Warm-up/General Exercises

Hello, everyone.

I was wondering if you could recommend some warm-up exercises; and also some exercises that could improve playing in general, in terms of speed and dexterity, maybe.

Thank you for all your help. Have a good one. :)

I usually start with some spider fingers (twice on a set of frets that's "easy" then twice on the next set up). I also pluck the strings above and below the note I'm fretting to make sure that I'm only fretting one note. Use alternate picking.

Next I'll run through a few riffs to get my fingers moving in a pattern and tempo.

Run through a few chords (and alternate fingerings of chords) at a tempo that's comfortable.

Give my fingers a break by clapping or tapping to a metronome in whatever strum pattern I'm working on.

Stretch my fingers and practice strumming.

I'm working on trying to become a rhythm guitarist, if I was working to be a lead I'd probably practice riffs instead of strumming.

Hope that helps.

Originally Posted by: jasim.hd

Hello, everyone.

I was wondering if you could recommend some warm-up exercises; and also some exercises that could improve playing in general, in terms of speed and dexterity, maybe.

Thank you for all your help. Have a good one. :)

Hi,

the most important thing to pay attention to while doing your warm-up is to FULLY engage your mind!

Let me explain that to you:

Whenever you start to warm up you need to get your fingers warm and smooth to play more accurate and faster. That is the part most players understand.

But your Bain also needs to get engaged and here is why:

If you don't engage your brain during the warm up you will "loose" a lot of precious practise time (YES you will loose the time to improve as a player, because playing a scale mindless up and down has absolutely NO benefit for your guitar playing!)

So you will actually improve your guitar skills during the warm up and therefore make your guitar routine much more efficient when you start to engage your mind.

How should you do that?

It actually doesn't matter what you are playing as long as it is challanging for your BRAIN.

For example play a scale you know but play a sequence of thirds instead of simply play the scale up and down.

Once you are getting familiar with that adopt the idea to another scale or simply change the pattern. There are endlesspossibilitys to that.

You will also get more creative and it is a lot of fun - right away even in the warm up

Cheers,

Matthias

Originally Posted by: jasim.hd[br]I was wondering if you could recommend some warm-up exercises; and also some exercises that could improve playing in general, in terms of speed and dexterity, maybe.

I just discussed this topic in this thread! Give a read & see if it helps. If you still have more questions, then please ask!

https://www.guitartricks.com/forum/thread.php?f=8&t=46945&pg=1#latest

Thank you all for your insights, truely valuable. :)

Originally Posted by: jasim.hd

Thank you all for your insights, truely valuable. :)

You're very welcome!

Hope it works for you

I usually warm up by playing along to some tunes. Ccr, nirvana... something not to difficult

[br]I prepare myself mentally at first. It means that one hour (or so) before the whole practising I know that I will play and how long I will play (I usually set up exact practise time). In this time I begin to prepare myself, to concentrate and to think about what I will practise exactly.[br]When my practise session begins, I start with some simple scales. I play them slowly and put emphasis on getting my fingers used to the touch with the strings. Sometimes I do not play scales, I only play separate tones with all fingers separately for the same reason - to get my fingers used to the touch with the string. It may sounds ridiculous, but it really helps me and it may take max.4 minutes (one minute each finger). Then I focus on what I will practise in this specific session and I begin to play the most difficult parts from it slowly and repeatedly.[br]That´s my way to warm up.