportunities in the music industry.

The road to learning how to improvise is a long one and knowing your scales proficiently is a great place to start. But, there is more required to developing your improvisational skill than just learning scales on the guitar...

One of the most important steps will be learning how to form musical phrases out of the notes of a scale. Probably the easiest scale to start with for this step is the minor pentatonic.

As you learn to play the minor pentatonic scale, learn how to sequence through the notes of it. Just playing it up and down won't bring to to soloing as quickly as sequencing the notes in unique (musical) ways.


Start to slowly experiment with forming simple phrases out of your sequences and learn to make up licks from the notes of the scale. Be sure those licks seem interesting to you and that they're musical, (you'll need to like the sound of them for them to integrate).

Go by intuition, of what sounds good to your ear. As you do this more and more, this will become a spontaneous process for you. And, it will become easier for you to create lines.

FROM SCALES TO IMPROVISATION:
Moving from scales to improvisation is quite an in depth study for guitar players. After learning scale shapes and developing their proficiency, (use a metronome and be able to play the scale flawlessly and at a quick tempo at 16th-notes around 100 b.p.m.), learn how the guitar neck works, (keys, patterns, note movement), and learn where you can go when playing music within a specific key center.

Musical phrases are created, you generally don’t have to continuously memorize phrases. However, guitar players do (over time) develop their own personal, "Phrasing Patterns." These "patterns" are unique to them as musicians. This is what forms - what many people will call - a player's style or a players, "sound."


PHRASING:
The first step to being able to phrase together musical ideas is that you’ve got to understand how scales work in order to make it to this stage of having a number of your own unique, "Personal Phrasing Patterns."

After that stage is reached, you’ve got to learn to let go and play from your heart. It will be difficult to sound flowing if your conscious about playing the "right" notes, or if you're feeling worried about how you're doing, or thinking to much on where you can go with your lines. You'll need to free your mind and allow the music to come out freely and openly.

Once you've learned to play in a scale position ascending and descending, the next step is to start to practice your scales in sequences to learn how to phrase with them. This will help ingrain the position of the scale, as well as, the sound of the scale.

You can learn more about practicing in sequences in my free lesson on "How to Practice Guitar Scales." Once you can perform the scale well, spend more and more time on learning to sequence the shapes. After that, start to spend time experimenting with the scale, try to come up with phrases using the notes of the scale that sound good to you.

When you feel ready, move into experimenting with the scale over backing tracks, (I have several backing tracks on the JamTracks Page of my Blog site). As you study jamming to pre-recorded tracks, playing lines will start to become more of a spontaneous process. You'll get better at learning to hear what you want to play from your mind and those ideas will start to flow much easier from your fingers.



LEARN BASIC MUSIC THEORY:
Probably the most important piece of music theory relating to scales is how to form chords from a scale that can be used together in the same key. My lesson on "Harmonizing the Major Scale" will help you to learn the chords that are used in a key and how progressions are developed from key centers.

It is also useful to know how to form the modes of a scale, (my eBook "Using the Major Scale Modes" covers this in detail). Other information such as the intervals that are used to form the scale are also important for learning more about how the notes of the scale interact with the notes of the chords and the key signiture.

Basic music theory will help organize the parameters surrounding how all of the concepts of melody and harmony fit together. This is very important, because if you do not comprehend how scales interact with chords, (especially how intervals operate), you'll be lost as soon as you encounter a more advanced situation of lead playing. Take the time and learn basic music theory. The benefits will out-weigh the time spent on the study of the information.


SUMMARY:
If all of this is new to you, start out by tackling a number of directions at once. Write out a practice schedule and keep organized. Begin with Scale-Pattern studies, and practice playing in time with a metronome for developing your competency, speed and rhythm, (the goal is to master the art of single-note playing).

Learning simple single note riffs and licks will go a long way during this period. I have some excellent exercises to help you develop your ability with that. They can be found on my "GuitarBlogUpdate" YouTube channel in the "Micro-Lessons" play list.

There are 300 short lessons (of all types of licks and riffs) in there. Studying those Micro-Lessons will help you form an excellent foundation for better control over the use of scales applied within riffs and licks.

If you're past the beginner and Intermediate stage, and you really want to learn all of the scale and soloing information in detail, consider joining my members area and start working through my, "Advanced Guitar Program."

