If you’ve been playing guitar for a while, chances are you’ve been playing bar chords. Maybe you’re good at them, maybe you’re just learning how to play them. Bar chords can always be a challenge, because your index finger needs to put all this pressure on multiple strings at once. Not always the easiest thing to do, especially if you’re playing a steel string guitar.
So, if you’ve never been properly trained to play a bar chord, you might be doing it incorrectly. If you’re really starting to hurt while you’re playing a bar chord, you’re definitely doing it incorrectly.
The wrong way to play a bar chord is if you use your thumb and the rest of your hand for the pressure on the strings. This causes a lot of hand tension immediately, since you’re using so much hand strength. If you’re playing a song with a lot of bar chords, pressing on the chord like this will make the last minute (or way more) of a song excruciating.
The way you play a bar chord is you actually use the gravity of your arm to push your hand against the strings. The distance between the strings and the fretboard of the guitar is so very tiny, you only have to move your index finger a little bit to fret the notes.
The very simple trick is to use the gravity of your elbow to bring the barring finger closer to the fretboard. With your elbow relaxed at your side, play the bar chord. Move your elbow back slightly, making sure not to raise your shoulder in the process. This should make it a lot easier to press down on the strings, so you can release some tension in your hand.
For a visual, please check out my video about using the elbow for bar chords!
You’re flying through the new tune you learned. I mean, really playing at rapid speed, imagining yourself as a truly great guitar player – the wind in your hair and a roaring crowd. Then, Plunk! A mistake. Plunk! Another mistake. You end up really struggling to get through the rest of the song.
I’m sure we all have had this experience time and time again. We have the urge to play fast, but we are doing harm to ourselves. We are doing harm in the short run because it will take longer to master the song or new technique, and harm in the long run because we are building up very bad habits of playing sloppily. I don’t let my guitar students play more than a measure of music if they are playing it faster than their ability. This requires a lot of consistency on my part, but the results are worth it. In order to become a more precise player from the beginning, be sure to slow down. Here’s why.
It’s Easier
This is the most obvious and straightforward reason. If you are a beginner, think about all of the new activities your brain has to process for every note you play. What is the pitch? What is the Rhythm? What is the left hand doing? What is the right hand doing? Is the guitar being held correctly? If you are playing really quickly, you simply can’t process all of this. You are essentially moving your fingers in hopes it will be correct. As you might imagine, this is not the way to advance your skills correctly.
You are Building a Habit of Precision
From the very first notes you play on the guitar, you should be focused on precision. Although the material is new to you, let’s face it, it’s pretty simple stuff. (If you are just picking up the guitar and what you are playing isn’t simple, please consider choosing easier material or a method book.) Spend this time really focusing on playing everything correctly. Only move forward when you feel confident that what you are playing is precise.
In doing this, you will be setting yourself up for success as the material gets more complicated. This is because you are developing the skill of practicing. This is one of the best skills you can possibly learn.
You Have a Stronger Connection with the Rhythm
Try this: Count 1, 2, 3, 4 at a very fast pace. Tap your foot along while you’re counting. Now try counting again, but much slower this time. Notice how your voice really connects with the tapping of your foot. Maybe your head will subconsciously start to nod along with the beat. Slowing down gives your entire body an opportunity to feel the beat, which means you will really connect with the rhythms you are playing on the guitar.
Success on any instrument relies on rhythmic proficiency. Since guitar is a plucked string instrument, it is extra important to have a very solid sense of rhythm. By playing fast, you are missing the opportunity to connect with the beat. Think about all of the music you listen to. What would it be without a good beat? Especially consider pop music. The songs that show up in the Top 40 usually have a moderate tempo.
It Strengthens your Fingers
One of the hardest parts of learning how to play guitar is learning how to play legato. (Italian for connected, it is the musical term for smooth playing) Many beginners hold the string down for long enough to get a note, then move on to the next note. This is because playing guitar requires left hand finger strength and mobility. By playing at faster speeds, your fingers are not spending enough time pressing down on the strings. This will cause your playing to sound choppy and disconnected.
During your practice. Play slowly and play the notes for their full duration. This means playing a whole note for 4 full beats, a half note for 2, etc. Your fingers will learn to connect with the strings and the rhythm. As music starts to get more complicated, your fingers will have the ability to move forward.
