Three Components of
Meaningful Practice

At some point, every legendary guitarist was a beginner. Similarly, every legendary guitarist struggled with the same things that many beginner and intermediate guitarists struggle with. It was not until they had spent hours practicing, playing, and exploring every aspect of the instrument that they could consider themselves worthy of the title.

Practice is what sets apart the good guitarists from the great guitarists, but what is considered great practice? Often guitar students struggle to find the time to practice their guitar, and when they do find time its typically less than thirty minutes or so. Without a plan, it is very easy to squander thirty minutes of practice time doing unnecessary noodling or other things that are not on the path of what they should be doing. Does this sound like you? If so, let’s discuss what makes practice meaningful practice and why it is important.

Have A Purpose
Meaningful practice is any practice that has a purpose. This is NOT running the same licks over a new backing track or playing the same songs over and over because nothing new is gained from that experience.

A great guitar teacher will know the proper path for your goals and will provide you with tools to help target and overcome your weaknesses. For instance, if you want to be better at legato, attempting to pick scales at two hundred beats per minute will not help you with that goal. You need to know the steps involved which include the right difficulty and speed of the exercises.

Stay Focused
When you’re practicing you need to remember to stay focused. Set a timer for five minutes, and have five straight minutes of practice, then relax for two minutes, than restart the timer and continue the meaningful practice. This keeps you from getting distracted while doing the exercise. To avoid boredom and keep yourself on track, provide small «wins» for yourself and allow yourself to noodle AFTER you’ve put in real practice time.

It is important to do meaningful practice because it rapidly expedites the speed at which you learn good guitar habits. Human beings have a knack for learning how to do things the wrong way. Some great guitarists have learned how to play extremely well with poor discipline, but they may have got there much quicker with proper practice habits and a teacher to help them do things in the right order. It is easy to practice the things which we are already good at, but that’s not really practice.

Do The Right Things, In The Right Order
A great guitarist pursues all angles of the instrument and the first step is pinpointing what techniques that you, as a guitar student, need to work on. Doing so is easier with a guitar teacher who can provide their own guidance to what you need to work on. Having this second pair of ears can help you recognize what actually sounds good to someone else. In the end, music is for others to hear.

Other useful techniques to discover your weaknesses are audio and video recordings. You never know what you sound like until you have heard a recording. Once you pinpoint the techniques you are weak in, it is easier to determine what needs practice.

Rather than noodling on the guitar every time you sit down to play, make goals and deadlines for when you want to achieve those goals. Taking part in meaningful practice will make you a better musician in no time flat!

Ken K is a professional guitarist and guitar teacher who lives in Denver, Colorado where he helps students enjoy learning to play the guitar. If you are looking for guitar lessons in Littleton, Highlands Ranch, Centennial, Lone Tree or other southwest suburbs of Denver, CO make sure to contact Ken.