Other Techniques¶
These are techniques that may still require documentation. At this moment, I’m not sure they’re really useful or if more detail is necessary.
Repeated Note Groups¶
Essentially, Chaining on steroids: take a passage, and briefly work on the two-note chains starting at every single note. Then do three-note chains, then four, and so on, until you’ve thoroughly explored every twist and turn. You should complete a given passage in a single practice session (i.e., you can go longer than 20 minutes), and so you shouldn’t pick a passage with too many notes.
Brief example: given the following G minor arpeggio:
Work on every two notes, repeating each one a few times until they feel good at tempo:
Then make 3-note groups, again repeating each a few times:
Then 4:
etc.
This requires a lot of patience to work through, but this dogged working through of any tricky sections might give some insight.
Tone and articulation variations¶
Varying the tone and articulation can exercise your playing muscles in interesting ways. For example:
Staccato picking: When picking a string, immediately after the pick has gone through the string to the other side, lightly place the side of your pick against the string. The note will be short and staccato. The great Rick Graham calls this “planting technique” and demonstrates it here. As Rick discusses, this promotes an economy of movement. I believe that it’s also effective because it works on the regulating the amount of force you’re using for the downstroke (see Excitation and inhibition).
Altering pick angle: changing the angle of the pick changes its tone. If you can’t easily alter the angle of your pick, it may be a sign of tension. Try it out, see how it works.
Volume variation is already covered in
Dynamics.Fretting hand articulations and dynamics are challenging. Try altering the volume of your slurs (hammer-ons and pull-offs), or make them staccato.