Play with a Metronome
The metronome is one of the best tools a musician can own. Nowadays you can get one for free on a smart phone or tablet. I definitely recommend getting a simple digital metronome because they don’t have Facebook. (Using apps for practicing can be great, but smart phones are practice session killers. I say this from an enormous amount of experience.)
Many guitarists associate playing with a metronome to building up speed. I find one of the best uses of the metronome is to make sure you don’t build speed. When you are learning a song on the guitar, especially as a beginner, set your metronome at a low tempo so you don’t have the urge to play any faster. Is playing along with the metronome very difficult? Work with it a little every day, when you have the ability to play along with the metronome you will have achieved a new level of mastery.
When I was studying a very complicated Bach piece, I would essentially blow through it as a show off piece. During my performance, I would make a decent number of mistakes but shrug them off because I was getting most of the notes right. When I played the piece for my guitar teacher, he downgraded me to practicing it at 40 BPM to the 8th note. It was unnecessarily slow. The 6 minute piece would take 20 minutes to play through, but I played every note with the perfect right and left hand fingerlings. I also focused on the tone of every single note.
The process was tedious, but after putting the time in, the slow playing had done its job. I breezed through the piece flawlessly with perfect tone. The improvements I made to how I played the Bach piece immediately found their way into the other pieces I was performing. In other words, I had become a much better player.
My message about playing slowly applies to the most basic beginners to concert professionals. It is so easy to lose self control and start playing at top speed. Cut the speed in half or more during your practice and you will see your playing improve exponentially.
Learning an instrument can be very difficult at first. There are new fine motor skills to learn, and you have to decipher a new written language. After doing all that work, you certainly want to make sure you’re having fun. Musicians get to have so many amazing experiences, and so can you. Here are some things to do to make sure you’re having the best time you can have learning guitar. Some of these may seem pretty obvious, but they are what really makes a difference. If you check all the boxes, you will most definitely find that you are enjoying yourself.
1. Take Guitar Lessons
In our modern world it’s easy to skip out on this step. There are tons of resources on the internet, especially with the amount of video lessons on YouTube. While most YouTube lessons don’t come with a price tag, there’s nothing like a live guitar teacher to help you along the way. Many people have success with self-study, but it is very easy to get overwhelmed by all of the information available. A good guitar teacher will put you on the right path and make sure you stay on it.
If you’re already taking guitar lessons and you’re not having fun, be open with your teacher about any confusion you’re having. Guitar teachers will be able to pick up on the fact that you are not practicing, and not progressing because of it. By letting them know what you are experiencing when you play at home, you can help them find a way to keep you inspired. It’s also important to make sure you are in the method book that works for you. I did a review of four of the most popular books for guitar for beginners in my previous post. Read it here.
2. Practice!
Before you roll your eyes, really think about this. Learning an instrument can be very fun, but it also takes some dedication. The only way to really enjoy yourself is to have a sense of knowing what you’re doing. This of course, takes practice. Knowing how to practice is just as much of a skill as knowing how to play the guitar, and if you don’t spend time doing it, you’re not going to learn!
It can be very difficult to fit a practice routine into a modern schedule, no matter what age you are. I have so many younger students who are busier than my adult students. Planning your week of practice ahead will really help. If possible, try to find a consistent time during the day. It is also very helpful to set a goal to practice every day for a month (or even a week or two). Results come after these periods of time, not just a couple days. If you stay consistent with your practice for this amount of time, you will start to figure out how to hone in on your guitar skills. You might just have fun while doing it too!
3. Listen to Music
I have many students who don’t know what to say when I ask them what music they like. Especially with younger students, the act of learning an instrument sometimes come before they really have learned to enjoy music. I also have plenty of students who love to listen to music, but do not listen to anything that has guitar as a prominent instrument. Listening to music trains the ear, it also helps you build up an emotional connection to music. It is because of this that the most inspired musicians are the best listeners.
