John's Guitar Blog

Here’s a scenario familiar to just about every guitarist: You’re at a party or hanging out with some friends. There’s a guitar lying around and someone asks you to play a song. The only problem is, you haven’t played since yesterday, your muscles are tight, and your fingers are ice cold. Even though you’ve been practicing that virtuosic piece with the epic guitar solo for weeks you know you could never pull it off cold so you opt for a good ‘ol sing-along with easy open-string chords to strum.

Killer Warmup to the Rescue

This warmup exercise is just the key. Almost every note is two strings away from the last and a five fret stretch is required at one point, so it really stretches out your fingers and loosens the fretting finger muscles. Picking can be challenging here since every note must be picked and again, almost each one is at least two strings away from the last.

It sounds like this:

Slow

Fast

I’ve found that running through this warmup once or twice before playing really helps my accuracy and comfort level. And, while it’s no Bach, it follows a standard I/IV/V chord progression that’s interesting to listen to and watch.

If you’re a beginner and find this kind of picking to be difficult, use your metronome and slow it waaaaaay down— say, 1/4th notes at 80bpm or so. Be sure to alternate your picking for each note. Try to practice a few times a week and make your way up the metronome. Once you can play 1/16th notes at 96bpm, you’ve arrived!

Here’s the written music (click for full size):