That "Advanced" course is devoted to developing the skills of improvisation on guitar. You could also begin with a FREE membership and watch the lessons titled, "QwikLicks," to get started. Those "QwikLicks" lessons are a great collection of scale lines, licks, riffs and melodies applied to all types of key centers and modes and can really help to get you started with the application of scales, arpeggios and modes.

Even for the most patient person, learning to play the guitar can be a challenge. The layout of the fingerboard will seem illogical, the techniques will take hours to establish, and without excellent instruction, the entire process will hardly seem user-friendly...


Pain, frustration, and embarrassment is what new students face when trying to play even the simplest nursery-rhyme song. Getting your fingers to find the right string on the right fret and applying the right pressure and tracking that with your pick is difficult. Getting your hand to make guitar chords is what it must feel like to recover from a traumatic head injury.

The guitar you are trying to learn has more than 90 notes divided among six strings that have only a dim relationship to the other strings. The same note can be played on several different strings but finding the note you need to play can be like finding a cab in New York City when it rains.

The difficulty that the guitar presents is magnified when you combine learning music with learning the guitar. Some people know a lot about music and how it is put together but they still struggle to get their fingers to form chords in time with the music.

Trying to learn the guitar without knowing about notes, scales and chords is a lot like trying to learn about sign language while blindfolded.


TIME IS ON YOUR SIDE:
I am not trying to discourage anyone from learning the guitar. Just the opposite. I want you to understand that for every gifted guitarist, there are 99 other guitarists who deal with a lot of frustration. You have to understand this, otherwise you will judge yourself too harshly and you'll give up one of the most rewarding things you can do in life – play guitar.

The secret to playing the guitar well is the same as life. You get out of it what you put into it. If you understand that and you are willing to feel pain, frustration, and embarrassment at least 15-20 minutes a day, you can learn to play a song, and eventually a lot more.

If you can spend over an hour a day, you can work yourself up to playing in a band. If you can spend four hours a day, you can be a rock star, eventually. If you can spend, six hours a day you can be jazz master, eventually. If you spend eight hours a day, you can be virtuoso.


THIS IS ABOUT FUN:
Playing even just a small segment of a song on the guitar is fun and those "fun" moments are what motivates us to do more practicing. General guitar practice is something anyone can do, but it can be difficult to push yourself further and further along when you are a beginner. This is why it is important to understand what you can expect from practice and how to focus more of your attitude on "fun."

At some point as a beginner, you may think that you are not cut out to play guitar, and that none of this feels like "fun" at all. Perhaps you will think that other beginners must play better than you. Maybe you'll even make up excuses for why you can't get good at guitar.

Ask someone who you know that plays the guitar 'how difficult it was' for them to learn. Even if they have been playing for a while, they will never forget how utterly impossible it felt in those early days.

If they're lying, they will tell you that they did not have much trouble. They might even tell you it was easy. But, nobody finds it easy. Learning guitar is about dedicating yourself to those tiny slivers of "fun" that show up along the way. Those periods are your fuel and that is what ultimately keeps the student going.


THE KEY = NEVER ENDING DESIRE:
Anyone who has learned to play guitar at a respectable level will generally agree with the following statement,

“I continued to practice guitar, even when I felt I was getting nowhere, because I wanted to learn guitar so badly that I did not pay much attention to my inability. I focused on the things I COULD and I recognized and appreciated the gradual improvement that I experienced along the way.”

A successful guitarist focuses on the good, not the bad. That is what keeps them going day after day. That is what will get them through the tough times, and it is why they do not give up when they cannot comprehend something. Instead of feeling bummed out, they push onward and they continue to study hard. They keep going until they get it.

Successful guitarists train themselves to see the good in their abilities - however small. If you understand this when you start learning, and if you hold onto this as you continue along day after day, you will protect yourself from your own self-doubt and any feelings of depression.

Don’t get me wrong. You will still have some feelings of failure and uselessness, but you are not alone. Everyone goes through it.

The good news is you can learn the guitar feeling inept, stupid, and like a loser. That is all a part of our learning curve. However, as long as you remember why you wanted to play in the first place and you can spend some time everyday practicing, you will always improve. You will learn that song you want to play, and if you get really good, you'll even someday play in a band.

Learn music. Practice the guitar. have fun... That’s all you have to do for success with this instrument.