Wanna Play Guitar Solo?

Wanna Play Guitar Solo?

If you say yes, read on! Maybe you've learn about chords like C, D, E, F, you named it. And then you listen to some songs from Mr. Big or Metallica or your favorite bands. You can guess or play the chord progression from their songs. But when it comes to solo, you have no idea on how to play it. So, in this post I will explain some basic soloing. Hope it useful.

The first step to learn solo is to learn scales. What is Scale? Scale is basiclly playing a bunch of notes from low to high or high to low in a good sounding order. There's a lot of scales, such as Major Scales, Minor Scales, Pentatonic Scales, etc.

A Scale is constructed by lots of notes and each scales has it own root. Root is like a starting note. I'm gonna give you some example. Below is C Major scale :

r = root

C Major Scale 1st Position

   r
|------------------------------------------------|
|------------------------------------------------|
|------------2-4-5-------------------------------|
|------2-3-5-------------------------------------|
|--3-5-------------------------------------------|
|------------------------------------------------|

You see the example above start in C (5th String, 3rd fret). C Major scale construct by C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C. Try to find all these notes on your guitar and you'll get C Major scale on every position with C as the root.

So, if a song use C Major as the key, it means the solo construct by C Major scale.

So how do I find A Major Scale? What is Minor Scales?

There's a lot of great articles about scales on the internet. Here some :
Scales @ Cyberfret
Scales @ Ultimate-Guitar

Don't forget to read about Modes because modes is scale's best friends. Here you go :
Modes of the Major Scales
Understanding Modes And How To Apply Them

And here are scales library :
Gui Tools
Online Scales Library

Once you learn about basic soloing, you can learn guitar techniques and apply it to your solo. This is why guitar players like Steve Vai and Joe Satriani always have great solo on their songs.
I've made a post about guitar technique basics here.

Also, you can increase your finger speed & accuracy. This is what Paul Gilbert, John Petrucci, Al Di Meola or Yngwie Malmsteen do. You learn it here.

You can combine both tehniques and speed to your solo and develop your own style. But, the most important thing is that you have to use your heart when you play solo. Set the mood for each solo that you play. If the song is sad then you have to feel the sadness. This is what makes you the next great guitar player.

Wanna Play Guitar Solo?

Guitar Technique Basics

Guitar Technique Basics

Here are some basics of guitar technique that you should learn right away. All these technique are required before you move further to learn some advance technique. Once you mastering all these technique, you will have a good foundation to learn more advance and tricky technique. So, here we are :

Alternate Picking
Alternate picking is a guitar playing technique, used only by pick users, that employs strictly alternating downward and upward picking strokes in a continuous run, and is the most common method of plectrum playing.

Palm Mute
This is one of many basic techniques that will make you rocks. Often used by hard rock, heavy metal, and particularly thrash, speed and death metal guitarist.

Palm mutes are executed by placing the side of the picking hand below the little finger across all of the strings very close to the bridge and then plucking the strings with the fingers while the damping is in effect. This produces a muted sound. The name is a slight misnomer, as the muting is usually performed by the side or heel of the hand.

String Bending
This is one of the most basic and widely used techniques of the modern guitarist today. It is usually achieved by playing a string, then pushing the string up with the fingers to create a pitch change. Keep in mind that you should be pushing mainly your wrist upwards to achieve the pitch change, and that putting your unfretted fingers behind the finger used to bend can give you more strength in your bend, and therefore, more accuracy.

Click here for advanced String Bending Technique.

Finger Vibrato
Finger vibrato is vibrato produced on a guitar by cyclic hand movements. Despite the name, normally the entire hand moves, and sometimes the entire upper arm.

Hammer On & Pull Off
Hammer-ons and pull-offs (hopo) are also known as slurs. They help to create a smoother sound between notes. This is the most important guitar technique you must learn. This technique used by every guitarist that exist in the whole world.

Click here for more hopo lesson.

I guess all the techniques I mention above for sharpening your guitar skill. In the next post, I will cover more of guitar techniques. Don't miss it!

Guitar Technique Basics

Guitar Warm Up Exercise

Guitar Warm Up Exercise

You don't wanna get hurt when practicing guitar, do you? Have you ever notice that you're not able to play those fast or those fluid passages with the grace and skill you could play them with at the end of your last practice session. One of the reasons for this may be that you haven't warmed up yet.

It is a great idea to start a guitar practice session with Stretching and Fingering Exercise. This will help to avoid injury and allow you to increase your reach.

Warming Up #1
Relaxing your hands muscles by doing stretching. Click here to learn on stretching your hands before starting your practice session.

Warming Up #2
Warm up your finger. Here some left hand practice. There's also string skipping exercise there (for left & right hand practice). Here some more exercise for both your hands.

Just don't forget to warm up before practice!

Guitar Warm Up Exercise

Tuning Your Guitar

Tuning Your Guitar

Yesterday, I found a site about how to tuning your guitar. You don't want your guitar sound bad, do you? There's basic intruction on how to tune your guitar. They even have a mini tuner. Here's the Link : http://www.howtotuneaguitar.org

You will also find some guitar basic lesson. It might be useful. There's also chords & scales library on the site I mention above. It's a great site for beginner!

Oh, I almost forgot. I have to more lesson for you to visits. Still about guitar tuning.
Tuning Your Guitar by Ear
Basic to Advanced Tuning

Happy Tuning!

Guitar Lesson - The Basics

Guitar Lesson - The Basics

To become a guitar virtuoso, of course you'll need to know and learn the basic on how to playing guitar. Maybe you already know the basics of guitar playing or maybe you don't. Actually I don't want to write about topics that cover guitar basics lesson 'cause many people (including you), maybe, have learn this. But, not all guitaris have learn the basics of playing guitar correctly. It's really important for you to know the basics. So you have a strong foundation.

This lesson will cover almost the basic you need to know, such as pic holding, guitar holding, strumming, chord, picking, rhythm, scale, lead guitar, etc. I didn't wrote this lesson by myself. Wrote by someone with a nickname 'High Voltage'. And, I found this is a very good lesson and of course, it's free. So, here's the lesson:

First of all, you need know how to read tabs. Click here to learn on how to read guitar tabs.

The Basics Part I
In this first guitar lesson will learn about pic holding, guitar holding (positioning), strumming, picking basic chord, progression and basic picking progression.

The Basic Part II
This one covering chords

The Basic Part III
You'll learn about rhythm & lead guitar in this part.

The Basic Part IV
This lesson covering an extention of lead guitar and the major scale.

The Basic Part V
Extends the key of major scales!

The Basic Part VI
Teaching you how to write songs and create your own chord progressions.

Learn all the lesson step by step. Try to mastering one part before you move to next part. And wait for my other guitar lesson & information from me. Happy Learning!

Guitar Lesson - The Basics

Guitar Technique

Welcome to my Guitar Technique blog. Here you will learn about guitar technique and tips on how to mastering guitar technique. Also, you'll find some useful information here about guitar like guitar sound, amp & cabinet, tabs, games, etc.