You may already listen to music, and you may be very inspired by some notable guitarists. Perhaps this is why you started learning guitar in the first place. Take your listening a step further, learning an instrument is an opportunity to expand your musical interests. Start broadening the genres you listen to in order to learn about even more notable guitarists. If you’re taking guitar lessons, ask your guitar teacher for recommendations. If you’re not, please first reread #1, then do some research into notable guitarists in all genres on your own. It’s important to have an open mind. If you allow yourself to enjoy a genre you are not used to listening to, you could possibly find your new favorite artists!
4. Go see Live Music
Going to see live music is taking listening to music to the next level. There is no better way to get inspired and to learn about the instrument than to see people play. Live music can take place at a huge variety of venues: stadiums, concert halls, bars, churches, restaurants, and even on the street. If your favorite artists are still performing and happen to be coming to your area, spend the money to go see them. The inspiration will be worth every penny. Find out about where live music happens in your town. With social media, this is easier than ever to keep track of. If there are musicians in your town that you enjoy, become a fan. Go to a bunch of their shows. You will learn from them and enjoy yourself all while supporting local music.
In addition to seeing live music in person, there is an unlimited amount of concert footage on YouTube. Watching live performances helps you focus on the music better. Plus you get to see how your favorite artists performed, they may be really wild performers!
5. Learn the Music You Want to Learn
Being successful at an instrument means starting out with a goal. If you have a favorite type of music, or if there is something that is inspiring you to play the guitar in the first place, then your goal should be to learn how to play it. If you are curious how one of your favorite songs is to play on guitar, there is no harm in looking up how to play it. There are online resources for practically every song. You can even watch guitarists playing more simplified versions on YouTube.
If you are taking lessons, be open with your teacher about what you want to learn. Your teacher can then help guide you in the right direction when the time is right. It is very important to listen to your teacher however. If he or she is giving you specific materials to practice, be sure to practice them well.
6. Play Music with Others
I can’t emphasize this enough. In essentially every culture around the world, music has been used for community building for a very long time. There is something very magical that happens when you play music with other people. The great news is you are working towards experiencing this. Not only is this an opportunity to get inspired while increasing your skills, it is also an opportunity to meet new people. If you have any friends or family who play music, reach out to them right away. If the genre or instrument they play doesn’t seem to match yours, see if you can make things work.
In order to meet new people to play music with there are many ways to put out feelers. Putting an ad on a community board at a music store, library, or anywhere else is a good way to start. You can also try posting ads on online outlets such as craigslist. Most areas have many events you can take part in. These include open mics, meet ups, jam sessions, or community ensembles. If you don’t feel comfortable playing guitar in front of or with other people just yet, it’s always fine to observe. It’s still a great way to see what musicians live nearby and to be inspired by their playing.
7. Perform
Performing can be very scary at first, but it does get to be an enormous amount of fun. For a beginner, performing does one major thing: it gets him or her to practice. If you practice diligently for a performance, you will be very satisfied with your results. It is also a great way to show off your new skills to friends and family.
Finding ways to perform can be a bit tricky. If you are taking guitar lessons, there is a chance the school you are part of will hold a recital. If you have not performed in a recital, ask your teacher if there will be a recital any time soon. Open mic nights are a good way to get comfortable performing in front of people. All open mic nights are different, but they will generally be very supportive of any beginners who have the courage to take the stage. If it’s your very first performance, let everyone know! You will receive a lot of encouragement afterwards.
It’s also just good practice to get comfortable playing around people. If you are happy with your progress on a new song, don’t be afraid to share it with everyone you can. If it’s a nice day, take your guitar to a park and practice. Just knowing there are other people around makes practicing feel a lot like performing.
8. YouTube/Social Media
Making videos of yourself playing is a way to perform without leaving the house. This helps you practice as well, because if you want to make a quality video you need to have a quality performance. YouTube is full of amateur musicians performing their covers and originals, so your videos may even be an opportunity to connect with them. If you don’t feel comfortable having your videos out there for the entire internet to see, post them on your favorite social media outlets so your friends can see your progress.
To find out more about Lambertville, New Jersey based guitar teacher Alan Rigoletto, please read his About Me page.
As a guitar teacher, one question you may be asking yourself is “Which guitar method book should I use?” There are many books out there, and all of them seem to offer something different. Finding the right method book is crucial, but the process can take a lot of trial and error. This article will take a look at 4 of the most popular beginner guitar method books in an effort to make your teaching experience a lot easier.
