5 Ways To Massively Improve Your Rhythm Guitar Playing
In order to become a great rhythm guitar player, you must learn how to play rhythm guitar riffs in a creative way. If you are like the majority of guitar players, you learn rhythm guitar by simply listening to your favorite bands and trying to emulate their playing style. While this may provide you with a few cool licks to play here and there; it will NOT help you to play great rhythm guitar riffs of your own. To help you make your own guitar riffs, I will be using the rest of this article to show you various innovative rhythm guitar practice methods.
Starting off, you will likely need to think about rhythm guitar playing in a totally different way than the way you are used to. In order to make cool riffs for rhythm guitar, you need to think less about the specific notes you are using and more about HOW you play the notes you use. The truth is that you can make any basic guitar chord sound great without adding in many new notes. In fact, you can probably already start writing good rhythm guitar ideas with just a fundamental understanding of power chords and open chords. However, in order to truly master the ability to play great rhythm guitar riffs, you will need to learn new guitar skills that you probably haven't thought of before.
You probably already know that to truly master rhythm guitar playing, you must work on improving a variety of different skills and you may even know what some of those skills are. However, if you are still having a hard time writing rhythm guitar riffs that you are happy with, most likely your approach to practicing this area of guitar playing could use additional help (even if you aren't aware specifically of "what" skills need to be improved). If you would like to understand exactly what needs to be done in order to improve all areas in your guitar playing, I recommend that you seek out a great guitar teacher who has already helped many other guitarists make significant progress toward their musical goals. In the meantime, there are 5 essential ideas that you can use to make great rhythm guitar riffs regardless of your current skill level. Once you have become comfortable with using these ideas in your rhythm guitar playing, you will be able to make creative guitar riffs any time you pick up the guitar:
1. Practice to improve your vibrato technique and pinch harmonics on guitar. By incorporating these ideas into your guitar riffs, you will be able to play powerful and intense guitar riffs. Using vibrato technique gives your guitar playing a voice-like quality. Once this is combined with pinch harmonics, your guitar riffs will let out a powerful scream that will be sure to catch the attention of anyone listening. For an extra cool effect, use these techniques at the end of your riffs to really finish strong.
2. Think of new ways to combine chords together. This will help you to come up with interesting groups of chords to put into your guitar riffs. If you already understand ‘key signatures' in music, this will be much easier. If you don't understand this music theory concept yet, you can still come up with cool ideas by playing the notes of major and minor triads together with power chords. For example, if you are playing an E power chord, you can add in the notes from E major or E minor to drastically change the feel of the music. This can be done with any power chord guitar riff. After you have tried this with a single chord, try putting together your own chord progressions. This will give you tons of creative ideas to use in your guitar riffs.
3. Focus specifically on the rhythms of the notes you are playing. Just like with guitar soloing, many guitar players tend to use way too many unnecessary notes. That said, in order to make awesome rhythm guitar riffs, you only really need a few notes at most. Although it is fun to learn new ideas to use in your rhythm guitar playing, keep in mind that your number one focus is to play something with an interesting ‘rhythm'!
By building guitar riffs with only one or two notes (or chords) you will naturally focus more on the rhythm of the notes you are playing. Here is a good exercise for this: Start by writing down 32 eighth notes on a sheet of paper. Next randomly erase 8 of these notes. Once you have done this, replace the notes you have erased with rests. Now, play the resulting rhythm with the notes that are left on guitar using only single notes or power chords.
This exercise will give you many rhythms that you can use to create cool guitar riffs. Additionally, you can make things more interesting by using various time signatures or alternate note durations.
4. Use a single rhythm to create many new guitar riffs. Take an interesting rhythmic pattern and use it with 5-15 different groups of chords or notes. This will greatly expand your capacity to play creative rhythm guitar. Additionally, you can use this idea from the opposite perspective: Use a single chord or note to play 5-15 different rhythmic patterns. This will give you a lot of material to use when coming up with new guitar riffs.
5. Focus on playing rhythm guitar as cleanly and ‘in time' as possible. If you cannot do this well, your rhythm guitar playing will sound mediocre at best. Most guitar players understand that being able to play in time means to play consistently to a beat, but few of these guitar players can determine when rhythm guitar parts are TRULY in time. If you can't play tight to a metronome or drum beat, your rhythm guitar playing will not sound good regardless of the notes you play.
An easy way to test your rhythm guitar timing is to record yourself playing quarter note rhythms using a single note. To keep the beat, use a metronome that is playing quarter notes. If you are playing the rhythm with perfect timing, you will start to notice how the click of the beat seems to blend together with the notes of your guitar, creating the illusion that the click has been turned off. However, if your timing is a little off, the click of the metronome will sound like it happens slightly before or slightly after the notes you are playing.
Aside from having great timing when playing guitar to a beat, it is important to improve other areas in rhythm guitar playing such as palm muting control and pick attack articulation. Having the ability to play well in these areas will not only help improve your overall rhythm guitar skills, but it will save you A LOT of cash in the studio if you ever record an album. Learn how to master these aspects of rhythm guitar by checking out this free guide for recording guitar in the studio.
It will certainly take time to become a highly creative rhythm guitar player. However, after reading the points in this article, you can see that there are many things you can do right now to start making progress in your guitar playing. As soon as you learn how to make great guitar riffs you will start to enjoy the creative musical process each time you play. Not only will better rhythm guitar playing help you personally as a musician, it will prove to be a very valuable skill when performing with a band on stage or recording music in the studio.
