Tag: fretboard knowledge

Day 45. Picking up some riffs

Today I finally got time to practice something from Module 13 and continued increasing the speed of 1234s.

Also the main goal for today was to start playing without looking at the fretboard all the time. So I played everything looking away from it.

1234 exercise

2134 on the 5th fret

8th notes at 130 bpm.

2143 on the 5th fret

8th notes at 130 bpm.

2314 on the 5th fret

8th notes at 130 bpm.

1234, 1243, 1324, 1342, 1423, 1432 on the 5th fret

8th notes at 150 bpm. I wanted to see if I’m able to play all these without watching.

12-13-14-23-24-34 on the 5th fret

8th notes at 130 bpm.

Fretboard knowledge

It’s funny how even sloppy attempts manage to end in 1:40. There was no try above that mark. And I’m really close to the goal – my best time is 1:32. Not sure if I got it before but it’s surely the best one.

Ear training

I managed to pick up notes for Crazy Train, Sunshine of Your Love, The Final Countdown riffs. The notes were pretty much perfect but my positioning and choosing the fret and strings to play them were not always the best ones possible. So I looked up all of them to make sure I was playing them right.

I also picked up Do I Wanna Know riff by ear but haven’t recorded it.

Summary

Tomorrow I’ll start Module 14. It’s time to finally move on and add some routines to my practice. Also I’m really glad there was this picking up by ear thing. Finally some songs, which is so much fun 🙂

Day 43. Adding 1234 combinations

Today I started practicing three new combinations: 2134, 2143, 2314 and tried to set the new record for fretboard knowledge. Also I replayed Demons by Imagine Dragons and got interrupted twice during 12-13-14-23-24-34 exercise.

1234 exercise

I wanted to start from 8th notes at 150 bpm but then realized that starting the pattern from the middle finger really makes everything much harder. So I dropped the speed to 110 bpm and played all of them, decent-ish.

2134 on the 5th fret

8th notes at 110 bpm.

2143 on the 5th fret

8th notes at 110 bpm.

2314 on the 5th fret

8th notes at 110 bpm.

12-13-14-23-24-34 on the 5th fret

8th notes at 120 bpm. Got interrupted twice…

Fretboard knowledge

From now on I’ll record every attempt to 100% film the attempt that will be the new record.

Imagine Dragons – Demons

I played this song again in order to relax my right hand more and play loudly. When playing like this another issue occurs – I just miss the E string while doing snares.

Summary

Not much practice today, but it’s a start of the week, so there are more days ahead to implement something new.

Day 42. Concluding 1*** combinations

Today I played 1*** finger variations for the last time for now in order to start practicing 2*** ones. Also my fretboard knowledge was checked once again. Besides I implemented palm muting and thumb snares playing Demons by Imagine Dragons.

1234 exercise

I wasn’t in great shape today so I’m gonna use yesterday’s videos for the week summary.

1234 on the 1-12 frets

16th notes at 90 bpm.

1243 on the 1-12 frets

8th notes at 150 bpm.

1324 on the 1-12 frets

8th notes at 150 bpm.

1342 on the 1-12 frets

8th notes at 150 bpm.

1423 on the 1-12 frets

8th notes at 150 bpm.

1432 on the 1-12 frets

8th notes at 150 bpm.

12-13-14-23-24-34 on the 5th fret

8th notes at 120 bpm.

Fretboard knowledge

Finally I got back to this exercise. As before – here is my first attempt. Finished in 1:55.

Off-camera I managed to do it in 1:32 and it was my best attempt yet. Unfortunately I couldn’t repeat that result on camera. So there is my 1:39 attempt.

Imagine Dragons – Demons

I implemented thumb snare in verses and palm muting in pre-choruses. It was fun. Maybe one day I’ll be able to sing along, but at this point my singing is completely awful…

Summary

Finally the cover is done so are 1*** combinations. Tomorrow there will be many new exercises which I’m really excited about.

