How To Organize Your Practice Sessions
Practice is the best way to improve your playing. Practice sessions for guitar playing should be compared to other things like fitness training, study revision, etc. If the practice session is organized then more will be gained. For instance if you had previously worked through all of the lessons preceding this one, then only practicing the first song learnt will never really make you any better at the other ones. Practice should be arranged such that all facets of your playing are worked on regularly with time reserved for attending to new things in order for you to progress and very importantly for you also to play the things you enjoy playing. If practice becomes boring and you don’t enjoy it, you’ll soon stop playing guitar. The biggest factor in organizing practice then becomes the time available. The length of time spent on practice can make big differences to your playing. When first starting the length of beneficial practice sessions need not be as long as those for someone who has played for a long time, as in the early stages there are lots of easy things to learn and put right. The longer you’ve played, the more likely it is that you’ve fixed and learnt the easier things and hence the learning curve gets steeper. One very important thing to remember is that if you are practicing heavily for extended periods of time and begin to feel physical pain, particularly in your wrists, hands, fingers and possibly back (bad posture) then you have to stop, if not you will do yourself injury (I know, I’ve done it !). In this case the practice sessions need to be shortened drastically. If you are feeling pain, then your body is telling you are doing something wrong. For very new beginners, it can be hard to devote time to practice as your fingers become sore quickly and also because you’ll find things hard at first which make you stop playing within a time short. This is ok and trust me you soon get over this. At this point its worth trying to pick up the guitar for around 5 to 10 minutes per day if possible, more is better. Leaving practice to say an hour one day per week is not as good as practicing for shorter periods every day. In the case of the one hour weekly, you’ll have forgotten some things, your fingers will have softened, accuracy of fretting and strumming will deteriorate, etc. As you progress and if you enjoy playing you will find that you will extend your practice sessions naturally because you have learnt more thus requiring more practice to keep up to scratch and also because you know and have more avenues to try and explore. A typical practice session should be organized to encompass all of the ideas mentioned above, as follows:
|
Activity Order |
Activity |
Beginner |
Intermediate |
Advanced |
|
First |
Warm up |
3-15 mins |
10-30 mins |
30mins-2 hrs |
|
Second |
Learning |
3-15 mins |
10-30 mins |
30mins-2 hrs |
|
Third |
Revision |
3-15 mins |
10-30 mins |
30mins-2 hrs |
|
Fourth |
Enjoyment |
3-15 mins |
10-30 mins |
30mins-2 hrs |
This is not set in stone and is only to act as a guide. The various activities mentioned can and will vary depending on your ability. For instance I used to practise 8 hours per day, about 9 days out of 10, which I kept up for about a year ! My playing came on leaps and bounds during this time but then I also injured my left wrist through trying exercises that were too hard (playing too fast and doing large finger stretches). Now I generally practise for 30 mins - 2 hours maybe 3 days a week, also being older and having more commitments means less time available. Now and again I will play for around 6 hours straight, but thats very occasionally. The warm up should be seen as similar to warming up before physical exercise. It should consist on light guitar playing (no crazy finger stretches or wild strumming, etc ) so that you can work yourself into playing without causing an injury. This could be strumming a few easy chords (beginner), playing a slow solo (intermediate) or running through some scales at low speeds (expert). Running through a warm up is always a good idea, and you will notice the difference after the warm up is complete and you move onto harder things, as your hands will feel looser and your playing will be more comfortable. The learning section may include working on lessons from a tutor, working through articles from books or magazines, exploring ideas from friends, such as learning new chords, scales, riffs or songs. Obviously the more advanced your level of playing, the harder the thing is you can work on which effectively reflects the amount of time given to this section. I always feel that it is important to add a learning section to a practise session because if not you’ll never improve. I’ve noticed that many people seem to miss this part out after a while and basically they reach a certain level and never really progress after that and its down to this reason. This can be referred to as a "rut" which is a kind of learning barrier which can stop your progress. If you hit one of these and we all do, then its time to look for inspiration in the opposite direction. Listen to and try playing other styles of music, read some music books, work through lessons from magazines, exchange ideas with your friends, etc. The revision section is generally working though the stuff you’ve learnt previously. If not you’ll forget it. It could be worth making a list of songs, chord sequences, scales, riffs, etc and play through a certain number of them in each session, hence you’ll always practise every thing you know. This is a pretty strict and tedious way of doing things, but it’ll help to keep things fresh in your mind. As mentioned before, make sure you enjoy playing the guitar, or you’ll soon stop playing it. Putting this section last gives you something to work towards, and by the time you’ve gone through the other sections your playing will be peaking, your hands and actions will be loose and your playing style comfortable. Play your favorite riffs, songs and solo along to your favorite records, even if your playing the same thing over and over. Maybe try to write some original material, work out the guitar parts to some CDs or experiment with sounds on your amplifier and effects pedals, etc. Just enjoy it.
