GUITARHABITS

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How Musicians Can Really Benefit From Meditation

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Photo by Sebastien Wiertz
Meditation has proven it’s usefulness among a lot of great guitar players and songwriters like John McLaughlin, Steve Vai, John Frusciante, Paul McCartney, Sheryl Crow and many others.

Once you’ve experienced the benefits you are more than willing to sit down on the floor for a couple of minutes a day.

Meditation can improve the quality of your life and musicianship in a tremendous way.

But yes I know, the hardest part is to get started everyday. It seems there are always more important things to do than sitting down with your eyes closed doing nothing. Well nothing could be more further from the truth.

Meditation will give you the inspiration and answers you need for all your tasks, projects and hard questions. But it will also make you twice as efficient and effective rather than being just productive. By stepping back your mind will see things a lot more clearly and the good stuff shows up.

I use meditation to find inspiration for writing songs, blog posts, teaching guitar students, life solutions, creating new ideas, happiness and balance, peace of mind, overcoming guitar obstacles and difficulties, finding focus for guitar practice and in the past I’ve used it for stage anxiety and finding answers to what I really want in life.

There are a lot of different ways to practice meditation and there is no wrong or right or just one way to do it. Most of them boil down to the same thing when you focus on the essence and leave out any religious rituals or other traditions.

I use three approaches at different times throughout the day or week:

# BREATHING MEDITATION
# MANTRA MEDITATION
# INSPIRATION MEDITATION
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Playing 2 String Triad Arpeggios All Over The Neck

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When I started learning to solo and improvise I began with the pentatonic / blues scale.

Somewhere along the way I got into arpeggios, intervals, patterns, improvising and making melody with the major scale. I accumulated all these ideas over time and incorporated it into my playing.

Learning all of these things takes time and effort, but the important thing is to have fun and experiment.

Bit by bit you will connect the dots and bring everything together and you’ll get a better overview of how guitar playing really works.

Learning to make melodies and creating ideas from the major scale, blues scale, modes, triads, intervals, patterns, arpeggios, etc, makes improvising and soloing exciting and more interesting to listen to. Expanding your vocabulary will expand your possibilities to make even more beautiful music.

TRIAD ARPEGGIO
A triad arpeggio is a three note chord where the notes are played one after another. There are four basic triads: Major (1-3-5) , Minor (1-b3-5), Augmented (1-3-#5) and Diminished (1-b3-b5).

In the examples below the triads are played within the key of G. (diatonic triads) There are 7 triads that can be derived from the major scale. One triad built on each scale degree. For the G major scale those are: G Am Bm C D Em F#dim

Take your time and practice these triad arpeggios all the way up the neck and back down again.

Have fun!
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How to Make Faster Progress On The Guitar

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Photo by mikelao26
I’m always in for finding new ways to make faster progress in different areas on the guitar.

Not so much because I’m in a hurry, but just for the fun of experimenting and see if practicing can be done more efficiently.

If you practice it’s nice to make progress instead of running into the same wall over and over again.

If you are really conscious of your guitar playing you get there much faster than spending a zillion hours of practice without real observation.

Some guitar players feel they get stuck at a certain level, that’s because there is a point where you need to observe and change what you’re doing. That’s when the magic happens.

Let’s take a closer look at the keys to make faster progress:
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10 Free Guitar Players Productivity Apps For iPad

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Photo by Siddartha Thota

I have to admit the iPad has made my life as a guitar player and guitar teacher a lot easier.

Having all the tools I need at hand from metronomes, tuners, jam tracks to music sheets, mp3s, videos, recording applications and writing tools. And the best thing about apps is that they are fast, efficient and effective.

The productivity apps are getting better and better and they are so useful for so many people including musicians. More and more I begin to wonder if there is anything that you can’t do with an ipad? :)

There are tons of great apps for a small price, but sometimes the best things in life are for free.

Enjoy!

1 – PA TUNER LITE
Plusadd Tuner Lite is a chromatic instrument tuner and pitch pipe that allows you to quickly and accurately tune your instrument using the built-in mic in your iPad or iPhone.
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