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strength
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seanm
Posts: 169
Joined: Apr. 5 2005
From: Halifax, Nova Scotia
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 RE: strength (in reply to hassurbanipal)
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I sounds as though you are getting tired or worn down due to tension in your hands, arms, shoulder or back. Though you need tension in the hands to press the strings down and to strike the notes, you have to make sure you relax your muscles immediately after these bursts of tension. As the cellist Pablo Casals supposedly said "I relax between the notes". So when you do practice slowly, very methodically ensure and be aware of tension in your hands, etc and practice relaxing when you don't need this tension.
For instance, an exercise for this is to play a fretted note and then immediately after the note sounds, relax the preasure on the note until it just buzzes. You will see how little preasure you really need to hold the note down after it sounds. Do this with all fingers for a while each day as a warm up for instance and eventually when you play your left hand will be playing with a fraction of the tension. Similarly, when you pluck a note or strike a rasqueados, let you hand fully relax before stiking the next. After a while, even when you play fast, you will have built in little momements of relaxation between each note and you won't get that accumulated tension build up the locks your muscles up (lactic acid build up etc).
I focused on this for 6 months or so a long time ago and since then I've never had tension issues and can honestly say that I never get tired when I play. It's just not something I even think about anymore and can play and pracitce for hours. My brain ussually gives out first :) Hope this helps.
Sean
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Date Jul. 9 2007 15:08:06
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carlos soto
Posts: 126
Joined: Oct. 22 2005
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RE: strength (in reply to hassurbanipal)
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The way it works for me is to have the basics such as posture, technique, playing in a relaxed way at all times. I also try to practice some endurance exercises but only for warm up and to work on things I have issues, I focus mostly on timing, tempo is never fast but at different normal and slow speeds.
On the other hand the things that are not basics and to some may seem unrelated but as I said it works for me. First, I don't pick up the guitar and play some billion note per second picado over and over again or anything that is going to be challenging in a physical way if I didn't had a good sleep having in mind I played a lot the day before, in other words if you killed yourself playing the day before let your body regenerate with a good sleep, otherwise practice will probably result in an injured hand.
Another thing is when you are just into a new chord and it's killing your hands, I'd say do that chord everyday until you are dead tired but stop right away if you feel pain.
And for your right hand mate, I believe you are not practicing your endurance properly, so when you go at full speed with the dancers at the first 5 mins you might do it perfectly but after a half hour of fast tempo if you haven't done that same half hour or maybe one hour of very very slow tempo then you will very hardly do it the fast way smoothly. This is like sports, if you are not in shape for a rugby or soccer match chances are you will get hurt. But, you don't get in shape by playing a match since its obvious you'd get hurt, so you do other simplier stuff first and build up a good shape, it could save you from tendinitis or any other hand problem, additionallly slow tempo practice will also improve your timing, rythm and patience with the guitar.
cheers
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Date Jul. 10 2007 2:48:20
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ToddK
Posts: 2961
Joined: Dec. 6 2004
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More discoveries= Picado (in reply to guitarbuddha)
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quote:
Your muscles are designed to work in pairs ( a simplification but still useful), flexors (picado) and extensors(rasgueado). In order for you to flex efficiently and quickly your extensors have to be relaxing otherwise the muscles are pulling in opposite directions at the same time. This is what causes tension, pretty much you need to learn to let one set of muscles relax fully so that the others can work unimpeded. This is why sometimes I practice with a slow metronome and only play every second or fourth beat, so that I can get into the cracks and feel whether or not my hand is tensing.
Ive noticed lately that focusing on not allowing the extensors to flex after
a rest stroke (in picado runs) has helped with speed and stamina.
I naturally have a tendency (and im sure many of us do) to want to pick each finger up with the extensor after a picado stroke. Index wants to "exchange" with middle, and vice versa.
As GB says, this does cause un-needed tension. Even around 16ths at 165bpm, i find you dont need the help of the extensors to return the fingers back to the "ready to play" position between strokes. Or actually, to be more exact, you dont need to "concisously" flex the extensor. Just the naturaly existing tension in the extensor is enough to return it in time.
If you're fuzzy on what im talking about, try this. Simply play 2 notes quickly.
Play a note with I, quickly followed by M, and see if I finger jumps out as
M finger comes down.
If it does, focus on not letting that happen. Of course, the fingers have to return to the string they need to play next, but i think its good to practice not letting them return at all, just to expirience what it feels like.
I had an especially bad habit with this. My fingers want to jump way up after every stroke.
So im trying to change that by going drastically the other direction. Of course, practicing super short staccato picado helps this, but im trying to go further with it.
Mostlly, just trying to relax in between every stroke as much as possible.
Its working REALLY well.
TK
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Date Apr. 9 2010 18:49:03
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guitarristamadrid
Posts: 133
Joined: Jan. 27 2010
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RE: strength (in reply to hassurbanipal)
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It took me a long time to build up to 8 hours a day, every day.... When I was in university (18 years old) I started playing one hour a day. By the time I left university a year and a half later, I was playing probably 4 hours a day. I stopped going to my classes and just played guitar..
Over the years I was studying with Entri the hours just kept going up.... 4 hours in the beginning, then 5 hours, a year later 6 hours, until within the last couple years I started doing 8 hours monday through friday, then 9 hours, even hitting 10 and 11 hours some days. It helps if you write it down, I got a calender and each day I would write a number so it looked like
DOMINGO 2.5
LUNES 7.5
MARTES 8.0
MIERCOLES 8.5
JUEVES 10.0
VIERNES 6
Build up to it man, it's like a sport. I think consistency is more important than raw hours. 3 hours a day is great, 5 days on, 2 days off, I think that's better than 8 hours one day, then not playing for 3 days, etc
_____________________________
Sometimes music is all you got in this world. Why do I create music? Because there was a time when I had nothing, and music kept me alive.
www.myspace.com/evancary
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Date Apr. 10 2010 3:44:34
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guitarristamadrid
Posts: 133
Joined: Jan. 27 2010
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RE: strength (in reply to minordjango)
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Entri says something like (to translate it into english)
"You should divide your studies into three parts: technique, practicing repertoire, and creating something new. So whatever time you have, divide it equally into those three things."
When I told Entri I could give him 7 hours of practice a day, he told me to practice technique for two hours, practicing my repertoire for two hours, work on composing new stuff for two hours, and then spend one hour listening to flamenco CDs.
Personally, I'm kind of technique crazy, and I like to spend a good three days in a row doing 8 hour technique sessions before I really feel prepared to record or perform. However, I definitely don't do that all the time, because it take a ton of effort and I have to suspend everything else in my life for three days. But whenever I am going to perform an important gig, or I need to produce a truly high quality recording. that's what I am to do.
_____________________________
Sometimes music is all you got in this world. Why do I create music? Because there was a time when I had nothing, and music kept me alive.
www.myspace.com/evancary
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Date Apr. 10 2010 4:36:15
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