Notes: A good home practice session will include practice reading standard notation and tablature as well as practice strumming and picking chords.
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Summary: No matter what style of music the beginning guitarist wishes to play eventually, a good home practice session will include practice reading standard notation and tablature as well as practice strumming and picking chords.
This is an example of what a good home practice session might look. For more general suggestions on practicing music at home, please see the last lesson "Guide to great home practice"
Good practice sessions start with warm-ups. This is a chance to get into the right frame of mind and to practice basic skills as well as get physically warmed up. If you want to make changes in your playing style (for example in your left hand position or the way you strum), this is the best time to practice those changes, too. Below are some ideas for warm-up exercises for guitar students, with an example of each type.
Strumming easy, familiar chords with an easy, familiar strumming pattern is a good first warmup. Start with the easiest chords and strums, and then do some harder ones. Each pattern should be repeated until the strings are sounding clearly and the strumming is steady, rhythmic and confident.
Students who are not ready to use finger picking while changing chords or singing can practice a finger picking pattern on a single, easy chord during warm-ups every day. (Eventually the patterns become easy and can be used in "real music".) Each pattern should be repeated (as slowly as necessary) until it is steady and rhythmic.
Alternating fingers can be very difficult for the beginner. Easy exercises that practice alternating fingers are a very useful warm-up.
Scale fingering patterns like this one can be used in many different keys, since they can be used at any fret. During warm-ups, you can play each scale pattern several times, starting at the first fret, and then moving up the neck until the body of the guitar is too much in the way. After practicing a scale, budding improvisers (even beginners) may want to spend a few warm-up minutes improvising around one of the scales.
Even if you don´t have a guitar teacher, assignments could really help you to make progressions. Weekly assignments may include:
* memorizing a new chord
* practicing a new strumming pattern
* racticing a new picking pattern
* working on a piece that requires reading music (and maybe also tablature)
* working on a song that requires singing and playing at the same time, and changing chords quickly while maintaining a steady strum or picking pattern
For best results, all assignments should be practiced as slowly and carefully as necessary to get a good, clear sound and very steady tempo. Never practice fast and sloppy. Once you are playing something clearly and steadily, speed it up a little, but only as fast as you can still play it well.
The ideal way to end a practice session is to play something easy and fun. For a beginning guitar student this will be music that has been mastered in lessons over the previous weeks, perhaps one or two "music-reading" assignments and one or two songs that you wouldn't mind performing for friends and family. This cool-down session:
* Relaxes any tenseness and frustration from practicing the new requirements
* Is a reminder of the rewards of practice
* Keeps up a repertoire of pieces you can play whenever anyone asks
Unlike during the practice session, you should usually play these pieces straight through. The emphasis should be on memorizing and touching up the pieces, so that they are easy and enjoyable to perform.
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