I think some of the best advice here was to go ahead and learn songs outside your level. Some of the very first songs I learned all the way through were Yngwie Malmsteen and Paul Gilbert songs that were way, way outside my ability at the time. But I learned to play them as slowly as needed and they had an immense effect on me. You also learn a lot musically this way. Seriously, anyone reading this, I don't care if your top speed is 30 BPM, you can learn shred pieces at 30 BPM. Do so! Probably the biggest core of my playing style now is playing the same shapes through octaves rather than the notes being in arbitrary places. I got this directly from the main theme of Paul Gilbert's Curse of Castle Dragon where Paul descends through three octaves of the harmonic minor scale (or just minor I guess as the 7th is excluded at first) and then throws the 7th back in to define it on the fourth segment in the lower register. I wasn't going to get that from learning four chord bangers and it really shaped me a lot to have insight into a virtuoso from the very beginning. I feel like I'm constantly ripping that composition technique off to this day. To be honest that one Paul lick probably shaped me more than anything since, and I learned it way before I could play it even close to as fast as Paul. Another eye opener was Yngwie's Black Star. The main theme seemed super slow (for Yngwie) and I thought it would be fairly easy. I quickly learned it wasn't and that it was even harder to replicate his vibrato than his speed. Guthrie Govan has been a big proponent of standing on the fact that Yngwie suffers a lot of jealousy from others for kind of being the ultimate "natural" and has a bad name for being so effortlessly fast but obviously truly "feels it in his soul" like some blues legends and has an absolutely unmistakable vibrato. As Govan said, "He's a REAL guitar player." It's not something you can tab out. Tab might say a full step bend but there's an ocean of nuance in there. You have to play along with him and really use your ear to get it close. Hell, even all these years later where the speed comes easily to me I feel like an absolute hack trying to cheese that vibrato and just want to get through it to the fast parts. But I probably wouldn't have a third of the vibrato I have now if I hadn't dived headfirst into the deep end of the pool of vibrato. I saw a recent interview with Anton Oparin who is arguably the best alternate picker in the world so far and he said the first song he ever tried to learn, despite being an AC/DC fan, was Malmsteen's Trilogy. For some reason he just had the urge to jump into that song while it was outside his ability. 6 years later he was playing Paul Gilbert's Get Out of My Yard in standard tuning, without the human capo, all alternate picked. I can't help but wonder if his journey might have been totally different otherwise. Maybe he would have learned some AC/DC songs and because the speed wasn't already there by a few years later, never even attempted to shred.
This really resonates a lot with my thought process out of the countless videos alike, and I have to say it feels refreshing being on the same page with someone I look up to
Good advice here thank you. Some of the best advice I ever got was from neuroscientist David Eagleman who has proved that whenever you take on a new task , your brain will work with you 50/50 to achieve it by building up the necessary networks. Every time without fail.
