You can tell when you're speeding up because you can simply play faster, but comfortably.
You know when you pick slow, it's really easy, you don't get tense and tight, and your face doesn't have to make crazy faces? It's like that when you get faster too.
If you have any of the above (except for maybe the crazy face, I just made that up
), you're probably playing too fast. However, when you are 'challenging' your speed, you may get a little tense for a bit while you are breaking your speed threshold.
Hope this makes sense and helps!
PS. As far as I have seen, there's no real 'pattern' for practicing speed picking, just find something that you like the sound of or that you want to learn and speed pick it away. The stuff in the lessons is great. The first thing I practiced for speed picking was from the first lesson and I think it was just the 12th fret repeatedly on the D string. Then it goes into a 14-12-12-12 pattern.
You are at GuitarMasterClass.net
Don't miss today's
free lick. Plus all our lessons are packed with
free content!