What Makes a Good Guitar Method Book?
Before we look at the books, let’s consider some factors that we will be looking for in each book:
Pacing
Pacing is particularly important for younger beginners who have no experience with music. Some books tend to get ambitious with their expectations of the student. You don’t want to put months of work into a book, only to realize it will take you forever to finish it.
Repetition
After learning a new set of notes, a new musical concept, or a new technique on the guitar, the student should be able to practice the new skill before moving forward. A well-paced book will take into account that the new information needs some practicing. It will provide a decent number of songs for the student to practice for that skill.
Focus on Rhythm
There is no doubt about it. If you fully understand how to read rhythms, you will be a better musician. I spend a very good chunk of my lessons making sure my students are playing each rhythm correctly, preferably while counting out loud. A good book will have a variety of rhythms without overwhelming the student.
Song Selection
This is a struggle for all guitar method books. Most of them rely on American folk songs and songs that younger students would have known – in the 1960s. I find that it is easier for a student to truly read a song if he or she does not already know the tune. That being said, a book with a good song selection gives the student an opportunity to learn traditional songs. It also gives the teacher an opportunity to teach a little bit about the notable musicians who performed them. Kids these days are definitely being deprived of “Red River Valley!”
There are certainly many more factors that can be taken into account when deciding whether or not a guitar method book is right for you. For the sake of simplicity let’s leave it at that four. We have some books to look at. The order in which I have chosen to list these books outlines my own personal journey as a teacher. The first was the first guitar method book I used and the last is the current book I am using.
My Guitar Pedagogy class in College used this book as the main example of how to teach beginning guitarists. This book certainly tries to cover as much ground as possible. In order to accomplish this, it has a very unique format. There are two sections: Section 1 is all about chords and accompaniment and Section 2 teaches musical notation. Both sections are to be used simultaneously so the student can develop a working knowledge of both chords and melody at the same time. This book covers so much ground, those finishing this book will know techniques on the guitar that most methods don’t cover until well into book 2.
Section 2 (which is similar to other method books) has students thinking about rhythms from the very first song. There is a great emphasis on rhythm, and plenty of helpful information about music theory. Many of the songs are melodies taken from classical guitar repertoire, which makes the classical guitarist in me very happy. Most songs also have an interesting, but not terribly difficult second part for the teacher to play.
Section 1 starts with basic chord progressions and uses many popular melodies such as “Amazing Grace,” “Our Land,” and “When the Saints Go Marchin’ In” to help the student understand basic strumming. This section covers a wide variety of techniques, including power chords, bass-chord accompaniment, and fingerstyle accompaniment.
The Cons
I eventually stopped using this book because of how it is paced. Almost every song has something new to teach. This is excellent for the student who picks up on musical concepts quickly. I found it rather difficult for a student who needs a bit of practice with each concept to fully grasp it. That being said, I definitely recommend this book for a more mature music student who may already have some musical training.
This book is a classic. I trudged through this book in the earlier days just like many others. Unlike Jerry Snyder’s Guitar School, Mel Bay has a much more straightforward approach. Students learn the guitar string by string while gradually learning musical concepts and 3-4 string chords.
The Cons
This book is my least favorite of the books mentioned in this article. In my early days of teaching, I was having a hard time getting my students to move on from songs because of how difficult they were. Finally, I had a major epiphany: “What if I don’t use this book anymore?!” There you have it, one of the most scathing things I’ll ever write on this blog – I hope.
The portion of the book concerning the first string (Pages 7-8) has good examples of the E, F, and G notes with different rhythms. The page introducing the second string is exactly what it should be. Page 10 launches the student immediately into confusion. There are longer songs that skip between strings like it’s not a problem for little fingers. By page 15 students are already learning eighth notes and alternate picking. By the time chords are introduced, the book becomes downright impossible for some students.
I used this book for a very long time. It is very similar to Mel Bay in its layout but it is definitely more mindful of any learning curve the beginning student may have. There are plenty of songs for the student to practice after each string is introduced, which allows the new notes to really sink in. The book teaches musical concepts and 3-4 string chords at a slower pace than Mel Bay as well. There are a lot of good folk/Great American Songbook songs in this book. This provides lots of opportunities to talk about Pete Seeger, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, etc.