Day 25. Welcome to Paradise

Today I accidentally played the chord progression which sounded very familiar. Turned out it was from Welcome to Paradise by Green Day. So I remembered this song, played and recorded it after all the routines. I messed up two or three times during the song, so I’m gonna practice it more. This is like the first try to compare with in the future.

Here is clean version to hear how messy it sounds now 🙂

1234 on the 1-12 frets

I continue to practice it at the same speed – 320 bpm – and not sure if I’m getting better at it. Maybe I need to warm up before it instead of using this exercise as a warmup.

1234 on the 5th fret

1243

As I mentioned yesterday, I reduced the practice time for this combination to 2 min. Still the same 300 bpm, because it’s not clean at all yet.

1324

Finally this combination is completed and played at 300 bpm. It’s easier for me than 1243. Anyway, tomorrow I’ll start the next one – 1342.

Chord transitions

B7/E transition

I started with the same speed as yesterday – 90 bpm.

And then proceeded to 100 bpm.

B7/C transition

Same chord – same story. 90 bpm at first.

And then at 100 bpm.

Am G/B C G/B transition

Finally I stopped messing up the chord order. Now the Am and C are played exactly when they should. Increased the speed to 80 bpm.

Em D/F# G D/F# transition

Still struggling with the D/F# shape. So I practice both variants – with my thumb on the E string and with my index finger. The former is done at 80 bpm, the latter – hardly at 50 bpm.

Strumming

Module 7 pattern

Today I got to 100 bpm. Not everything went smoothly, but at the end I nailed it.

Fretboard knowledge

Realized that haven’t been practicing this stuff for a few days now, so I just did two attempts in a row on camera and got the time below 1:50 both times. Still worthy 🙂

Summary

I really like that thing with the songs and surely will do full covers (I mean two guitars and a bass) of both of these. Need more time to practice the bass lines, they are pretty fast and tricky. And keeping it up with my daily upload thing gets harder. But I’m having too much fun to stop doing it, so I’ll keep it up for as long as I could!

Week 3. Summary

I’m only happy with the first half of this week. Then there was too much planned and the practice was not the priority of that reason. So the only time to play was at night and I really couldn’t do what I needed and wanted to at that time.

I watched modules 6 and 7, played some more chord transitions and strumming patterns, but mostly I focused on 1234s again but this time with some new finger combinations. The details are in the video.

1234

1234 – On the 5th fret at 320 bpm → On the 1-12 frets at 320 bpm
1243 on the 5th fret – 200 bpm → 300 bpm
1324 on the 5th fret – 200 bpm → 220 bpm
1342 on the 5th fret – 200 bpm → 220 bpm

Fretboard knowledge

All strings at once – 1:44 → 1:35

Chord transitions

C/D – 90 bpm → 110 bpm
Am/C – 140 bpm → 180 bpm
E/D – 120 bpm → 160 bpm
A/E – 110 bpm → 150 bpm
A/Dm – 90 bpm → 140 bpm
G/D – 120 bpm → 140 bpm
B7/E – 60 bpm → 70 bpm
B7/C – 60 bpm → 70 bpm

Strumming

Module 6 pattern – 80 bpm → 120 bpm

Day 20. Midnight practice

There was not much time to practice today, so I ended up starting the routines at 00:30 or so. So I didn’t plug in the guitar today as well as didn’t practice loud things such as chord transitions or strumming.

1234 on the 1-12 frets

I started with the usual 300 bpm tempo.

Then I decided to increase it to 320 bpm. My legato went south instantly 🙂 I got better in the end but this speed increase was unexpectedly hard in comparison to the 1243 speed improving which will be described below.

1243 on the 5th fret

I really want to end the week with the ability to play 1243 at 300 bpm so I had to increase the speed twice today. First I set the metronome to 260 bpm.

And then to 280 bpm. My pinky and ring fingers have a quite strong relationships and are not willing to leave each other when one of them pressing the string. In 1234 combination it was okay, but when the pinky presses the string first, it’s hard for me to press the string with the ring finger and then lift my pinky up. Hopefully, this problem will sort out by itself.

