Best exercises to improve accuracy and dexterity

[Marco01]

Any suggestions? Simply working on scales for warmups and practice gets a little boring, although necessary. I wonder if any others had suggestions on good workouts that really reap rewards? Thanks.

[Stackabones]

Warmup up with scales and then practice songs. The songs contextualize everything you work on and directly point to those things you still need to work on.

[bako]

Find repertoire that addresses different technical and expressive issues and play that instead.
You can also extract interesting passages from music and expand on an idea and develop patterns that are more connected to a musical context,
but if you find that patterns and scales are boring you then just stick to playing music. Improvising within preset technical/expressive parameters also works.

[ksjazzguitar]

Of course, I am a bit of an "anti-scalar" player. But it is good to practice them. I always say that the reason we practice scales is so that we can forget about them.

Sequences are a great way to make scales more challenging. Here I quote from myself on a different post:

Originally Posted by ksjazzguitar

I assuming you're tried sequences too? Playing through the scales with repeating patterns?

So the notes played for the "threes" below, in the C major scale would be: C D E, D E F, E F G, etc.

The most common are:

"threes" - 1 2 3, 2 3 4, 3 4 5, etc.
"fours" - 1 2 3 4, 2 3 4 5, 3 4 5 6, etc.
"thirds" - 1 3, 2 4, 3 5, etc.

But of course you can keep it going up to fives, sixes, sevens, eights and forths, fifths, sixths, sevenths, octaves.

Another nice thing to do is quasi-arps, like:

"quasi-triads" - 1 3 5, 2 4 6, 3 5 7, etc.
"quasi-7ths" - 1 3 5 7, 2 4 6 8, 3 5 7 8, etc.

Do them all up and down.

One last thing I like to do is take the "thirds" and "quasi-triads" and precede them with a chromatic approach from 1 fret below. Remember, it is a chromatic step below even when coming down the scale.

And lastly, mix up the rhythms. Start the sequence off the beat. Or do a 4 notes sequence as triplets, shifting the accent around. Do a 3 note sequence as 16th notes. Mix it up. ...

Hope that helps. It will keep you busy for a while and will make sure that you really know your way around your scales.

Peace,
Kevin

[lindydanny]

Good suggestions. I'd always heard of the sequences called "Coils". Same idea.

~DB

[ksjazzguitar]

Interesting, never heard that one.

Peace,
Kevin

[Aristotle]

You should develop scale pattern practice for every interval.

But to develop real "dexterity," I'd suggest something more like the Shearer excercises.

[Silence]

You could buy some etude books.

Classical pick style studies is one that I use. I have been thinking about getting Robert Conti's "Precision Technique" DVD, but I haven't really heard anyone say anything about it.

Greg fishman "Jazz Guitar Etudes" is great also.


. . . . . you still have to practice your scales though. For me, scales are the bottom line in my routine. I won't usually do exercises that are just for finger dexterity. Namely the 1234 exercises for each string. I don't have a problem learning new material consistently, so when I am doing something sort of mindless, I get kind of tired. I understand what those exercises can do, but within the context of a song I feel that I would be better off transcribing something difficult or playing scales over a 1 or 2 chord vamp while setting goals that deal with playing faster and smoother. Usually what I do to keep things interesting is I will change keys/patterns within a 4-5 fret region to keep refreshing each key so I know them cold.


For instance, I will take a sequencing idea (1234,2345,3456, etc . . . ), go through one major scale derived shape once starting with a down pick, and once starting with an up pick. After that, I will switch to another key in that area of the fretboard and apply the same exercise. After going through 3 or 4 keys, I will shift up to the next pattern that was from my first key and do it again.

Hope that helps.

[pierre richard]

add rhythmic variety to the scales....easy ones are 1 1/4 note and 6 1/8 notes..2 1/4 notes and 4 1/8 notes..and so on..

up and down the scale...2 1/4 notes and 1/16 notes to the octave and back...follow me?...

triplets...dotted 1/4 followed by an 1/8....dotted 1/8 followed by a 1/16...one 1/8 and 2 1/16...2 1/16 and one 1/8..etc...

other good stuff above here too....make the scales musical....play sttraight to get the fingering down..then alter the rhythm...it's all in the rhythm

time on the instrument...pierre

[ksjazzguitar]

Originally Posted by Silence

Classical pick style studies is one that I use.

Yeah, Leavitt has a nice book of classical things for pick. Bach's 2-part inventions are nice too - one of the books in the Barry Galbraith series comes with a nice book of these and a CD so you can play the duet with someone.

Peace,
Kevin

[Jolsin]

You should warm up with jazz licks. Buy Robert Contis Ticket To Improv Volume One . It comes with an instrustional dvd and you print the notes and tablature . Memorize the four songs and you can warm up with the licks.

Follow this link:

First Class Jazz Guitar Lessons

[markf]

good tips here.