The Cons
Reading shorter musical examples is very helpful for the student who is learning to read music for the first time.Alfred’s Guitar Method doesn’t seem to agree with me on this. Many of the songs students learn early on in the book are 16-25 measures long. At this point in time, it is more important for the student to be focusing on reading 4-8 measure songs that contain pitch and rhythmic variations.
Another issue with this guitar method book is there are way too many quarter notes. A good number of the songs are a torrent of quarter notes, not allowing the student to properly focus on counting. There are songs with plenty of rhythmic variation towards the beginning of the book, but they are so long that the student ends up spending more time trying not to lose his or her place than reading rhythms correctly.
Finally, it is my opinion that learning to read rhythms is much more important than being able to play bass-chord accompaniments. By the time students have gotten to the low E string and have begun reading 8th notes, there is plenty of material to keep them challenged. At this point, the book puts a lot of emphasis in Carter style bass-chord accompaniment, which most students aren’t ready for yet.
This book is my current favorite. I do not think it is perfect, but there is a substantial use of the first three “factors:” it is well paced, there is a lot of repetition of concepts, and the major emphasis is on rhythm. The book immediately introduces a variety of rhythms in very short songs and examples. The student gets plenty of practice reading simple rhythms before the book begins introducing eighth notes.
My favorite thing about this guitar method book is that chords and melody are kept separate. This makes the songs much less of a physical burden. Less physical burden means more time counting and focusing on technique. As the student starts to learn different strumming patterns with the chords, his or her working knowledge of rhythm is strong enough that changing chords is more natural. By the time my students approach the more sizable duets at the end of the book (including Bach’s “Minuet in G”) they are much more confident in their reading abilities.
The Hal Leonard Guitar Method’s song selection has some real gems. Many of the untitled songs are actually “Easter Egg” songs, which are famous pop/rock melodies disguised as mere exercises. There’s “Brown Eyed Girl,” “Spirit in the Sky,” and others. It’s always fun seeing if the student can recognize the song just by reading the notes.
The Cons
My main complaint about this book is the lack of even spacing between notes. This book could definitely use a good cleaning up as far as layout is concerned. There are spots where quarter notes are jammed in with eighth notes and other spots where quarter notes have as much space as the surrounding half notes. I have to remind my students once in a while what rhythm they are looking at, and it is usually not their fault.
Other Books
There are many other guitar method books out there that I did not mention. I have spent countless hours going through these books with my students over the years, so I thought it would be best to write about the books I have experience with. Perhaps in the coming months I will write a follow up to this with some different books. If you have a particular favorite, please don’t hesitate to let me know!
What does it mean to be “stuck in a rut?” I’ll attempt a quick and easy definition: A prolonged period of time where little to no advancement is made. I just got chills writing that out, it hits home pretty hard. All guitarists have this problem at some point, and getting out of this “rut” can be pretty difficult. The key to pulling yourself out of this situation is very clear. A change of mindset is required. Don’t worry, I’m not going to just tell you to “chill out” and chalk that up as my two cents. There are very distinct things we can do to change this mindset and in turn start to see progress on the guitar again.
“Climbing The Mountain” or “Vertical” Learning
In my first post in this series, I went over two different types of learning that I have identified. You can imagine this grid as a line graph. There is “Vertical” learning, or advancing skills, techniques, and overall knowledge of the instrument. Then there is “Horizontal” learning, or the progress you make honing in on each skill. This can be learning new songs, scales, or exercises. To put things in more poetic terms, we can call this “Climbing the Mountain” (horizontal) and “Loving the Plateau” (vertical).
Let’s explore what it means to “climb the mountain” of guitar playing. Real patience is required to scale this musical Matterhorn, as well as strategy and pacing. Trying to advance too quickly can cause some serious self doubt. This can also lead to over-practicing, which can lead to physical (and mental) injury. We all want to advance quickly, but it is much more important to advance correctly. This brings to mind the alternative to the famous phrase: Perfect practice makes perfect. Just practicing doesn’t cut it. You have to practice perfectly. If you just found what I said intimidating, don’t worry. Here are a couple pointers to help you implement this in your practice routine.