Fretboard knowledge

For a week or so I practiced fretboard knowledge the same way and ended up with a great time. Today I decided to basically start over and play strings not only one by one but in the opposite order.

As I thought I really got used to the order I played the notes. So when I changed that order it became way more difficult. I think I will practice it that or some similar way for a while.

Anyway, that’s my initial attempt.

And that’s my final try for today after I practiced each string for 5 times independently.

Summary

There’s a lot to do tomorrow. I’m looking forward to increase every result to record my weekly report video and share it in the facebook group. Too soon to make some statements yet, so let’s just move on.

Day 19. Tricky transitions

Finally I had some time in the morning to play the guitar. I went through module 7 and took some routines from it. I didn’t touch new strumming patterns because I didn’t quite master patterns from the previous module.

1234 on the 1-12 frets

I started the exercise at 300 bpm. It got better than before. My phone ran out of memory again so I didn’t record the first attempt and repeated 1234s one more time.

1243 on the 5th fret

This time the speed was increased to 240 bpm.

And I repeated the routine in the end of today practice just to improve the results more.

Chord transitions

In module 7 there were two chords added – G and B7. The latter was almost not used by me at all, so these were tricky ones.

A/E transition

Did it at 140 bpm. Not sure if I will practice this transition more – it’s pretty easy to play it.

A/Dm transition

This time the metronome was set to 120 bpm. I decided to mute the strings after each strum to hear if all the strings are played in each chord.

G/D transition

This one was easy. The ring finger serves as the anchor point to rotate other fingers around it. The pace was 120 bpm.

B7/E transition

There is where fun begins… I played this chord literally several times in my life. And the hardest part of it is to place the fingers so that open strings are not muted. So I started at 60 bpm. I wouldn’t say it was too fast, but for now my transitions are not very consistent at that speed.

B7/C transition

Somehow this one was a bit easier for me despite the fact that in terms of fingers movement there is much more going on here. I think that that one song I played which contained B7 chord was with this transition, so I have some kind of muscle memory for it.

Fretboard knowledge

As always, first attempt for today – 1:41.

The best one was in 1:35. And the last one on camera was in 1:42.

Strumming

I continued increasing the speed for module 6 strumming pattern. At first I played it at 110 bpm.

Then I increased the speed to 120 bpm. Will start from this speed tomorrow, because it was not perfect.

Summary

I want to play 1243 on the 5th fret at 300 bpm by the end of the week. So I will be practicing mostly this thing as long as I could in terms of my hand and finger exhaustion.

It’s cool to finally get to the point where I need to practice something from level zero. I’m talking about B7 chord. I was surprised to see it as one of the crucial ones. I saw it maybe in 1 or 2 songs I played. It will be fun to improve my chord transitions speed with this one.

Day 18. Repetition

Today I didn’t have much time to practice so I just repeated every yesterday exercise, some with the metronome speed increased.

1234 on the 1-12 frets

I repeated it at 300 bpm. There were errors but not so many. I missed a string with a pick a few times, messed up timings of my ring and pinky fingers a bit and messed up with transitions between the frets once or twice.

1234 on the 5th fret

I continued to practice different combinations of fingers at the same 220 bpm. It’s quite hard for muscle memory and for the brain to master all combinations at once so I decided to practice them one by one for a few days each to get to the consistent playing at 300 bpm or so.

1243

1324

1342

Chord transitions

I practiced the same transitions as yesterday at the faster speed.

A/E transition

Did it at 120 bpm. Because of the way I play the A chord this transition is easy for me. Tomorrow I’ll increase the speed even more.

A/Dm transition

That’s more tricky, but not impossible, especially at 100 bpm. Tomorrow I’ll increase this value.

Strumming

I started with practicing it a bit more without the metronome, because I did’t quite mastered it yesterday. Then I tried to do it on beat. After several attempts this chord and strumming progression was written to my brain and I managed to do it pretty seamlessly and clean.

This is my last attempt, I recorded it separately to have it in other video.

Fretboard knowledge

Maybe I need to practice more of it every day or maybe it’s really hard to get below 1:30, but I didn’t get closer to it yet. My first attempt was in 1:42.

