Have you “hit a Wall”?

So, what am I talking about today? Well, you know those times when you keep practising and practising, but it just feels like you’re getting nowhere? No matter how hard you try, or how long you play for, you just don’t feel like you’re improving? That’s when you’ve “hit a wall” and can’t go any [...]

December 15, 2011 at 3:43 pm | Practicing and Practice Routine | No comments

Stuck in a Rut?

OK, today’s post comes especially with inspiration in mind. Do you ever find yourself stuck in a rut? I mean, do you ever find that- although your technical ability is improving- everything you play and/or improvise is starting to sound the same? Well, you may have heard that the best way to get out of [...]

September 21, 2011 at 4:00 pm | Practicing and Practice Routine | No comments

Guitar Speed

I made this video because I was asked how fast I can actually play. I have given out lots of advice about how to play faster, but not really demonstrated these techniques in a video before. No, I’m not the fastest player in the world, and I’ve never tried to be. The idea behind this [...]

June 20, 2011 at 8:53 pm | Practicing and Practice Routine | No comments

Transcribing: Melody

The dark art of transcription, a.k.a. “tabbing stuff out” has baffled many aspiring musicians for many years. Well, if you’ve come here looking for the answers then you’re in luck! I’ve broken down the process of transcribing into what I might end up calling “The Lead Sheet Method“. What is the “lead sheet method”? Well, [...]

June 9, 2011 at 2:00 pm | Developing Your Ears, How to, Practicing and Practice Routine | No comments

Finger Independence Video

Today’s video is about finger independence exercises. Here are links to the guitar tab for the exercises I talk about: Picking Exercise 3 (the main exercise in the video) Advanced Spider Exercise Finger dexterity Warm up

June 8, 2011 at 11:01 pm | Exercises, Practicing and Practice Routine | 1 comment

Practice Routine: Self Evaluation

If you’ve followed this series, then you would have first figured out what to practice and then set about creating a practice routine that focused on those goals. After some time, however, you’re going to need to make sure your practice time is still being used effectively. I can’t tell you how long you’re gunna [...]

May 27, 2011 at 8:00 am | Practicing and Practice Routine | No comments

Practice Schedule (part 2)

Following on from last week’s post, today I’m going to be finishing off what I was telling you about how you can create a personalised practise routine just for you. We’ll start where we left off, with the third section of the routine (please read the previous post for the first part of this article). [...]

May 20, 2011 at 8:00 am | Practicing and Practice Routine | No comments

Practice Schedule

So, over the last week you should have created a list of things to practice (and if you haven’t read last weeks post, I suggest you read that first). This week we’ll be doing the complicated bit: putting together a personalised practice routine just for you. I know some practise routines that you find on [...]

May 13, 2011 at 8:00 am | Practicing and Practice Routine | No comments

What Should I Practice?

In the previous post in the series, I outlined how to not just blindly follow a set practice routine, but to create your own unique routine based on your specific goals. It’s really no good just saying “I’m going to practice alternate picking for 6 hours a day, because that’s what I heard John Petrucci/Steve [...]

May 6, 2011 at 8:00 am | Practicing and Practice Routine | No comments

How to Practice Effectively

I recently realised that, although I’ve talked a lot about practice routine, I haven’t actually given you a chart or set routine to follow. The difficulty is that you are a unique musician- every musician is unique, and so everyone will require a slightly different practice routine. Your personalised routine will depend on where you [...]

April 29, 2011 at 8:00 am | Practicing and Practice Routine | 1 comment

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