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Posted by: jstcrsn Feb 2 2011, 07:49 PM

well ,I think I found my wall
i have been playing over 20 years been in numerous bands in which we have even won battle of the band contest in our smalltown of 400 thousand. I have played solos such as crazy train, rainbow in the dark and eruption live many times but there was one thing I could never do, alt.picking at shred speeds- or even fast speeds.In my mind shred starts at 120bpm 16 th tripltes and fast would start at 100
So now as my forth anniversery focused on alt.picking approaches and my third here at GMC.here is where i am
Ihave changed the way i hold the pick several times - each time requiering a huge slow down to try to retrain my brain and muscles and now I am pretty much holding the pick the same way i used to with the exeption my angle used to be reversed and now my pick is parralel to the strings
as I was trying to figure out what the $#@! to do to incease my speed- and here is what i am doing now and am challenging others here at this site that are working at this as well
one step at time
my starting point was slow enough that there was nothing i could not play in perfect time with the nome-and I mean nothing- scales, arppegios or varios sequences of them , 2 and/ or 3 notes per string and even a few string skipping arps. well, i mean perfectly without string noise or the like
and my thought was that certainly , my brain would let me increase 1 beat per day- well
it would not and it seemed that one day was not enough time to train my brain- that sounds like a good song name- train my brain
anywho, so as I pondered how man days my brain would need . I am now staying on a schedule of every 3 days increasing .
I thought that 1 beat every 3 days would take longer then I thought ,as I was attepting to reach 100 steps in 100 dayS
so I ended up with a 3 beat increase every 3 days
and let me just say that I think that I am finally finding my problem
and am once again enjoying practicing even though I am playing at speeds well below capabilities ,I am seeing where many of my problems
are and how problems in one area can affect a completly different area

So there you are-I encourage you
slow down to apoint where you can play everything at that speed -it will be hard becase you will sometimes start playing fast the things you can, but when you notice - just bring it down- bring it down,( can you hear my southern draw)
but you will also start developing more patterns to play because you will some times get bored,but everytime you write a new pattern you will have another trickup your sleeve
and be diligent - everyday - and increase 3 beats everyday and if you have been struggling like me for years ,I think you wil be impressed

well I'll go for now , just had a day off from work because it is 5 degrees out with an overnight low of -6 ( yes that is farenheit)
and hopefully in 100 days I will have finally conquered my giant

Posted by: dark dude Feb 2 2011, 08:07 PM

Yep, sadly most people don't realise that the advice of "just take it slowly and build up" is the fastest way of improving your technique.

However, you need an even balance. It's very easy to burn out on only doing exercises to a metronome for several hours a day. Never forget why you are building your technique, it's all for the music.

Posted by: MonkeyDAthos Feb 2 2011, 09:20 PM

QUOTE (dark dude @ Feb 2 2011, 07:07 PM)

Posted by: Daniel Realpe Feb 2 2011, 11:35 PM

Something really important when practicing is being able to ADAPT your hands and fingers to new limitations that may occur.

I mean, your technique is likely to NOT CHANGE unless you put the extra effort of being able to CHANGE the way you move your hands.

I'm trying this new flamenco style picking and at first it was impossible for me but as I approached this new technique with full awareness and willing to STOP doing my normal picking, suddenly I start making room for the new technique slowly. And I haven't lost my previous technique. I can always switch easily.

Posted by: Todd Simpson Feb 3 2011, 03:32 AM

I try to stress this constantly to every student I teach. You are 100 percent right. Start slowly and play slowly, hopefully with a metronome to confirm your consistency. Eventually you won't need the metronome. I can actually hear one in my head every time I play. It becomes part of you. Until then, use the metronome and "PLAY IT PERFECT BEFORE YOU PLAY IT FASTER".

I'm very glad to see you coming to this conclusion yourself as that's critical. I and every instructor on earth could should it from every tree in the land and it won't really help until it becomes a truth for you as a player.

Congrats. You've take a big step believe it or not, toward your goal.

Todd

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Feb 10 2011, 11:50 AM

All the ultra fast stuff you want to practice is being done, quite the opposite, on ultra low tempos. The goal is to stay on those tempos for some time until you acquire precision needed for going up.

In addition to that, usually players don't realize that it's a specific mental state of mind that enables you to practice so slowly. I like to experience it as a sort of meditation or relaxing, and this way I could go on for hours without stop. Some people just aren't capable of practicing slowly for long periods of time, they don't have patience for this.