What to Practice?

Hi,
I have been playing about 3 weeks now and just subscribed to this website a few days back. The beginner videos and instruction I gotta say are GREAT. That being said as a beginner is there some certain set of "things" I should be practicing daily? If it has already been posted or if I am starring at the answer on the tutorials..I apologize, but I cannot seem to find a basic "practice this the first week" "practice this the second week" etc..The only thing so far I have done every time I pick up the guitar is a very basic scale. Hope that makes sense and thanks for the help in advance,
Ed

Hi,

There is a very good reason why you don't see a "weekly practice schedule." Everyone progresses at different rates. What may be a good schedule for one, may not be so good for the next.

I believe I remember it said in a couple of videos, proceed to the next video, after you feel comfortable with the current lesson.

Hmmm yeah he's right, but there is a general regimen you could follow, here's mine.

Jam time: Just messing around with riffs and whatnot, goofing around basically.

Warmup: Varying excercises. I switch up what I focus on though, and you could do it too. Like one day I'll warm up with lead practice, or rythm, or speed, or even just posture and fretting, that's all up to you.

Learning: I suggest picking a song from a band you like, or even just a riff from a song, and practice it ten times a day for two weeks. It's even helpful to record yourself every once in awhile.

Book time: This isn't neccesary, but it's kinda important to touch base with music theory, start by learning all the notes of the fretboard and go from there.

Focus on: Chords, Scales, Technique

Anyway that's pretty much what I do. Some tips are to never practice for more than an hour straight, always take a break because your arms, hands and brain are muscles and they need rest.

Make sure to stretch before hand and always watch your posture and stuff.

lastly, and this is the demon of playing (can't stress this enough) metronome, metronome, metronome!

Oh and it never hurts to ask questions :)

hope that helps a little.

Also, don't be afraid to try something new on your own. Don't wait for someone to tell you when you should move on, or what you should move on to. You mentioned you've kind of just been stuck playing a basic scale pattern. If you have it down, and you understand what you're doing with it (and only then will you actually have it down right), move on to another beginner type lesson. Or even try something a little more advanced.

The thing with practicing is you always need to try to push yourself to do something a little harder than before. You can play the same thing over and over again and be an expert at it, but when you go to try something different it will be completely new and you may fail miserably. But don't let that discourage you, because you can't expect to be good at something new right away obviously.

Hello Ed,

A simple practice session might look like this :
Theory - 10 minutes (or more if your are working on a long tutorial)
warmup - 5 minutes
Exercises - 20 minutes (chords changes, scales exercises)
Break - 5 minutes
Fun stuff - 20 minutes (learning a song that includes the chords you've learned)

Practice should be used to reinforced what you've learned in the courses. Most of the things you'll learn needs to be played over and over again to become second nature. This is where most guitar player have trouble with and a lot of them quite because they don't give themselves the time to learn.

Practice sessions are extremely important and don't need to be 2-3 hours long. Most of us can't fit long practice sessions into our schedule anyway.

A good warm-up exercise would be Lisa's Spider exercise.

As for the exercises they can be made up of any of the exercises lessons you'll find in the courses. There's ton of them and it's a good opportunity to work on those giving you the most trouble. You could also take any exercises you feel comfortable with and work on speed and accuracy.

I hope this helps you out.

Thanks guys. That is the kind of "things" I was looking for. I am guilty of practicing too long at once I guess. I have playing until my fingers will not let me go on. Thats one of the reasons I was looking for a more structured practice schedule that nearly everyone uses. I am still having so much fun I haven't been frustrated yet...that being said I think the F major is impossible :eek:
Thanks again for all the quick help, I am really glad to be part of the community.

Originally Posted by: oldtimehobbiesI think the F major is impossible :eek:

Haha! I feel your pain. I use to think the same thing about the open F major chord, but I got it. If I got it, anyone can! lol.

Lol i've been playing the guitar for 4 years and i'm still struggling with the f minor chord

Are you serious? I haven't even been playing 1 year and I already got that down... you sure you've been practicing?

As one who has been playing for many years I fell into a rut.Then from subscribing to this web-site I began playing open chords,major,and minor scales,and most importantly,to keep the same tempo,and to play all chords and scales clean.No slurring notes.I breezed by the first chapter,and am half way through Chapter 2.Its not about speed though.As long as one can proficiently play a piece of music,then move on.Thats the rut I fell into.Playing the same thing over and over.I Try something new from the lessons.Hope that helps.On my days off from work,I can play all day.After all,music should move you,IMO.Some stuff is tedious,but I just plug through it.How long should one practice?I practice as frequently as I can.This web-site has re-taught me some important guitar lessons,and enriched my love for why I play guitar.