These are a few finger excercises to get those hands warmed up. To explain the images that you see:
1. The horizontal lines resemble a standard staff in music notation but the six lines are actually your six strings.
2. The circled numbers, at least in these excercises, are your fret number as well as your finger number.
So if you see a circled 1 on the lowest line, then you are playing the first fret on the lowest string (6th) with your first finger. That note would be an F.
The first excerise is a pretty straight forward one using all four of your fingers in order across every string on the guitar. As with any finger excercise, once you get to your highest string (1st); repeat the pattern going back through the strings until you reach the lowest string (6th) again.
The second excercise is very similar except for we are going to do the pattern backwards from the fourth finger to the first finger. Remember when you get to the first string to go back through the strings until you reach the sixth string.
Nice job! Now you are getting the hang of it! The next excercise gets a little tricky. Instead of running in order with your fingers, we are going to switch it up a bit. In this excercise you start with your first finger but then finish with a four, three, two pattern. Similar to the previous pattern but with a twist. Give it a try!
Ok, now we are going to get a little funky, try this next excercise! In this pattern we are skipping fingers while still ascending from string to string. This one will get your brain working kind of like walking and chewing gum at the same time. We start with our first finger, then third, then back to second, then jump to the fourth finger.
Now for a fun one! This next pattern incorporates finger and string skipping. It starts with our first pattern then skips a string and continues with our second pattern. Next, got back to the string you skipped and continue the pattern. Remember to descend down the strings once you get to the first string. That will be an interesting turn around.
Congratulations! You have just completed your first lesson in finger excercises. These excercises will definately increase speed, dexterity, accuracy, and both left and right hand technique. A few things to consider when excercising:
1. Remember to alternate pick to increase speed. To alternate pick means to strike the string with a pick in your right hand with a down, up, down, up fashion. To make it even more interesting try starting with an up stroke and continue alternate picking like up, down, up, down. Try all downs or even all ups if you want to get fancy.
2. Give yourself about one minute per excercise with a metronome set on quarter notes at a comfortable speed and go for it. Over time you can increase the time and the speed of the metronome until you blazing fast and right in time with the click.
3. Remember to start slow and be accurate, really concentrate on technique and making sure every note it sounding out clean. If there is pain, STOP! You don't want to over do it and blow a finger or wrist muscle.
4. Get creative! Music is all about creativity! Try any pattern you can think of forwards and backwards all over the neck. Try writing down new patterns that you can go back and work on in the future.
Good luck and expect more fun finger excercises in the future!
