Narrowing Guitar Goals

STEP ONE
Make Useful Observations About Others’ Playing and put it in your journal.

Here’s an example of what I did when I thought of techniques or styles I wanted to incorporate into my playing.

In the last article I listed my guitar heroes and what I’d like to do that they can do. Now I’m going to be more specific and make useful observations about their playing. These are the things that I want of theirs.

Alex DeGrassi: He is able to use arpeggios in his playing like no other, every note leads to something that enhances the melody.
Phil Keaggy: Great riffs, his phrasing is articulate and original.
Nightnoise: Their combination of elements of music just speaks volumes. The emotion they can evoke in a melody is what I’m looking for here.
Pierre Bensusan: His knowledge of intervals and the relationship between notes he plays is astounding. So is his technical ability. His music sounds like a conversation between musical notes.
Tommy Emmanuel: Dynamics and attack!!
Doyle Dykes: Doyle Dykes can arrange songs like no other. His pieces and very defined movement and they resolve great.

STEP TWO
Alright, now that I know what I need to focus on, I need to write out my goals. And now that we know that the process is paramount, we need to focus on not only what we practice, but how we practice.
I’m going to write my weaknesses first though (in light of what I’ve already written) in order of importance. You use the worksheet on the next page for you if you want to do the same.

1) Elements of music
Because music is a relationship and the interaction of these things determines the quality of music you compose I really need to explore the elements of music. (NightNoise) I don’t have a good command of these, maybe my weakest. I’m including the structure of song with this.

2) The fretboard and intervals. Without knowledge of the fretboard, I have no freedom. I need to memorize the notes and gain muscle memory of their location. (Pierre Bensusan)

3) Dynamics. Right hand attacks. These I can probably consider as part of elements of music but we’ll see. (Emmanuel) My melodies tend to be static and monotonous so I need to study as many ways to make my music dynamic as possible.

4) Scales and phrasing. These are the building blocks of chords and progressions. I should really learn the theory behind scales as well. Can only help. (Keaggy) All of my solos sound like major scale exercises.
Blah!

5) I play way too many grace notes that don’t lend themselves to moving the music. They’re just there. Which I think is a common problem among fingerstylists. I want not to play notes just to make my music sound more complicated. I want them to direct the emotion and mood of the piece. Degrassi is the man at this.

STEP THREE
Write your goals out

Based on what I have so far, I’m going to write out specifically in my journal what I want to change in my practice to try to reach the point where I want to be. Many times you’ll hear that with goals you should make them measurable and concrete. Well, in a sense I’ll do that. But each person measures success in their own way. So I prefer to focus on changing my practice so that for one, the goals don’t seem so far away. Also because I’m focusing on the process, it makes it easier to adapt and redefine my goals based on any changes in my style.

1) When I practice I’ll dedicate one section to studying the elements of music, their relationship to one another, and the emotional effect of each of these relationships.

2) When I practice I’ll dedicate one section to studying intervals and the emotional response to them as well. I also will train my ear to identify the intervals forward and backward.

3) When I practice, at all times I will try to keep focus on relaxing (right hand in particular) and I’ll study right hand technique and it’s effect on the elements of music. (We’ll get into this in the technique section more)

4) When I practice, I’ll dedicate one section of study on practicing and creating different phrases for different scales tying them into my interval study and dynamics study.

5) I will create an entire piece with arpeggios strung together and use dynamics and elements to identify the melody. Now all I need to do is create my practice schedule. To be perfectly honest, though, I’ll use this as general guideline depending on what’s going on in my life. All of these lessons and schedules are provided to be aids in your pursuit. There’s no definitive guide. Hopefully, you can get something out of these.

On the next pages I’ll give you some sample schedules to use but here’s mine:

My schedule
Daily:

Warm up: 10 minutes
Elements study: 15 minutes or 20%
Interval and ear: 15 minutes or 20%
Right hand technique: 15 minutes or 20%
Scale studies: 15 minutes or 20%
Arpeggio / composition: 15 minutes or 20%
Unstructured play time: whatever time I have
Warm down: 5 minutes

Go back to "Establishing Goals"
Get the "Goals Worksheet" (pdf) or Go to "Practice Scheduling"

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Narrowing Guitar Goals