On Those Bad Days..., Can't hit anything today. Options

[antareus]

Hi GMC,
A few questions, most of them relating to alternate picking. I'm doing Kris' alt-picking lesson and Pavel's alt-picking lesson following one of the guides in here that had the section entitled "Alternate picking for the casual player." That has been going OK, I can get up to 75bpm 16ths (started at 50bpm 2 weeks ago) most days. However, today, I find I can barely get through ten loops of the first bar w/o fudging up at 60bpm.

1. What should I do on these days? I went ahead and just did my normal routine, but at 60bpm.
2. How do I know the proper speed to be training at? On Pavel's, I'm using Guitar Pro, so I can adjust it to any speed I want, and I loop the first bar over and over. Currently, I allow myself to go up 5bpm if I do ten loops perfectly with no mistakes.
3. How much does typing all day affect wrist tension? I find that after a good day of work, most of my focus has been depleted, so I just stick to a shorter practice routine for right now until I can build up to something more.

Thanks,
Matt

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[David Wallimann]

Hi GMC,
A few questions, most of them relating to alternate picking. I'm doing Kris' alt-picking lesson and Pavel's alt-picking lesson following one of the guides in here that had the section entitled "Alternate picking for the casual player." That has been going OK, I can get up to 75bpm 16ths (started at 50bpm 2 weeks ago) most days. However, today, I find I can barely get through ten loops of the first bar w/o fudging up at 60bpm.

1. What should I do on these days? I went ahead and just did my normal routine, but at 60bpm.
2. How do I know the proper speed to be training at? On Pavel's, I'm using Guitar Pro, so I can adjust it to any speed I want, and I loop the first bar over and over. Currently, I allow myself to go up 5bpm if I do ten loops perfectly with no mistakes.
3. How much does typing all day affect wrist tension? I find that after a good day of work, most of my focus has been depleted, so I just stick to a shorter practice routine for right now until I can build up to something more.

Thanks,
Matt

Hi Matt!
What you describe is quite normal, at least that happens to me a lot.
Have you been playing every single day for the last week or so?
If so, sometimes you just need a break.

I think he proper speed for you is the one that feels comfortable. You want to aim for comfortable playing I think, the goal being to gradually increase the max tempo for comfort. I think that increasing 5bpm for every 5 times is good. I wouldn't go any higher than that though. And don't worry if your progress seems slow, once again you are aiming for comfort. :-)

Hope that helps a bit!

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[Pedja Simovic]

Matt sounds to me like you are taking right approach at this time.

Tempo dropping might happen if your hands get tired for one reason or another. If you are aiming to play things fast and do that all the time then you will need to spend quite a time with metronome and building up your chops. Once you reach desired tempo, all you will need to do is maintain it every day - and then new technique kicks in


I like how you are increasing tempo by 5bpm and doing 10 repetitions is awesome man.
If you make a mistake in one of those 10 times , you should start counting from beginning ! Thats what I tell my students always. Make sure you can play it at certain tempo at least 10 times without any mistake before moving on. This will enable you to move tempos faster and never come back to 50 bpm for example but rather start at 80, 100 etc (depends where you are at right now).


Keep up the good work and don't forget to take brakes between practicing , drink some water and get back to it again !


Hope this was useful

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[antareus]

Have you been playing every single day for the last week or so?

Yes, and it has been a very long week at work, too, so I am mentally exhausted still.

Matt sounds to me like you are taking right approach at this time.

Tempo dropping might happen if your hands get tired for one reason or another. If you are aiming to play things fast and do that all the time then you will need to spend quite a time with metronome and building up your chops. Once you reach desired tempo, all you will need to do is maintain it every day - and then new technique kicks in

It seemed like it was right because there was no shortcuts or anything involved.

I like how you are increasing tempo by 5bpm and doing 10 repetitions is awesome man.
If you make a mistake in one of those 10 times , you should start counting from beginning ! Thats what I tell my students always. Make sure you can play it at certain tempo at least 10 times without any mistake before moving on.

Yep, thats what I do. It is agonizing to get to 9 and then relax a little and miss something. I can start at 60bpm most days now, so I think this is right. I just want to keep working at it!

Keep up the good work and don't forget to take brakes between practicing , drink some water and get back to it again !

Too true. I always feel so good after I have about 32oz of water each afternoon.

The upside to all of this is I'm winning the mental battle: I go into a state of flow easier now when doing exercises and my self-criticism voice isn't really heard.

Thanks for the replies.

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[Vasilije Vukmiro...]

Been there, mate!
Just the part of the process of learning. It doesn't go smooth, like, it doesn't go gradually. You start at 50, then 60, then 70, then 55, then 65, then 80 then 65, then 80.....

There is an opposite phenomenon, you don't practice for days, then you pick up the guitar and bang! 80 bpm without effort. So basically, it's normal. It may be that you are straining your right hand, or pushing the fretboard too hard?

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[Pedja Simovic]

You welcome Matt

Please post some videos of your playing - that would be really cool

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