Thoughts on practice as a 2000 GIT grad. Sorry for the length but I want to be thorough and help. I suggest everyone read John Petrucci's "Wild Stringdom" column for "Guitar World" from the 1990s. He breaks down his practice routine and filing system in minute detail (back then, it was literally in a filing cabinet--he probably still has it). *1) There is a perfect practice routine--the one that rapidly improves your weaknesses and accomplishes your goals as a player. But this perfect practice routine is not the same for everyone.* *2) Technical vs. applied.* Purely technical stuff is best practiced when you only have short amounts of time--30 mins or less. I use this time to improve things like alternate picking, vibrato, sweeping, etc., because exercises can be mindless for long periods. I often go for comfortable tempos for extended periods (like long distance running) and pushing myself to maximum bpm for short periods (like sprinting). I keep careful logs of bpms--comfortable and max. I try to do this daily. I practice until failure but I don't play through pain. I make sure to practice all rhythmic subdivisions. New and younger players seem really dependent upon inflating bpm to ridiculous numbers like 300 bpm because they cannot count short subdivisions like 16th and 32nd notes in large pockets. They think they are playing incredibly fast at "300 bpm" when they are playing 16th notes at 150 bpm, a brisk but not blistering speed. They need the extra click for both the down and up stroke to stay in time. Learn to set the metronome to a very slow tempo--40-60 bpm--and play fast within that musical pulse, making sure you are coming down on the downbeat. Now on to applied playing. Applied means trying to perform a song that works on weaknesses in your playing. A song is essentially an exercise arranged in a musical way. The thing is when we create our own exercises, we tend to play whatever is easy for us to play. Songs written by other people may force us to play what we are not good at. *Often good players stop at being technically skilled. They are great players but not musicians and songwriters. The following helps you become a better musician and songwriter.* *3) Fruitful improvising can become difficult because it can become aimless noodling. One begins to develop a set of stock licks and habits that one uses instead of coming up with something truly innovative.* Since rock and metal are rarely improvised styles, I would not work on improvisation there very much, because in those genres the song tends to be played the same way every time. It's better to simply practice challenging/complicated licks so you can pull them off cleanly later. Even blues and jazz players do this with turnaround licks. In my opinion, improvised music like jazz and blues tends to sound like elevator music. It comes in your ears and is quickly forgotten. Improvised licks taken from masters is cool, but improvising for the sake of improvising is something I consider a waste of time unless you play a genre that calls for improvisation. Improvising is much better for the sake of being able to play outside/non-diatonically over complex changes without stopping to think. Improvisation helps you see the fretboard more quickly through practice. This leads us to: *4) Fretboard visualization and ear training.* There is no shortcut for this. You simply have to understand music theory, which is not difficult if taught in the right sequence and an easier level is mastered before moving to a more advanced level. Example: understand diatonic triadic harmony before moving on to 7th chords. Be able to build harmonized diatonic chord scales in every key (stack every other note in the scale to form chords). Etc. *I recommend "The Guitar Grimoire" by Adam Kadmon for theory.* Music theory is not like higher level math. I hated higher level math but found theory easy. Theory is more like grammar in that there are rules. *Generally, just match chord tones with the main/characteristic notes of a scale/mode.* Generally notes that are close together clash. Eventually even things like "Why can't we use a maj11 chord more often?" become easy (because the 3rd and 11th rub together, causing tension). *Make sure you can use a scale/mode over 5ths/triads before moving on to 7th-13th chords. More notes in a chord mean more chances to hit a wrong note and create undesired tension.* *Something that is hard in theory is understanding the formal rules of four species counterpoint--something most non-classicists avoid these days.* I still find these rules useful because they help me figure out what sounds good without using my ears. Most counterpoint will be diatonically focused, especially complex Bachian and Baroque counterpoint. *Jazz is a whole other world, which leads us to the ultimate goal in music theory: chord progression reharmonization.* Here you are substituting chords for other chords in a progression, often using very advanced (but not hard to understand when isolated) concepts. *8-Bit Music Theory has an excellent video on "levels" of reharmonization in 8 and 16-bit retro video game music. Reharmonization (and plugins that do it for you like Scaler) is important because it helps you write more interesting progressions.