what should i be practising?

ok, i hear you guys talk about practising 6 hours a day, well what do you practice? and what should i practice? should i be doing scales? learning challinging songs? whats the best way?

any input would be GREATLY appreacated

thanks everyone :)

In MY OPINION any one who practices 6 hours a day is eventually gonna suffer some serious burnout. I can't stay on my guitar for more than 1-2 hours a day. This is my little routine when I do pick up my guitar. First I warm up with my scales(metronome). I try to stick with scales I'm trying to learn as opposed to scales I learned years ago. After that I usually play Hotel California (chords only) To get my switching going. Then I usually play mindless stuff to try to stumble onto a cool riff. Songwritings my thing so....
I haven't really tried learning new songs in awhile. It just doesn't appeal to me like it did when I was your age. These days I just try to put together my own stuff. The songs I really thought helped me when I was starting out were Nothing Else Matters to which I owe much of my fingerpicking technique, a few by the Chilipeppers which helped my understanding of melody, Crazy train just because, and Tears in Heaven. Work it out and find what best suits you. Everyone learns different and what works for one won't work for another.

I agree with all that! To add on to that... I would say that you kind of have to choose what path you want to take. For example, if you want to play more of the lead type stuff and you're into a lot of metal... you're probably going to want to work on a lot of scale work and get your fingers use to playing fast and other techniques like pinch harmonics, tapping, and sweeping... If you're more into acoustic stuff or more into chunky rythyms and riffs... you may want to work on chords and alternate tuning type stuff... and your strumming techniques like palm muting, spider riffing, and translating chord shapes... stuff like that. It depends on what your influences are really... You have to ask your self what kind of guitarist do you want to be? Then go out and practice everything that goes along with that style. Then you can move onto other styles. I, myself, have been doing a bunch of styles at once because my taste in music is so vast... So just practice whatever keeps you interested and will help you be the guitarist that you want to be.

Originally Posted by: magicninjaIn MY OPINION any one who practices 6 hours a day is eventually gonna suffer some serious burnout. I can't stay on my guitar for more than 1-2 hours a day. This is my little routine when I do pick up my guitar. First I warm up with my scales(metronome). I try to stick with scales I'm trying to learn as opposed to scales I learned years ago. After that I usually play Hotel California (chords only) To get my switching going. Then I usually play mindless stuff to try to stumble onto a cool riff. Songwritings my thing so....
I haven't really tried learning new songs in awhile. It just doesn't appeal to me like it did when I was your age. These days I just try to put together my own stuff. The songs I really thought helped me when I was starting out were Nothing Else Matters to which I owe much of my fingerpicking technique, a few by the Chilipeppers which helped my understanding of melody, Crazy train just because, and Tears in Heaven. Work it out and find what best suits you. Everyone learns different and what works for one won't work for another.

thanks alot for your reply. I usually practise for a hour a day, usually 30 min at a time. I can already play nothing else matters and crazy train, but i have been working on voo-doo child, beacuse I thought it would be chalining.. but its really not, i think nothing else matters is harder

Originally Posted by: aschlemanI agree with all that! To add on to that... I would say that you kind of have to choose what path you want to take. For example, if you want to play more of the lead type stuff and you're into a lot of metal... you're probably going to want to work on a lot of scale work and get your fingers use to playing fast and other techniques like pinch harmonics, tapping, and sweeping... If you're more into acoustic stuff or more into chunky rythyms and riffs... you may want to work on chords and alternate tuning type stuff... and your strumming techniques like palm muting, spider riffing, and translating chord shapes... stuff like that. It depends on what your influences are really... You have to ask your self what kind of guitarist do you want to be? Then go out and practice everything that goes along with that style. Then you can move onto other styles. I, myself, have been doing a bunch of styles at once because my taste in music is so vast... So just practice whatever keeps you interested and will help you be the guitarist that you want to be.

Thanks alot :) Im into rock, metal, blues and some acoustic stuff.

what scales/ songs should i be practising? everyone sayd learn pentatonics first, but hell, there are 5 possisions for each scale!! and thats just basic stuff. and do you have any good links to a site that has all the differnt scales?

thanks agin guys :)

if you're into rock and metal can i recommend you try some early metallica, any maiden, some beatles and some classic rock riffs. metallica's early stuff uses a lot of good, well structured riffs that'll teach you a hell of a lot, as with maiden (though maiden use some good, worth learning lead guitar and chord patterns), beatles songs have a lot of good chords to learn and the rock riffs are just cool :D

i used to practice for 10 hours a day. dont think it did anything for me good or bad. when i got older it was 3 hours, now its probably less than 1 due to work and kids. i really dont have time for that now but i tell my students to go for atleast 30 mins a day, pushing it further if you desperately want to learn something.

You can go a long way with just knowing the major and pentatonic scales. The blues scales are basically pentatonic with two extra notes... so they're not that different. The biggest thing is not getting caught up in other peoples music because you'll end up not having any chops of your own. Try to get some exercises off this site or out of Guitar World magazine that work toward building your own chops. This way you can learn to improvise early on. Jamming is the best part of being able to play. Definitely look into some old Metallica stuff. "Fade to Black" is a great song to learn because it incorporates chording with some good riffs and some nice lead work as well. If you want to get challenged in the Blues arena take on some Stevie Ray Vaughan... he'll teach you a lot about chording all over the fret board as well as how to fly around the pentatonic scales and bend notes like its your job... for good tabs go to www.ultimate-guitar.com they have a great selection as well as some scales and such. Search for "online scale database" or something of the sort on a search engine and you should be able to find a site with scales. If you want to really get into scales check out the Guitar Grimoire books. They're massive scale books with more scales than you can imagine. Good Luck

thanks alot for the replys guys :)

I have all the pentatonic "boxes" shown on a 22-fret guitar neck, for all keys, in an Excel spreadsheets. It is an excellent tool when pracaticing.

If you would like me to email them to you, let me know.
Email me at [email]djlogan33@cs.com[/email]

e-mail sent

thanks dennis :)

1. Technique.

2. Repertoire (Covers).

3. Composition.

4. Improvisation.

5. Ear Training.

6. Theory.

7. Music Reading. :cool: