How To Practice Guitar: Do This To Get Out Of A Rut Quickly

by Tom Hess

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If you're stuck in a guitar playing rut…

And you feel like you're playing the same things over and over again…

Or you sometimes feel bored playing guitar...

Then, good news:

This guitar practice article will help you.

A lot.

Here is how:

First...

I'll lay out the most common causes of guitar practice ruts

(Many of them are likely to NOT be what you might expect)…

And then…

I'll help you pinpoint what to focus on during your guitar practice, so you can become a better guitar player much faster and have a lot more fun reaching your musical goals.

IMPROVE YOUR GUITAR SPEED
BY AT LEAST 100%

ENTER YOUR NAME AND
EMAIL TO GET ACCESS

FREE E-GUIDE

By submitting your info, you agree to send it to Tom Hess Music Corporation who will process and use it according to their privacy policy.

To begin…

Watch this guitar practice video to discover the main causes of guitar practice ruts:

Now that you know the common causes of guitar practice ruts…

Here are 5 specific things to practice when you find yourself in a guitar practice rut that help you break out of it and become a better guitar player faster than you ever thought possible.

Tip #1 For How To Practice Guitar To Get Out Of A Rut: Work On Your Guitar Phrasing. Here Is How:

One of the best ways to break out of a guitar rut is to work on your guitar phrasing. Phrasing means ‘how’ you play the notes. The better your phrasing – the more expression you can squeeze out of everything you play.

To make your phrasing better, play a short and simple guitar lick (3-5 notes long) and challenge yourself to make each note drip with emotion.

Make a list of all the ways you can articulate the notes and apply vibrato, slides, bends, double stops and harmonics.

Then, choose one phrasing element from your list, decide what note you’ll add it to and play your guitar lick with the element applied.

Repeat the lick over and over until the element sounds great.

When it does, choose a different phrasing element and add it to another note in the lick – continuing to refine it until you’re happy with the sound.

This guitar practice process makes you sound more pro very fast.

Watch this video to see how to practice guitar phrasing in this way:

Here are bonus guitar phrasing tips that will help you become a better guitar player:

1. Refine your vibrato. This means: balance the speed and the width of the vibrato pulses. The faster your vibrato is, the wider it ought to be. The slower the tempo, the narrower it can be.

It's also critically important to keep your vibrato in tune. This means: every time you bend the string up, it must come all the way back down to the starting pitch.

Side (guitar practice) note: it is a good idea to sync up your vibrato with the tempo of the tune you're playing along to.

2. Alternate between instant vibrato and delayed vibrato. Instant vibrato means: you pick a note and apply vibrato immediately. To do delayed vibrato, pick a note, let it sustain for 1-2 seconds and then add vibrato. (You can also re-articulate the note by picking it again after the delay.) This makes the vibrato more dramatic.

Both types of vibrato sound great.

3. Use advanced string-bending variations as you practice guitar phrasing. Practicing creative variations of a 'simple' guitar technique (like bending) is a fast way to get out of a rut and become a better guitar player.

Watch this video to learn some awesome guitar string bends to incorporate into your guitar practice:

Question: "But Tom Hess, what if I'm struggling to bend strings in tune when I practice guitar?"

Answer: Try simply tuning your guitar down (by a whole step or a half step) and practice only half-step bends instead of whole-step bends. This makes it much easier to bend the strings and get the right sound.

As you get better at bending strings, work your way back up to standard tuning and progress towards wider bends.

Also, practice simply playing the note you intend to bend up to as an unbent note. Get its sound into your ears and then bend the string up to it (from 1 or 2 frets below). This will help train your ear for bending in tune.

4. Practice guitar slide variations. Most guitar players think slides are boring and simple. That's because they only think of slides as sliding 'into' a note from a lower pitch. But there is a lot more to this guitar phrasing technique that can level up your guitar practice and help you get out of a rut.

Tip #2 For How To Practice Guitar To Get Out Of A Rut: Practice Integrating Your Guitar Skills Together. Here Is How:

Integration means tying your skills together.

And it can refer to technical skills (tying several guitar techniques together) as well as musical skills (e.g. ear training, fretboard knowledge, phrasing and technique).

