Sounding Pro with a Simple Practice Plan

by Glenn Bird
Filed in Practice

Have you ever been disheartened when you see a great guitar player pulling off a massive solo and thinking 'I could never do that'? This so often happens to less experienced players when they are practicing how to play guitar solos and a lot of the time, they end up giving up because of it which is a tragedy.

The truth is the majority of people who listen to music want something they can connect with, so if you are in the above category and feel like giving up this may put your mind at ease.

Instead of looking at what you can't play, focus on what you can and do it well!

When learning how to play guitar solos the most important thing is playing every note well, with great technique and emotion. If you can't play the flashiest solos yet don't worry about it - it will happen in time with the right practice. There are certain things to concentrate on when practicing that will make you sound like a better player while playing very few notes, so try these out and forget what everyone else is doing - this is about you.

Practicing with single notes:

If every note has to be spot on it makes sense to practice notes on their own as well as in scale runs. Try practicing notes like this and see how it feels:

• Pick a scale, let's use the C major scale (C Ionian) as a starting position


• Play through all the notes in the scale slowly with a metronome, and with the most important thing, total control of every note. Make sure you watch your fingering as well, and move your hand as little as possible by placing a different finger on each fret (1^st finger - 3^rd fret/ 2^nd finger - 5^th fret/ 4th finger - 7^th fret etc).


• When you can play it through with each note sounding smooth and it feels easy, put the metronome to half the time of what it is now.


• Play each note again in half time and practice a steady vibrato on each note, and make sure the vibrato is in time with the metronome as well (it's not enough that the note is played on the beat, the vibrato should be practiced in time as well).


• When this feels easy, practice sliding up from the previous note in the scale, so in this case slide up from the B note before the root note of the scale. The aim is to pick the note in the same scale previous to the one you're playing and slide from it.


• Combine the two by sliding up to the note and then adding vibrato.


• When this all feels comfortable, try adding a downward slide as your coming down the scale to add a new element.


• When this is done and you feel good about it, turn the metronome back to the speed it originally was and play through the scale again normally, and you should find it a little easier and you'll have more control over the notes. Keep speeding it up as you start feeling comfortable with it, and when you get to the stage when you start making mistakes, start over with the next scale up the neck (try playing all the scales of the notes in the C major scale, C D E F G A B C - so the next one here is the standard D scale).


• Repeat for all scales until you get back to C further up the neck.

It sounds a little basic but you may be surprised how challenging it can be, and this way of practicing alone can give a huge control over the notes you play and at the same time, set you up for both knowing the fret board and learning modes (both will really help you with composition).

Good luck with it and remember to take it slow and get that control over the notes before you move on to other techniques or speed, and your playing will improve tenfold!

Discussion

I'd love to hear what you think. Pop over to the Facebook group and share your opinion. See you there.