* As for fretboard visualization, I was taught in a fairly standard Paul Gilbert way--CAGED, 3 note per string (and now four), and modal. A jazz player or Berklee grad might look at the fretboard differently, being more chordal based and less concerned with patterns/shapes and more about identifying intervals and typical chord progressions like II V I and I VI II V. *My best advice for rock and metal players--take any chord shape and know what each note in that chord does. Also, change the root of that shape and be able to immediately identify the new identity of the chord. This will get you into jazz. Example: Cmaj7 = C E G B so Cmaj7/E = E G B C = Emin(b6).* You have to have this chord knowledge in jazz because often the bass guitar will change the root note while the guitar omits it. Changing the root changes the relationship among all the other notes and thus the identity of the chord. You've just made a big change just by moving the bass note (a big thing when using diminished 7th chords and dom7 chords to change keys). Ear training was always most difficult for me depending upon the instrument I was listening to (fundamental vs. overtones--start with a piano then try guitar, which has more overtones). In the 90s at GIT we used cassette tapes that we listened to over and over and tried to write what we heard on the music staff. Eventually, I got good with rhythm because once I started recording on PC I would do covers of songs I liked. I would listen to the song and transcribe the drums by ear, programming them into a drum soft synth VST like Superior Drummer or BFD on a grand staff (each drum and articulation had its own note). Eventually, I heard 16th note patterns as pieces. Now I can do nearly any pattern with little problem, although highly syncopated rhythms using small subdivisions at high tempos can still be challenging. Can you really hear that 32nd note rest or is it a dotted note? Transcribing songs by ear also forces you to listen hard to mixes (some of which are not very good). Often parts are wrong due just as much to a bad mix as ear training errors. If you can't hear the note clearly, you won't transcribe it correctly. Ear training for pitch is easier now because there are apps for it and it can be done in short periods. My problem was my ear often conflated pitch with timbre and I got incorrect pitches (a high note but warm tone). What goes along well with ear training is audio production/mixing practice. Here you will be dealing with timbre instead of pitch, and learning what parts of a frequency sound like. This can help you listen for buried and subtle parts in professional mixes. *Overwhelming wall of text but I hope it helps intermediate players with good technique but not much theory knowledge know where to go next.* Thanks.
One more thing I wanted to add for advanced guitar students. *Watch RUclips lessons with piano players, especially gospel and jazz players.* You will learn a lot more about harmony that way since each of their hands is essentially a separate guitar. They will also often rely on complex reharmonizations to spice up traditional tunes, and you will also learn more about ear training from them since you can hear their tones more clearly than a guitar's and they can play any interval whereas a guitar cannot. Where guitar lessons excel is in doing things that pianists can't do because guitarists can cross strings. Guitar and piano are complementary in that what one can do the other can't. A piano can play huge intervals/chords and difficult melodies, but a guitar can transpose to any key much more easily in standard tuning. The two instruments work well together. *For neoclassical heavy metal guitarists like me, try to find books that transcribe Vivaldi and Bach licks from violin to guitar.* You'll have a bunch of cool sequences and patterns this way, especially for sweeping with Vivaldi. If you want to get really out there with theory, try listening to early-mid 20th century composers like Berlioz, Stravinksi, Bartok, etc. They will use polychords, mirrored chords, 12 tone rows, and generally exotic things you won't find in most modern music.
Great video! I would love to hear more about practice ideas for improvising. I have always been pretty frustrated with my progress on improvising and feel like I end up repeating the same licks or motifs everyday.
Thanks, what you are saying is exactly what I did when I was a teenager. Also, someone told me, "Make sure you focus on what you are playing and practicing instead of letting your muscle memory do the work. This will help you improve your skills and save you a lot of time learning new things.". What you think about that?
First learn basic theory. After that it’s simple - 2 hours of exercises and 2-3 hours of improvising in different modes keys….do that daily for a few years and you will be a monster guaranteed
For Lots Of Fun Exercises To Practice Join The Patreon Page At: www.Patreon.com/JamieRobinson 🎸
On the chromatic exercise I also like skipping strings. 1-3, 2-4, 3-5, or 1-4, 2-5, 3-6.
smart
Absolutely! Every possible variation is worth trying and practicing! 👍
I think some of the best advice here was to go ahead and learn songs outside your level. Some of the very first songs I learned all the way through were Yngwie Malmsteen and Paul Gilbert songs that were way, way outside my ability at the time. But I learned to play them as slowly as needed and they had an immense effect on me. You also learn a lot musically this way. Seriously, anyone reading this, I don't care if your top speed is 30 BPM, you can learn shred pieces at 30 BPM. Do so!
