A Stretching and String-Skipping Workout
I've had about a month of enforced lack of practice; this happens to all of us from time to time. As I often do I devised a little etude to get my hands warmed up and in synch again. I'll be practicing this for the next couple of weeks, and probably using it as a warmup after that, so I thought you might like to try it yourself.
The workout is a series of patterns that ascend and descend the neck, and it's atonal although all of the patterns can be used in the context of conventional scale-based playing. The focus is on wide stretches and string-skipping and it's quite an aerobic workout for your hands and fingers. Learn the patterns so you don't have to look at the tab, then work with a metronome to increase speed slowly. Because these shapes involve considerable stretches, please practice carefully and move your hands through the positions smoothly as you play, especially on the lower frets.
Well, here's my attempt to get through it from this morning. It sounds pretty ragged and you can definitely hear a few mistakes and some sloppiness in the timing that will hopefully get smoothed out with practice.
OK, let's go through the tab. Part 1 ascends in mirror-image way that I've spoken about before:
T---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |-----------7--4--------------------11--8--------------------------15--12---------------------- A--------5--------6--------------9---------10------------------13----------14------------------ |-----4--------------7--------8----------------11----------12------------------15-------------- B--2--------------------9--6-----------------------13--10--------------------------17---------- |----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Obviously with this you can continue the pattern up or reverse it to do downwards. When you first start learning this pattern it's probably best to play it up and down in rotation, but another fun thing is to come down in groups of three, with a wide stretch and a string skip, giving us Part 2 of the workout:
T---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |----------12----------10----------8---------6--------4--------2------------------------------- A-----------------------------------------------------------------5---------------------------- |------15----------13----------11---------9--------7--------5--------6------------------------ B--17----------15----------13---------11--------9--------7------------------------------------- |----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The last two notes give a nice link back to the ascending pattern. On the other hand, we could ascend with that mirror-image idea again, making Part 3:
T---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |--2--------------6--4--------------8--6---------------10--8-----------------12---------------- A-----5--------5--------7--------7--------9---------9---------11---------11-------------------- |--------6--2--------------8--4--------------10--6----------------12--8------------------------ B---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Finally Part 4 is a descending run based on the same pattern but with a tricky string-skip every other time around:
T---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |--12-------10------8------6------------------------------------------------------------------- A-----11-------8------7------5----------------------------------------------------------------- |----------------6-------------2--------------------------------------------------------------- B--------8--------------6---------------------------------------------------------------------- |----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This run ends on the note Part 1 started with, so we can now repeat the four parts as often as we like. I decided to give it a bit more variety, though, by repeating the four parts up a string, with a couple of devious variations.
Here's Part 1 the second time around -- notice I start on the 3rd fret to give a smooth transition from the end of Part 4:
T-----------8--5---------------------12--9--------------------------16--13--------------------- |--------7--------7--------------11---------11------------------15----------15----------------- A-----5--------------9--------9-----------------13----------13------------------17------------- |--3--------------------10-7------------------------12--9---------------------------18-------- B---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Patrt 2 on the repeat -- you can slide down to the 17th fret this time, which throws the rhythm into a different place and creates a bit more variety.
T---------12----------10----------8---------6--------4--------2-------------------------------- |---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A-----15----------13----------11---------9--------7--------5----------------------------------- |-17----------15----------13---------11--------9--------7-------------------------------------- B---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As before, the first note of Part 3 is the last note of Part 2 so run them together to get this:
T--------------6--4--------------8--6---------------10--8-----------------12------------------- |--5--------5--------7--------7--------9---------9---------11---------11----------------------- A-----6--2--------------8--4--------------10--6----------------12--8--------------------------- |---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- B---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Finally Part 4, which on the repeat has an even more tricky double-string-skip because I kept the low notes on the fifth string. This is a real challenge to play smoothly at speed:
T--12---------10--------8--------6------------------------------------------------------------- |------11---------8--------7--------5---------------------------------------------------------- A---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |--------------------6------------------------------------------------------------------------- B----------8------------------4--------2------------------------------------------------------- |----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
