We’re Talking About Practice… Again

Like many of you reading this now, I enjoy reading what my friends and co-workers Lindsay and John contribute to our monthly newsletter. Both of them have been playing guitar for a lot longer than I have and they always have some interesting insights that I may have never taken into account. John’s article last week, in particular, really resonated with me as I’ve been struggling to get back into my own practice routine. Between this and the recent play-off basketball series between my “old” home team Philadelphia 76ers and my “new” home team the Hawks, I was reminded of Allen Iverson’s infamous practice rant from 2002 (easily found on YouTube if you’re not familiar with it). Though the often overlooked segment of the interview involves Iverson addressing his grief and mental state after losing his best friend and dealing with another Sixers loss, all anyone could talk about (or remember almost 20 years later) was the portion where he says, “We talking about practice,” about 20+ times in approximately two minutes. As that phrase echoed through my head, I found myself evaluating my own attitude towards practice. 

Having recently finished up recording for my band’s upcoming album, I was excited again to explore simply playing the guitar instead of rehearsing a specific set of songs ad nauseam. Around this time, I found a video by Atlanta’s own Rick Beato in which he dissects how he would approach a practice routine and it led me to one very important realization about practicing that I had been missing all along. Though John touched on it briefly in his article, this is something that bears repeating. It’s vital to have a game plan to your practice routine. Having a proper plan enables you to set goals and focus on some core concepts to achieve those goals. With all of this in mind, I figured I would take some time to detail how I’ve been approaching my own newfound routine.

My practice routine comprises of a few different stages and I’ll adjust the time that I spend on each depending on how much time I can actually spend practicing that period/day. I start with a brief section of “free expression,” something I picked up from Julian Lage. From there, I’ll work on one or two technical ideas which will typically change on a weekly basis. Then I’ll dig into my repertoire. Lastly, I finish off with some form of music or guitar “study.” This approach lends a little bit of everything to a session so that it doesn’t get tedious in one particular category.

The idea of engaging in a short period of “free expression” is admittedly a relatively new one to me, though it’s a concept I’ve enjoyed exploring. This is something that Julian Lage recommends doing where you pick up the instrument and play freely for a short period of time, anywhere from 30 seconds to 2 minutes. It doesn’t particularly matter what you play, it can be a “modal” approach based in a particularly key or utterly atonal. The idea is that this will help you shake off the cobwebs as you get your fingers moving and warmed up as well as begin to get your creative juices flowing as you are freely improvising, ideally in a way that is more spontaneous than most “noodling.” I like to use this approach to explore the full range of the guitar from its lowest register to its highest. This is a judgment free time where one should ideally focus entirely on the instrument and truly LISTEN. I’ve found that the biggest benefit I’ve gained from this exercise is that I’m beginning to expect the notes just before I play them, something that I thought was near impossible unless I was on the level of players like Joe Pass or Steve Vai. Lage takes things a step further, often recording this exercise and analyzing what he does to pick out any trends or unconscious tendencies. If I’m feeling a little extra saucy, I’ll record into a looper or Sound-On-Sound style delay and also use it as an improvisation exercise.

After this period of free expression, I’ll dive into an exercise to work on my actual technique in an area where I feel I may be lacking or introduce some new concepts to my playing. For a while, I felt like getting back to basics and working on pentatonic scales and being able to connect all of the scale “boxes” in a given key. Recently, I realized that I’d never really worked on arpeggios so I’ll go through all of the major or minor shapes using the “CAGED system” (which is an incredibly useful way to think about the fingerboard if you’re not familiar with the concept, perhaps warranting an article all of its own). I’ve discovered that a musical way of practicing these techniques comes from starting in one key and then cycling through the entire circle of fifths, starting in C then moving to G then D then A, etc. Once I can move effortlessly through fifths, I’ll change it up and move the opposite direction in fourths (C to F to Bb to Eb, etc.). It’s useful to explore things like scales and arpeggios in a non-linear fashion, a la not playing scales like your usual “Do Re Mi Fa So La Ti Do” and instead mixing up the notes. Playing all of the notes in a scale in order is a surefire way to make all of your solos sound like a practice routine instead of music!

Next, I’ll move into whatever primary focus I have at a given time. Sometimes that will be the scales or arpeggios from the previous section and sometimes it’ll be another area. Right now, for example, I’m working my way through a great book (that we happen to frequently stock here at the store) called Chords and Progressions for Jazz and Popular Guitar. My old teacher had suggested this when I was interested in pursuing a degree in jazz guitar (spoiler alert: that was a failed effort) and it’s been a particularly useful book for me. I spent a period of a few weeks on Chord Inversions alone, taking an additive approach. This approach involves starting small and then slowly adding to it. So for inversions, I would start with one shape that I’d move through different keys (the same circle of fifths idea from before) then I’d add another until I’m able to move through all of the different shapes through all of the different keys. Then I’d go to the next chord type and repeat the process. This section ensures that I’m always adding to my guitar vocabulary.

The next portion might be the most important as this is where I’ll work on the things people actually want to hear… Songs! My repertoire has become fairly vast these days as I’ve been exploring the many sides of my own musical personality. I’ll spend some time working on new songs from my band, In The Presence Of Wolves, or revisiting old ones that I haven’t played in some time. Jazz is becoming one of my primary focuses and I’ll often try to expand upon what I’ve been working on in the previous “technique” sections by exploring some standards as a guide. Perhaps the most fun repertoire additions I’ve been working on are solo guitar arrangements of whatever tunes I want to do. It’s a blast reinterpreting songs that are a part of my DNA and putting all of the different elements of music together on a single instrument is a challenging and rewarding process. One of my goals is to put together a full set of these pieces and perform them publicly, an admittedly terrifying but exciting prospect!

The last portion of my practice routine is something that usually pops up throughout the rest of my day as I spend a substantial amount of time absorbing music- and guitar-related information. To me, half of the fun of playing guitar is exploring the gear and different colors that you can add to your pallet. I’ll read up or watch videos about different styles of guitars, amps, and effects so that I can better translate the sound(s) I hear in my head to the music that I play or record. Ideally, I get to spend some time with my Line6 Helix to test out some new amps or effects that I don’t have a lot of experience with. Rick Beato suggests using this time to understand the history of your instrument as well as studying things that you don’t know yet, all of which is beneficial in so many ways! 

So there we have it, my new practice routine. I’ve set aside a little bit of time every morning before eating breakfast and leaving for work which has already led me to see an improvement in all of these areas in a short amount of time. It’s become a part of my day that I look forward to and a way of kicking my day off in the right direction. Breaking it up into smaller, ever-evolving chunks has kept my attention span on the task at hand and ensured that there’s always something fun to do later if one section starts to get too tedious. But perhaps the most important thing is that I’ve found a routine that works for me. Everyone has different goals on the guitar and tailoring a specific routine into what works for you will certainly get you on the right path! If you’ve been struggling with your practice routine due to lack of motivation or lack of direction, hopefully some of these ideas can get you reeled in and improving your guitar playing every single day! It’s certainly an easy thing to talk about practice but now it’s time to get out there and put in some time!
Chris Capitanio, 2021