Probably the biggest core of my playing style now is playing the same shapes through octaves rather than the notes being in arbitrary places. I got this directly from the main theme of Paul Gilbert's Curse of Castle Dragon where Paul descends through three octaves of the harmonic minor scale (or just minor I guess as the 7th is excluded at first) and then throws the 7th back in to define it on the fourth segment in the lower register. I wasn't going to get that from learning four chord bangers and it really shaped me a lot to have insight into a virtuoso from the very beginning. I feel like I'm constantly ripping that composition technique off to this day. To be honest that one Paul lick probably shaped me more than anything since, and I learned it way before I could play it even close to as fast as Paul.
Another eye opener was Yngwie's Black Star. The main theme seemed super slow (for Yngwie) and I thought it would be fairly easy. I quickly learned it wasn't and that it was even harder to replicate his vibrato than his speed. Guthrie Govan has been a big proponent of standing on the fact that Yngwie suffers a lot of jealousy from others for kind of being the ultimate "natural" and has a bad name for being so effortlessly fast but obviously truly "feels it in his soul" like some blues legends and has an absolutely unmistakable vibrato. As Govan said, "He's a REAL guitar player." It's not something you can tab out. Tab might say a full step bend but there's an ocean of nuance in there. You have to play along with him and really use your ear to get it close.
Hell, even all these years later where the speed comes easily to me I feel like an absolute hack trying to cheese that vibrato and just want to get through it to the fast parts. But I probably wouldn't have a third of the vibrato I have now if I hadn't dived headfirst into the deep end of the pool of vibrato.
I saw a recent interview with Anton Oparin who is arguably the best alternate picker in the world so far and he said the first song he ever tried to learn, despite being an AC/DC fan, was Malmsteen's Trilogy. For some reason he just had the urge to jump into that song while it was outside his ability. 6 years later he was playing Paul Gilbert's Get Out of My Yard in standard tuning, without the human capo, all alternate picked. I can't help but wonder if his journey might have been totally different otherwise. Maybe he would have learned some AC/DC songs and because the speed wasn't already there by a few years later, never even attempted to shred.
This really resonates a lot with my thought process out of the countless videos alike, and I have to say it feels refreshing being on the same page with someone I look up to
Good advice here thank you. Some of the best advice I ever got was from neuroscientist David Eagleman who has proved that whenever you take on a new task , your brain will work with you 50/50 to achieve it by building up the necessary networks. Every time without fail.
Thoughts on practice as a 2000 GIT grad. Sorry for the length but I want to be thorough and help.
I suggest everyone read John Petrucci's "Wild Stringdom" column for "Guitar World" from the 1990s. He breaks down his practice routine and filing system in minute detail (back then, it was literally in a filing cabinet--he probably still has it).
*1) There is a perfect practice routine--the one that rapidly improves your weaknesses and accomplishes your goals as a player. But this perfect practice routine is not the same for everyone.*
*2) Technical vs. applied.* Purely technical stuff is best practiced when you only have short amounts of time--30 mins or less. I use this time to improve things like alternate picking, vibrato, sweeping, etc., because exercises can be mindless for long periods. I often go for comfortable tempos for extended periods (like long distance running) and pushing myself to maximum bpm for short periods (like sprinting). I keep careful logs of bpms--comfortable and max. I try to do this daily. I practice until failure but I don't play through pain.
I make sure to practice all rhythmic subdivisions. New and younger players seem really dependent upon inflating bpm to ridiculous numbers like 300 bpm because they cannot count short subdivisions like 16th and 32nd notes in large pockets. They think they are playing incredibly fast at "300 bpm" when they are playing 16th notes at 150 bpm, a brisk but not blistering speed. They need the extra click for both the down and up stroke to stay in time.
Learn to set the metronome to a very slow tempo--40-60 bpm--and play fast within that musical pulse, making sure you are coming down on the downbeat.
