Home > 6 Smart Ways to Develop Your Guitar Playing Skills and Techniques

6 Smart Ways to Develop Your Guitar Playing Skills and Techniques

6 Smart Ways to Develop Your Guitar Playing Skills and Techniques

Are you looking for ways to improve your guitar playing? If so, this article is perfect for you! We’ll be covering 6 great tips that will help develop your skills and techniques. These are all simple strategies that anyone can apply right away. 

1. Memorize Your Favorite Songs

Memorizing songs is a great way to improve your guitar skills. It’s also fun and rewarding! By knowing what comes next, you’ll be able to jam the song with more spontaneity and feel. The good news is that memorizing songs isn’t as hard as it sounds. You can do it with less than 10 minutes of practice per day.

Once you gain the confidence to play songs on your own, you’ll never want to stop. Print out the lyrics for a song with chord changes that you know well. Take a few minutes every day to tap along with it on your guitar. This little bit of daily practice will pay off over time, and you’ll be playing songs like never before! 

2. Practice Your Metronome

A metronome is a device that marks time by making sounds at set intervals. If you’re having trouble keeping your rhythm steady, then a metronome is for you. According to the expert guitarists at https://www.dealdrop.com/guitar-center, if you have trouble keeping your tempo steady, then try doing the same thing with a slower tempo.

Set the tempo at around 120 bpm and jam along with it until it becomes natural to do so. Eventually, you’ll find that the metronome becomes a great practice tool, helping you keep your tempo steady. 

3. Learn Fingerpicking Techniques

Fingerpicking is a simple yet powerful way to add interest and texture to your rhythm guitar playing. It’s also a great way to learn more notes on the fretboard and develop your picking control. To learn to fingerpick, all you need is an acoustic guitar and some time.

You’ll start by learning how to play the rhythm of a simple song using your thumb and one finger, usually index or middle. Once you’ve got that down, add in another finger. With enough practice and patience, you’ll be playing chord melodies and even solos in no time. 

4. Record Yourself

Playing in front of a mirror has the effect of making us nervous and self-conscious when we hear ourselves play. But when you’re recording yourself, you can focus on your playing without worrying about how you look. Recording yourself is a fun way to learn new things.

It’s a great way to review your progress and give yourself an audio record of your playing. After you’ve recorded yourself, you can save it to your computer or play it back on the CD player. Then, you can listen to yourself objectively, with a critical ear that isn’t influenced by nerves. 

5. Play Along With Your Favorite Artists

Learning to play along with your favorite artists is a fun and rewarding way to improve your rhythm guitar playing. Whether you choose to learn a classic song or something modern, the benefits are many. When you play along with another artist, you’re learning how they phrase and approach the music.

You’ll also develop your timing and musical ear by having to sync your rhythm with another artist’s rhythm. While playing along, you’ll create a mental blueprint of the song that you can use for a reference point when you’re in front of your band. 

6. Slow Down Your Tempo

The next time you’re listening to a song on the radio, take a moment to appreciate the flow and feel of how the song is played. The most common speed for a lot of guitar songs, especially rock and pop tunes, is around 120 beats per minute (bpm). The challenge is that it’s easy to get locked into this tempo and play the song at the same speed every time you jam along. But the beauty of music is that it’s meant to be felt and played, not just heard. This is where slowing down your tempo comes into play. 

guitar skills 2

If you’re a working musician, then these concepts are much more important than just improving your technique. By using one of these methods the next time you play a gig, you’ll be able to impress your fans and create new opportunities for yourself. Keep in mind that the road to success is rarely a one-step process.

There are many little steps along the way, and you can take great satisfaction knowing that you’ve put in a lot of hard work. The more you practice, the better your guitar playing will become.

 

Leave a Comment