Beyond Bedroom Guitar by Spencer Westwood - HTML preview

How do I increase my skills to read the music faster?

 

For more information then look out on the net using the resources. There’s loads of stuff out there on both.

Knowing the information is one thing, using it is an entirely different thing. I’ve hinted along the way some of the mental tricks to get the information quickly to that Unconscious competence stage but I’ll add a few more here.

Firstly break down the learning. Don’t try and learn all the tab symbols in one day.

From my table there are 13 different symbols (I put the harmonics together. There are another 11 at least – look them up in powertab or a guitar magazine. Take them 4 a day.
Learn them:-

• Imagine seeing the notation written down for that fragment
• Imagine seeing yourself playing them on your guitar
• Imagine how it would feel to play that tab snippet.
• Hear how it would sound.

Then try playing them on your guitar, and then keep thinking about them during the day.
For the more advanced players – Still do it. Take four a day, learn them play them and then think about them at odd times during the day.

I usually do this mini reminder thing when I’m waiting for something like coffee to filter, or a can to drop out of the machine.

The intention is that you’ll have at least 30 – 50 times during the day to specifically think about the three steps (I’m a busy person and I have at least that many interruptions over the whole day).

On the second day, after learning the second four and thinking about them etc., remind yourself of the first 4, write them down, play them and imagine them just one more time.

Continue this way reviewing the previous day’s stuff until you’ve got to the end of the table and then Review them all.

 

Write them down one by one. Check them. Play them all one by one in your head and then physically.

 

By now you might even have a few new techniques to add to your playing.

 

Ok after a few days of working on the tab symbol stuff some of it will be UC, some CC.

 

Go out and buy another edition of a guitar magazine and look at one of the pieces.

Take out a piece of paper and write down each notation item that you can find on one page- for example if it’s a slide, imagine you doing that slide. Go through the whole of one page looking at each notation item in turn.

Can you imagine your fingers actually doing those things? Cool huh… And your almost there.

It’s a funny thing but when someone buys a new car, they notice more other cars that are similar on the road. For example if the car is metallic blue, they notice more metallic blue cars on the road. If it’s a Van or MPV as we call it over here in the UK, then you notice more of them on the road. It’s not that suddenly more people have bought the same as you it’s just that your awareness has changed.