Now on to applied playing. Applied means trying to perform a song that works on weaknesses in your playing. A song is essentially an exercise arranged in a musical way. The thing is when we create our own exercises, we tend to play whatever is easy for us to play. Songs written by other people may force us to play what we are not good at.
*Often good players stop at being technically skilled. They are great players but not musicians and songwriters. The following helps you become a better musician and songwriter.*
*3) Fruitful improvising can become difficult because it can become aimless noodling. One begins to develop a set of stock licks and habits that one uses instead of coming up with something truly innovative.* Since rock and metal are rarely improvised styles, I would not work on improvisation there very much, because in those genres the song tends to be played the same way every time. It's better to simply practice challenging/complicated licks so you can pull them off cleanly later. Even blues and jazz players do this with turnaround licks.
In my opinion, improvised music like jazz and blues tends to sound like elevator music. It comes in your ears and is quickly forgotten. Improvised licks taken from masters is cool, but improvising for the sake of improvising is something I consider a waste of time unless you play a genre that calls for improvisation. Improvising is much better for the sake of being able to play outside/non-diatonically over complex changes without stopping to think. Improvisation helps you see the fretboard more quickly through practice.
This leads us to:
*4) Fretboard visualization and ear training.* There is no shortcut for this. You simply have to understand music theory, which is not difficult if taught in the right sequence and an easier level is mastered before moving to a more advanced level. Example: understand diatonic triadic harmony before moving on to 7th chords. Be able to build harmonized diatonic chord scales in every key (stack every other note in the scale to form chords). Etc. *I recommend "The Guitar Grimoire" by Adam Kadmon for theory.*
Music theory is not like higher level math. I hated higher level math but found theory easy. Theory is more like grammar in that there are rules. *Generally, just match chord tones with the main/characteristic notes of a scale/mode.* Generally notes that are close together clash. Eventually even things like "Why can't we use a maj11 chord more often?" become easy (because the 3rd and 11th rub together, causing tension). *Make sure you can use a scale/mode over 5ths/triads before moving on to 7th-13th chords. More notes in a chord mean more chances to hit a wrong note and create undesired tension.*
*Something that is hard in theory is understanding the formal rules of four species counterpoint--something most non-classicists avoid these days.* I still find these rules useful because they help me figure out what sounds good without using my ears. Most counterpoint will be diatonically focused, especially complex Bachian and Baroque counterpoint.
*Jazz is a whole other world, which leads us to the ultimate goal in music theory: chord progression reharmonization.* Here you are substituting chords for other chords in a progression, often using very advanced (but not hard to understand when isolated) concepts. *8-Bit Music Theory has an excellent video on "levels" of reharmonization in 8 and 16-bit retro video game music. Reharmonization (and plugins that do it for you like Scaler) is important because it helps you write more interesting progressions.*
As for fretboard visualization, I was taught in a fairly standard Paul Gilbert way--CAGED, 3 note per string (and now four), and modal. A jazz player or Berklee grad might look at the fretboard differently, being more chordal based and less concerned with patterns/shapes and more about identifying intervals and typical chord progressions like II V I and I VI II V.
*My best advice for rock and metal players--take any chord shape and know what each note in that chord does. Also, change the root of that shape and be able to immediately identify the new identity of the chord. This will get you into jazz. Example: Cmaj7 = C E G B so Cmaj7/E = E G B C = Emin(b6).*
You have to have this chord knowledge in jazz because often the bass guitar will change the root note while the guitar omits it. Changing the root changes the relationship among all the other notes and thus the identity of the chord. You've just made a big change just by moving the bass note (a big thing when using diminished 7th chords and dom7 chords to change keys).
Ear training was always most difficult for me depending upon the instrument I was listening to (fundamental vs. overtones--start with a piano then try guitar, which has more overtones). In the 90s at GIT we used cassette tapes that we listened to over and over and tried to write what we heard on the music staff.
