scales

[gnr10101]

Hello.

I've been practicing my scales everyday now the past 2 weeks and i'm startin to get bored.

Someone please reassure me that practicing my scales everyday may be boring but will help my fingers to get to that point someday where i am lightning fast. I just need a little advice on how to deal with practicing the tedious things of guitar playing.

[zbalz]

dont worry. I felt the exact same way. Only I was dissecting only the C major scale...for close to a month. I was playing all different patterns and just ripping it apart. I also had the questioning if it would pay off. Soon enough, after moving on to generally a scale a day, I began to realize that I was more aware of song keys (not too aware because I am still bad). It also made just general improvization much easier.

However, if you are doing it to build up chops. It is still highly recommended to learn scales but you should also get a book of dexterity exercises, I recommend "Guitar Fitness" by Josquin Des Pres. (I know, its been mentioned a million times) It gives you several boring exercises to get your fingers movin...but trust me.. all the scale and dexterity exercises PAY OFF.

-zbalz

[StoneDragon]

If you want to fly around the fingerboard, then your fingers have got to know where to go instinctively. The only way to get to that point is to practice until the pathways become embedded in your nervous system and your muscles are developed to the point where they can respond without hesitation to those nerve impulses.

Figure out ways to make the tedious things fun. For me, this often means making it a game or a challenge.

When I was trying to learn my scales... and keep in mind, that you don't "know" a scale until you can use it... I would see how many times I could play the scale ascending and descending without stopping and without hitting a wrong note. If I could do it 5 times up and back perfectly, the next time I had to do it faster. (I always practiced scales with a metronome.)

Another game I used to play was what I called "connect the patterns". This consisted of shifting between patterns either up or down the fingerboard.... always in time with the metronome and no mistakes allowed.

There's lots of things to work on and lots of ways to mix it up so that it is not the same old thing. But quite honestly... if you've been at it for only two weeks, you haven't earned the right to be bored with it. It's going to take a lot more investment than that if you want to be good... even more if you want to be great. You've got to need it... so much that you don't have time to be bored because there isn't enough time in the day to perfect everything that needs perfecting.

Andre Segovia, the father of classical guitar, once summed this up when he said, "While I'm busy sleeping, others are busy practicing."

[gnr10101]

thanx a lot for the motivation guys. I will continue and become great someday