Have Very Clear Goals
Try to catch yourself next time you say, “I’m just not getting better at the guitar.” Maybe you’re saying this to yourself, a friend, or your teacher. (If you’re saying this to your teacher, try to think about whether or not you’re doing everything he or she is telling you to do. Many people (including myself) are guilty of receiving excellent lessons, only to go home and do something completely different during practice.) When you ask this question, be sure to follow it up with “Well, what are you trying to get better at?” If you’re response to that is “guitar, duhhh,” then you are setting yourself up for a vicious cycle of broadness. It’s time to seriously narrow down what your goals are.
If you’re lucky, you will be able to immediately identify what these goals are. Perhaps you’ve earned yourself the opportunity to skip this paragraph. If you’re not quite sure, start by thinking about what genre you’re playing. It’s also good to think about who your main inspirations are. What do those guitarists do that you’d like to do? Is there something all of these artists have in common? Perhaps you are trying to make an audition or get into a band that plays a specific genre. What are the requirements? Maybe there is just a song or group of songs that you’ve been trying to learn for a really long time without any sign of progress. Spend some time trying to figure out what techniques this song requires that you are falling short on.
Learn Guitar Exercises
If you’re anything like I was as a teenager, you would have seen the heading “Learn Exercises,” said “cool!” and left this page looking for new exercises to learn. Hold on! It’s not like that. I used to be like a sponge for exercises. Every website, every article in every Guitar World magazine I owned, every VHS tape I owned (OK, now I’m dating myself) had some fancy new exercise. “Increase your speed with this arpeggio sequence!” “Gain sick chops with this fancy chromatic trick!” It can be an information overload which can lead to very disorganized, distracted practice habits.
It’s important to take a step back to think “what do I need to get better at?” If you’re looking to get better at chord transitions, you want chordal exercises. If you want to improve your speed, you need to do some training with a metronome. Every skill has an endless amount of exercises that goes along with it, you can even make up exercises yourself based on the specific things that are hanging you up. Once as you have done your research, choose some favorites.
Routine, Routine, Routine
Continue for at least two weeks doing only two or three of these exercises every day. That’s right, that sentence is bold, italicized, AND underlined. If you want to get the full effect of the exercise, playing it once for five minutes is going to do nothing for you. If you are really looking to advance your skills, consistency is your best friend. Start every practice with the same exercises. This way you will advance your ability to control your fingers. If you have chosen your exercises well, you will find that you are subconsciously putting these new skills to work on every song you play. Sometimes, you may even find yourself reminding yourself of an exercise when you are getting hung up on a passage of a song.
If you are trying to advance your speed, don’t get ahead of yourself. (I’m not just talking to shredders when I say speed, this also refers to chord changes, arrangements, anything that you are incapable of playing at performance tempo.) Choose the metronome setting that is just enough of a challenge for you and stick with it for those two-three weeks. This may be painful for some readers, but your brain needs to really sink in to the challenge tempo.
Take Songs you want to Learn and Stick with them
Now that you have an exercise routine, spend some time figuring out what songs you want to learn that have been a challenge for you. Perhaps you may need to spend some time finding new songs to play. Only choose one or two depending on how much of a challenge they are. Make sure your song selection is something you are interested in learning, because you want to practice it every day for at least a month. If you find you need longer at the end of the month, don’t worry, just keep going.
In an age of immediate gratification, it is easy for us to get frustrated over lack of progress very quickly. Setting a goal with a time period of a month or longer allows us to relax and sink into a routine. Instead of saying to yourself “I’ve been playing this song for three days and I still can’t get it!” you will find you are simply saying “Day 3/30.”
If you find you haven’t mastered the song(s) after the month, don’t immediately start to get frustrated. Take a step back and consider what this month has done for your playing. You will find that you have absorbed a lot and that you are a better player for it. If you are sick of the song at the end of the month, put it down and start something new. You’ve earned it. If you still feel determined to master the song, by all means, go another month.