Eventually, I got good with rhythm because once I started recording on PC I would do covers of songs I liked. I would listen to the song and transcribe the drums by ear, programming them into a drum soft synth VST like Superior Drummer or BFD on a grand staff (each drum and articulation had its own note). Eventually, I heard 16th note patterns as pieces. Now I can do nearly any pattern with little problem, although highly syncopated rhythms using small subdivisions at high tempos can still be challenging. Can you really hear that 32nd note rest or is it a dotted note?
Transcribing songs by ear also forces you to listen hard to mixes (some of which are not very good). Often parts are wrong due just as much to a bad mix as ear training errors. If you can't hear the note clearly, you won't transcribe it correctly.
Ear training for pitch is easier now because there are apps for it and it can be done in short periods. My problem was my ear often conflated pitch with timbre and I got incorrect pitches (a high note but warm tone).
What goes along well with ear training is audio production/mixing practice. Here you will be dealing with timbre instead of pitch, and learning what parts of a frequency sound like. This can help you listen for buried and subtle parts in professional mixes.
*Overwhelming wall of text but I hope it helps intermediate players with good technique but not much theory knowledge know where to go next.* Thanks.
One more thing I wanted to add for advanced guitar students. *Watch RUclips lessons with piano players, especially gospel and jazz players.* You will learn a lot more about harmony that way since each of their hands is essentially a separate guitar. They will also often rely on complex reharmonizations to spice up traditional tunes, and you will also learn more about ear training from them since you can hear their tones more clearly than a guitar's and they can play any interval whereas a guitar cannot.
Where guitar lessons excel is in doing things that pianists can't do because guitarists can cross strings. Guitar and piano are complementary in that what one can do the other can't. A piano can play huge intervals/chords and difficult melodies, but a guitar can transpose to any key much more easily in standard tuning. The two instruments work well together.
*For neoclassical heavy metal guitarists like me, try to find books that transcribe Vivaldi and Bach licks from violin to guitar.* You'll have a bunch of cool sequences and patterns this way, especially for sweeping with Vivaldi.
If you want to get really out there with theory, try listening to early-mid 20th century composers like Berlioz, Stravinksi, Bartok, etc. They will use polychords, mirrored chords, 12 tone rows, and generally exotic things you won't find in most modern music.
Thank you..
A very honest comprehensive experience and advice..
Great video! I would love to hear more about practice ideas for improvising. I have always been pretty frustrated with my progress on improvising and feel like I end up repeating the same licks or motifs everyday.
I’ve posted a couple lesson videos in the past on improvising. I cover it a lot on Patreon and it’s often brought up in my livestreams as well 😊
Great info. I’ve gotten into the habit of practicing one or two things tons of times and it’s so easy to get into boring muscle memory.
Thanks Jamie!! You are an awesome teacher !
Great tips, Jamie! I seem to have problem with too much 'improvising' (noodling, tbh), and not learning enough new material...
Thanks, what you are saying is exactly what I did when I was a teenager. Also, someone told me, "Make sure you focus on what you are playing and practicing instead of letting your muscle memory do the work. This will help you improve your skills and save you a lot of time learning new things.". What you think about that?
Soon to be 2year guitarist here. Would love to see more advice on economy picking and legato practice
I have a “10 minute Legato Workout” video on my channel from a while ago. That will definitely help build the technique/strength!
I started economy picking around my 3rd year of guitar and is my personal favourite picking style. Great for conservation of movement
This is great
You have a doppelganger.. The owner of Paint Green in san diego..you and Jon look like twins...
nioce
First learn basic theory. After that it’s simple - 2 hours of exercises and 2-3 hours of improvising in different modes keys….do that daily for a few years and you will be a monster guaranteed
OK, but you're asking folks to play guitar 5 hours a day. Most people won't have that kind of time.
I go major and minor scale all over the fretboard with metronome, slow.