QUOTE (chast @ May 5 2008, 08:22 AM)
My weakness is playing guitar
But my main problem is probably my vibrato and that I can't pick fast :/
And I nearly have no idea about theory
But these are weaknesses that just need some work.
Chast,
I have the same weakness
The guitar is like crack to me, if i pick it up i can't put it down. I really have to focus on things i have to get done around the house and what not so i don't spend 5 hours lost in guitar land
As far as vibrato goes its really a preference as to what you do vibrato wise. There are so many vibrato techniques and variations on them i could write a college essay on them lol.
Me personally i have two vibrato styles that are pretty much my staples the first one is with my index finger i don't use a wrist vibrato i just shake the string with my finger back and forth i also almost always really pinch the string when i use this vibrato.
The other vibrato i use is shaking the guitar and sleightly moving my fingers back and forth. Because of the way i shake the guitar it makes my vibrato when i do this eliptic too, which adds another element to it.
As far as practicing vibrato first you need to decide on the technique your going to use for doing it. But once that is settled practice with either a metronome or a backing track...the backing track is more fun for obvious reasons. But try to time your vibrato in natural tempo's that compliment the BPM your using. You dont have to match perfectly but it makes it sound so much nicer when your close to a natural tempo. Alot of newer players i see tend to get very spastic when it comes to vibrato, and it shouldnt be spastic. Fast vibrato is not wrong nor is slow vibrato but it needs to have some kind of order to it. Unless for musical purposes your speciafically trying to sound chaotic.
Now when you say you can't pick fast are you saying that you can't AP fast...or just can't move the pick across the string quickly in general?
If its an AP problem there are several lessons here that can get you started in the right direction. If its picking in general i.e. just sounding the string. Start working on whats hanging you up. In the beginning i remember not having any consistency sounding the string with my picking. First off my hand motions were too big, and secondly my pick angle was all wrong for playing fast.
Don't get me wrong there is nothing wrong with picking the string with your pick parrallel with the string, if...and thats a big IF, you can get your pick touch light enough so you barely have to move to sound the string at speed. But for the most part precision of that kind is hard to come by without years and years of practice. Its far easier to angle your pick so its closer to 90 degrees to the string. This way when plucking the string with the pick the string will tend to "roll" over the string because the pick is curved on the end. The other way with the pick parallel to the string if your touch isnt super light it will "Hang" on the string making it very difficult to get a smooth picking stroke.
Music theory is just like learning math..or science, you have to study it to understand it. A good first step though in your road to theory mastery is to memorize the notes on the neck of the guitar, to know without thinking about it for example that if you fret a note on the low E string on the 7th fret that its B for example. If you learn the notes to the point you can just call them out in any order, it will make it much easier once you start to apply the theory skills you will learn as you go.
Daniel
QUOTE (TreyDeschamp @ May 5 2008, 08:25 AM)
Great Topic!
I think my weakness is trying to play but not get mad and frustrated when I dont get something quickly.
TreyDeschamp,
I know the frustration road you speak of all to well. There are even licks now that i have practiced for weeks and weeks that i just can't get my body to cooperate.
I find the best thing to do is when you learn a lick pattern to incorporate it into your own playing as quickly as you can. Lets say you learned a lick pattern thats meant to be played at 130BPM but you can't play it that fast. Find a backing track you can jam along with thats only like 100BPM and try using the lick in the context of that BT at that speed. I find i assimilate a certain pattern much faster if i do this rather then beating myself over the head with a metronome.
Daniel
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