To learn more about becoming a really TIGHT rhythm guitar player, read this free guide for recording guitar in the studio.
Get professional advice to help you improve your guitar playing on this page with guitar playing help.
Starting off, you will likely need to think about rhythm guitar playing in a totally different way than the way you are used to. In order to make cool riffs for rhythm guitar, you need to think less about the specific notes you are using and more about HOW you play the notes you use. The truth is that you can make any basic guitar chord sound great without adding in many new notes. In fact, you can probably already start writing good rhythm guitar ideas with just a fundamental understanding of power chords and open chords. However, in order to truly master the ability to play great rhythm guitar riffs, you will need to learn new guitar skills that you probably haven't thought of before.
You probably already know that to truly master rhythm guitar playing, you must work on improving a variety of different skills and you may even know what some of those skills are. However, if you are still having a hard time writing rhythm guitar riffs that you are happy with, most likely your approach to practicing this area of guitar playing could use additional help (even if you aren't aware specifically of "what" skills need to be improved). If you would like to understand exactly what needs to be done in order to improve all areas in your guitar playing, I recommend that you seek out a great guitar teacher who has already helped many other guitarists make significant progress toward their musical goals. In the meantime, there are 5 essential ideas that you can use to make great rhythm guitar riffs regardless of your current skill level. Once you have become comfortable with using these ideas in your rhythm guitar playing, you will be able to make creative guitar riffs any time you pick up the guitar:
1. Practice to improve your vibrato technique and pinch harmonics on guitar. By incorporating these ideas into your guitar riffs, you will be able to play powerful and intense guitar riffs. Using vibrato technique gives your guitar playing a voice-like quality. Once this is combined with pinch harmonics, your guitar riffs will let out a powerful scream that will be sure to catch the attention of anyone listening. For an extra cool effect, use these techniques at the end of your riffs to really finish strong.
2. Think of new ways to combine chords together. This will help you to come up with interesting groups of chords to put into your guitar riffs. If you already understand ‘key signatures' in music, this will be much easier. If you don't understand this music theory concept yet, you can still come up with cool ideas by playing the notes of major and minor triads together with power chords. For example, if you are playing an E power chord, you can add in the notes from E major or E minor to drastically change the feel of the music. This can be done with any power chord guitar riff. After you have tried this with a single chord, try putting together your own chord progressions. This will give you tons of creative ideas to use in your guitar riffs.
3. Focus specifically on the rhythms of the notes you are playing. Just like with guitar soloing, many guitar players tend to use way too many unnecessary notes. That said, in order to make awesome rhythm guitar riffs, you only really need a few notes at most. Although it is fun to learn new ideas to use in your rhythm guitar playing, keep in mind that your number one focus is to play something with an interesting ‘rhythm'!
By building guitar riffs with only one or two notes (or chords) you will naturally focus more on the rhythm of the notes you are playing. Here is a good exercise for this: Start by writing down 32 eighth notes on a sheet of paper. Next randomly erase 8 of these notes. Once you have done this, replace the notes you have erased with rests. Now, play the resulting rhythm with the notes that are left on guitar using only single notes or power chords.
This exercise will give you many rhythms that you can use to create cool guitar riffs. Additionally, you can make things more interesting by using various time signatures or alternate note durations.
4. Use a single rhythm to create many new guitar riffs. Take an interesting rhythmic pattern and use it with 5-15 different groups of chords or notes. This will greatly expand your capacity to play creative rhythm guitar. Additionally, you can use this idea from the opposite perspective: Use a single chord or note to play 5-15 different rhythmic patterns. This will give you a lot of material to use when coming up with new guitar riffs.
5. Focus on playing rhythm guitar as cleanly and ‘in time' as possible. If you cannot do this well, your rhythm guitar playing will sound mediocre at best. Most guitar players understand that being able to play in time means to play consistently to a beat, but few of these guitar players can determine when rhythm guitar parts are TRULY in time. If you can't play tight to a metronome or drum beat, your rhythm guitar playing will not sound good regardless of the notes you play.
An easy way to test your rhythm guitar timing is to record yourself playing quarter note rhythms using a single note. To keep the beat, use a metronome that is playing quarter notes. If you are playing the rhythm with perfect timing, you will start to notice how the click of the beat seems to blend together with the notes of your guitar, creating the illusion that the click has been turned off. However, if your timing is a little off, the click of the metronome will sound like it happens slightly before or slightly after the notes you are playing.
Aside from having great timing when playing guitar to a beat, it is important to improve other areas in rhythm guitar playing such as palm muting control and pick attack articulation. Having the ability to play well in these areas will not only help improve your overall rhythm guitar skills, but it will save you A LOT of cash in the studio if you ever record an album. Learn how to master these aspects of rhythm guitar by checking out this free guide for recording guitar in the studio.
It will certainly take time to become a highly creative rhythm guitar player. However, after reading the points in this article, you can see that there are many things you can do right now to start making progress in your guitar playing. As soon as you learn how to make great guitar riffs you will start to enjoy the creative musical process each time you play. Not only will better rhythm guitar playing help you personally as a musician, it will prove to be a very valuable skill when performing with a band on stage or recording music in the studio.
To learn more about becoming a really TIGHT rhythm guitar player, read this free guide for recording guitar in the studio.
Get professional advice to help you improve your guitar playing on this page with guitar playing help.
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