For example: to integrate challenging parts of a song, do this:

Isolate the transition part (by taking the last 3-4 notes of part 1 and the first 3-4 notes of part 2).

Practice the transition as its own lick to make it clean and smooth. Focusing on the hardest parts (e.g. position shifts or string skips) becomes much easier with the hard part isolated.

Gradually make the transition longer by expanding it in both directions. Add a few more notes to part 1 and a few more notes to part 2 until you have successfully integrated both parts.

Watch this video to see an example of integration guitar practice in action (this process helps you become a better guitar player quickly).

Tip #3 For How To Practice Guitar To Get Out Of A Rut: Learn Your Guitar Fretboard. Here Is How:

Learning your fretboard helps you learn songs faster (when you practice guitar) as well as create your own guitar riffs and solos more quickly.

The 2 most important things to focus on (during your fretboard memorization guitar practice) are:

1. Learn the individual note names on each string. For example: challenge yourself to find all the A notes on every string and play them up and down with the metronome (1 note per click). Repeat the process for all the other notes until you can play them smoothly and without much thinking.

2. Learn all the scale shapes for every scale you play when you practice guitar. For example: the major scale, has 7 notes. This means: you can play it starting from each of those 7 notes. This gives you 7 patterns to learn the scale across the entire fretboard. When you do, you become free to play scales all over the guitar.

This musical freedom helps you to break out of your guitar practice rut and become a better guitar player faster.

Bonus tip for how to memorize scale patterns faster: memorize them away from the guitar.

Put your fingers (of your fretting hand) on your picking hand’s forearm and move them up and down, as if you’re playing scales on guitar. You can do this for 1-2 minutes at a time, many times throughout the day (e.g. while in your car, waiting for the light to turn green)

This helps you get more repetitions with scale patterns and memorize the scale patterns more quickly.

Tip #4 For How To Practice Guitar To Get Out Of A Rut: Learn About Effective Guitar Practice Habits, So You Can Improve Faster, Without Practicing More. Here Is How:

Few things help you get out of a rut faster than improving your guitar practice habits.

When you see, hear and feel that you’ve become a better guitar player after every practice session, it’s almost impossible not to feel motivated to return to practice guitar the next day.

Here are some tips that help you squeeze more from your guitar practice time:

- use an effective guitar practice schedule that helps you squeeze more from your practice time, even if it’s limited.

- set micro goals for each guitar practice session. These are goals you can reach in 1 day. (For example: memorize the hard part of a guitar solo or song, and simply play it all the way through at a slow tempo... or practice getting used to a new way of holding the pick).

- use a problem-solving mindset when you practice guitar, like I demonstrate in this guitar practice video.

7 guitar practice habits that make you a better guitarist

Tip #5 For How To Practice Guitar To Get Out Of A Rut: Work On Guitar Playing Consistency. Here Is How:

It’s frustrating when you play really well one day, but make a lot more mistakes the next day. Or, more commonly, you feel like your skills disappear the moment you have to play guitar in front of someone.

To solve this, practice developing musical consistency (the ability to play guitar at or near your best in a variety of conditions).

The best way to train this skill during your guitar practice is by imitating the stressors of playing live while you practice guitar at home.

Watch this video to see an example of what this looks like:

Bonus tip: Make your own list of specific guitar playing scenarios that cause you to make more mistakes and practice them during your guitar practice sessions to make your playing more consistent.

Now that you know how to get out of a guitar practice rut, I want to show you how to transform every part of your playing from ‘just ok’ to totally freaking awesome, even if you’re stuck right now and are having some self-doubts about your potential.

I show you how in my personalized Breakthrough Guitar Lessons. Unlike some other guitar lessons, you don't get cookie cutter lessons from me. I create your guitar lessons based on you, your skill level, musical background and who you want to become as a guitar player. I’ve taught thousands of guitar players to play like pros (even if music is a hobby for them) and you can be next.

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About Tom Hess: Tom Hess is a guitar teacher, music career mentor and guitar teacher trainer. He teaches rock guitar lessons online to students from all over the world and conducts instructional live guitar training events attended by musicians from over 50 countries.

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