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Tuesday 13 May 2014

How to master licks and riffs on your guitar

Mastering licks or riffs on the guitar isn't straight forward. The most important thing to remember is that getting something to sound good takes time, practice and lots of patience.

I have found through my years of learning licks and riffs that starting slow is the best approach to learning. Start slow and get it RIGHT...and by this I mean no fret rattle, no dead notes or anything; be hard on yourself! Your brain can interpret information much easier when its fed slowly, so take your time at first and make sure you submit the correct information to your brain, not you playing the riff in a sloppy manner!

Once you have the riff nailed at a slow speed, slowly start building up the tempo ensuring you can play it perfectly before you move on to a faster speed. If you want to practice to a metronome, try this one online - http://www.metronomeonline.com/

Learning to play something at a pace you feel comfortable will come back to haunt you when you try and play with others. Practising at all tempos ensures the riff is transferred to muscle memory and means you can play it cleanly in any song.

Good luck and never give up. Even if you only nail a riff at a slow speed at least it means you can use it in slower songs. This is how I practice and its worked really well for me over the years.

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