Meaningful Guitar Practice

Guitar practice can be fun. If you are a learner guitarist starting to find that guitar practice can be a drag, take another look at how you use your practice time. There is room for enjoyment in learning to play the guitar.

Every guitar player should work out a daily practice routine. Your guitar practice should assist advancing your skill levels, help you to broaden repertoire, allow you to play a mixture of music, and aid you in memorizing your songs. Guitar practice does not necessarily mean playing without a pause. Guitar practice time is an occasion to renew the way you look at the guitar. You must set yourself some goals when you practice, but design them to be part of the fun of playing. Playing every day makes you a mighty guitarist, but attempting to play scales and chords your hands are not ready for just makes you grouchy. Take a pace back and try to appreciate your practice.

Maybe you can start by having many things to practice so that when you get sick of practicing one thing you can move onto something else.

Some areas we could aim to work on:

Warming up your hands

Improving technique

Learning new songs

Improving technique by reviewing music you are already intimate with

Any guitar practice routine loses its effectiveness if it is not kept fresh. If you are the kind of person who has troubles getting down to work, make a set time to practice and make yourself stick to it. If you usually sit down to practice regularly without distraction you should spice up your practice as much as you can because your chief hazard is going stale. Take some breather breaks during a demanding practice session. A great way to break up practice time is to make sure your guitar is in tune at all times. Divide your guitar practice time into portions, say 10 minutes practicing arpeggios, 5 minute tuning break, 15 minutes scales, 5 minutes on a tricky chord change.

Another hazard for a guitarist is regarding your practice as "only" practice. If you have coaching with a teacher or occasionally play for friends and family, organize in advance as though you were preparing for a proper performance. You need to see what you require to work on to sound your best. To make the most of your guitar practice time, allow your troubles to drop away. Take a vacation from your life.

 If you want to play guitar for an audience it is a world away from performing by yourself. When people are watching you play or sing, everything changes. You become aware of yourself in a different way and you can no longer play on autopilot the way you do when you are by yourself.

Start with a plan for a basic set lasting about three hours. As a guide, your songs are around 3 to 4 minutes long, and you will have a minute or two between songs. So you need to get yourself a list of about forty songs. You will include your favorite songs, and you will also need to draw upon a list of popular songs. If you look on the internet you will find many people’s definitions of popular songs, just choose some songs from a list that more or less corresponds to your style. It will take quite a long time for you to memorize so many songs, so get yourself a music stand and some sheets of paper with your lyrics written on them. These will be your cheat sheets until you have your repertoire memorized.

How To Play Guitar For An Audience

Thanks to Ricky Sharples at playaguitarforfree.com for research and support!