Consider Your Deadlines
If you are preparing for an audition or a performance, there can be a much larger element of stress to the feeling of lack of progress. You have no choice but to get better. In the end, that’s a great thing, but the process is stressful. For the sake of relevance, let’s say your audition/performance is one month away. Take some time to consider what you have to accomplish in this time and how many hours you have each day to do so. Then make a commitment to practice exactly what you need to every day for that thirty days. When you set a goal like this, you are less likely to slack on it. I don’t want to cheat my future self with an imperfect 29/30 days of practice.
Without doing this extra element of scheduling, it can be very easy to procrastinate (if you’re even the slightest bit like me, that is). You will find that the deadline is getting close and you haven’t been practicing. This causes an extra element of stress, which makes practicing even harder. “Cramming doesn’t work,” remember? If you stick with your pre-determined routine for the time period you have available, you will find that the performance you give is as close to the best you could do as possible. Feel like you could have done much better? Learn from your mistakes. Perhaps you needed much longer than a month to prepare, or the routine you had chosen wasn’t appropriate enough.
I have an a series about auditioning for college coming up soon!
Have Faith!
I have a lot of students who say to me “I’m practicing a lot every day, and I’m just not seeing results yet.” A lot of times they make this statement after demonstrating to me that they have come a long way in the past 7 days. I always say to them, “If you are putting the time in and having good, focused practice sessions, you will see results, you just have to keep at it.
The difference between their perception of improvement and my perception of their improvement is that they seeing their progress on a day-to-day basis. It’s hard to perceive change that way. If you plant a seed, put a chair in front of the pot, and watch the plant grow, you will find the process to not be rewarding because plants grow too slowly for spectators (with a natural amount of patience). If someone watches you plant the seed, goes away for a month, and comes back, they will return to see a fully grown plant.
A great way to help yourself realize your progress is to record yourself at the beginning of every week (or every day if you’d like). Each recording is like a snapshot of your progress. After a month, you will be shocked at how much better your recordings sound.
Learning an instrument really can be a leap of faith. There is so much time and money invested, and most of the time you never know when you will get where you want to be. By sticking to a routine, your practice really becomes “a practice,” and you will learn to see, hear, and feel tiny improvements in your skills from day to day.
We all have felt the dreaded feeling of being “stuck in a rut” when trying to learn guitar. It can feel like weeks, months, or even years since there has been any noticeable progress, and it’s horribly frustrating. If you’re a beginner you may think, “I have been stuck in a rut since day one!” Being constantly concerned about making leaps and bounds on the instrument can make learning the guitar very difficult. We can become unhealthily attached to seeing our skills skyrocket. It takes a bit of relaxing, and a bit of faith, to let go of this attachment. The common saying for this is “loving the plateau,” and it takes a true Zen guitarist to master it.
“Climbing the Mountain” and “Loving the Plateau” or, “Vertical” and “Horizontal” learning.
As a classical guitar student in college, I had a very erratic practice schedule. This schedule had a very distinct pattern: practice, over-practice, injury, no practice. I wasn’t the only one, this seemed to be a very common habit among students. The obsession with learning the most challenging music and pushing my physical abilities was much stronger than my actual abilities. It led to very inconvenient periods where I had no choice but to step back from the instrument. My teacher, while helping me with these practice habits, taught me to “love the plateau.” It was the first time I heard the phrase. This led to a change of mindset focused around routine and mindful practicing. To this day I am still trying to perfect this.
While my classical guitar cautionary tale may be interesting, you may be thinking “How does this apply to me? I play blues guitar and my hands feel fine.” Regardless of what genre of music we play, and to what extent we play it, there is a natural ebb and flow that comes along with progress. The brain needs to absorb the enormous amounts of knowledge it takes in about the instrument. Sometimes this takes more time than we would like.
I talk to all of my students about how I perceive the two stages of learning. There is “Vertical” learning, or “climbing the mountain.” These are the new skills you learn, which over time make you the best guitarist you can be. Then there is “Horizontal” learning, also known as “Loving the Plateau.” The guitarist who learns to balance both vertical and horizontal progress will become more prolific, more musical, and most importantly, more sane.
The first time I learned to “Love the Plateau,” and how it came to a sudden halt.