My best one for today was in 1:38 and the last one I recorder – in 1:41.

Summary

I don’t have much to say today. It was quite an eventful day, so I got only 1 hour or so in the evening to practice. I did nothing new, just repeated the previous day routine. But that’s ok, I think. The best thing is that I find some time to do it. And my consistency with these daily posts is what makes me happy.

Day 17. Proceeding further

I decided to continue doing different 1234 combinations but at the same time look through some following modules to start practicing something more exiting. These 1234s are great but not so enjoying. Not mentioning the fact that my left hand gets tired after 1-2 practices 5 minutes each so I need to do something else. So I watched the 6th module today.

1234 on the 1-12 frets

I spent my time at the same speed – 300 bpm. I need to make this consistent. For now, it’s not like it.

1234 on the 5th fret

I kept the speed to practice all these new combinations more and try to make less errors while playing. It was not very successful so I’ll continue to practice at the same speed for a day or two more. The metronome was set to 220 bpm.

1243

1324

1342

Fretboard knowledge

I somehow deleted the video of my first try of this day, but it was in 1:42.

The last attempt was faster, I managed to finish it in 1:38. Still not the new record but pretty good. All my attempts today was below 1:50 even regarding the fact that I messed up a lot.

Chord transitions

In module 6 there was A and Dm chords presented. So transitions included these two.

A/E transition

That’s a pretty easy one but I decided to start safe at 110 bpm to have some room to proceed to.

A/Dm transition

That’s trickier, so I set the metronome to 90 bpm just to be sure I would make it.

Strumming

A new PDF was given, so first of all I started to learn all new strumming patterns without playing actual chords. I played them line by line and then all together at 100 bpm.

After that I included chords in the equation. As I saw this combination the first time, it was quite tricky at first, and I set the metronome to 80 bpm to play it consistently.

Unfortunately, my phone ran out of memory again so I had to record the final attempts at 80 bpm as well. Surely, I will increase this speed shortly.

Summary

After the answer to my week 2 summary I started to practice being plugged in when it’s possible. And the first thing that I got from it was the fact that after practice I wanted to play more, to do something beyond the routine. So yesterday I started to record The Kids Aren’t Alright by The Offspring. And after a few major problems with my software it all is set up and running, so I’m gonna work on it the next days.

Day 16. Step by step

1234 on 1-12 frets

I returned to practicing this routine on different frets. Last time (it was in the week 1) I did it at 270 bpm. So today I started at 300 bpm. It wasn’t perfect, but it was ok.

1234 on the 5th fret

Other combinations I practice is not enough well-played to do this kind of stuff, so I practice them at 5th fret only for now.

1243

This one is the easiest one of the combinations left, but I want to improve them simultaneously, so the speed was increased to 220 bpm as for the others.

1324

That’s the combination at which my fingers stopped obeying my brain… The first two minutes went pretty decent but then… So many times I stopped because of my fingers mixed up and pressed the strings at the wrong time. Tomorrow I’ll repeat this routine with the same 220 bpm.

1342

Another tricky one. Emotions are pretty the same here. Need more practice. Tomorrow it will be at 220 bpm again.

Fretboard knowledge

Same as always, there is my today’s first attempt. I finished in 1:42.

Unfortunately, I was thinking too much about the record and my goal to beat the 1:30 time and it interfered with my playing which led to me messing this up. So the last try was in 1:52.

Chord transitions

I sped up every transition for a bit and nailed it.

C/D transition

Transitions were made at 110 bpm. The hand started to feel pain, but not much so nothing unusual.

Am/C transition

I increased the speed to 180 bpm. I have no idea why would anyone in any song did so many Am/C transitions at that speed.

E/D transition

I did it at 160 bpm with some errors. Don’t know why this is needed too.

Summary

I decided to stop doing these chord transitions. They are not fun and I am pretty good at them when it doesn’t go to the speed where the transitions start to sound unnecessary fast.

I will practice as many 1234 combinations as I could this week and will proceed further into the course.