As a young teenager, I really struggled when it came to teaching myself how to strum chords. There were kids all around me who were playing songs for their friends. I wanted to be just like them. It took me a while, but once as I got the hang of it I was strumming constantly. As long as it had chords, it was worth me strumming it. I was a musical sponge, and my song list was growing rapidly. My skill level had increased in the “vertical” sense, I had climbed higher on the mountain. I stopped trying to learn new techniques and started learning as many songs as I could using these techniques. This was one of the best examples of “horizontal” learning I ever experienced. I was on that plateau and I had no concerns about climbing any higher. I was loving it.
After a couple of months, I decided there was one particular song I wanted to learn. Sounded easy enough, but it ended up putting a huge halt on my horizontal progress. The song was all barre chords, which I had never attempted before. I had seen my friends playing them, but it was simply impossible. In hind sight, I needed to build strength and the action on that guitar was way too high. At the time however, it seemed like there was no looking back. There was no way to get any better at the guitar. I had hit a vertical rock face on the otherwise easy trail of my guitar playing.
Learn guitar skills both “Vertically” and “Horizontally.”
It’s in times like this that we go from taking a beautiful carefree stroll through the woods to shuddering while looking at the shadow the gigantic mountain is casting of us. Be it new techniques, improvisational creativity, or overcoming physical challenges, the psychological effect of realizing how much further you have to go can be paralyzing. In the case of my younger self facing barre chords for the first time, I had no choice but to go back to playing the songs I had considered “easy” at that point. Every couple days, when I was feeling courageous, I would have another go at the song with the barre chords. Before I knew it, barre chords were a new skill. I had reached a new plateau and I loved it just as much as the last one.
This “horizontal” learning is the key to progressing as a guitar player. If you’ve learned a couple new techniques, really spend some time with them. Find as many songs as you can that you can learn with your newfound techniques. You will find that you needed much more practice with them than you realized. In order to progress “vertically” spend a little bit of time each practice session trying to touch upon the new challenge that is giving you problems. Learn to love the challenge just as much as you love the plateau. After all, when you are not thinking about how hard it will be to climb the mountain, it sure is a pretty sight from below.
How to adapt a “Horizontal” learning routine.
The key to becoming successful at “loving the plateau” is having a plateau to love. It is very easy to get into the bad habit of practicing something completely different every day. For example: On day 1, you learn the harmonic minor scale and a couple phrases from your favorite Van Halen solo. On day 2, you practice fingerstyle technique and a couple phrases of a Bach piece. While it’s fun to be curious, having one or two things you routinely do every day is very helpful. If you want to learn the harmonic minor scale, spend every day for at least a month practicing it. Don’t learn it one day and assume you will actually remember it in a couple weeks.
As far as learning new songs using your current skill set goes, actually spend some time writing down your skills on the guitar. Set a timer for 20-30 minutes (or longer). Force yourself to come up with as many skills as possible and you will be surprised with how many you get down. While you are writing this, you may already start thinking of songs or exercises you can be learning to help reinforce these skills. There may be many fundamental things you don’t practice because you feel like you surpassed them years ago. All of these things need reinforcement, and it’s very easy to keep trying to learn bigger and better things instead.
Teaching guitar lessons, my way of practicing fundamentals.
Most days of the week, I spend hours teaching people how to learn guitar. Although many of my students are Intermediate-Advanced, I have lots of beginner students. These students are an incredible resource for my own “horizontal” learning because I spend most of the lesson counting basic rhythms with them. After many years, I realized my sense of rhythm has grown incredibly solid! There are many reasons for this, but I feel teaching beginners certainly has helped. As an aspiring professional musician, I had no idea I would be spending that much time playing songs in beginner method books.
Teaching lessons is my outlet for “horizontal” learning. It may take a little searching, but you too can find your outlet for practicing easier material. It is easy to get bored with easier material because it is not challenging enough. If you strive for absolute perfection with easier material, it becomes just as much of a challenge. Let’s say you learned how to strum “Brown Eyed Girl” when you were 12 and haven’t touched it since. Sit down and try to strum that chord progression while counting out loud with perfect rhythm, perfect form, the perfect dynamic. Can you keep this sense of perfection while singing and playing? Suddenly the challenge has increased, and with it your feeling of satisfaction. When you go back to playing the music that caused you to get stuck in the first place, you will have a new perspective on how to approach it.
