| My go-to exercise for, well, pretty much anything is the quasi-chromatic exercise. There are a lot of variations, some that do string-skipping and stuff, but I stick to the basics. Lemme see if I can give an approximation... I've never tried doing a tab before, LOL.
G |---------------56788765---------------|
D |----------5678----------8765----------|
A |-----5678--------------------8765-----|
E |5678------------------------------8765|
Do that using even strokes in a constant 3-2-1 right hand pattern. You will automatically be changing up which right hand fingers are falling on the left hand notes, particularly if you rake on the way down. When I am practicing I do the pattern twice across the board.
After doing the above, I then I do it with every combination of 3 fingers on the left hand (you'll find this will line up more easily with the 3 strokes on your right, but again if you rake on the way back down you will find it offset, which is good!) The point is to create independence between your left and right hands.
Lastly, I run the pattern again with every combination of 2 fingers. The last one usually ends up being 3 and 4... it's a fun one. :P Chances are your hand is tired by now, and it's isolating the least used muscle.
The important part is to do the exercise slowly, fully and cleanly articulating every note, and preferably to a metronome. I also use it as an easy counting exercise as, at least on a 4 string, every pattern falls perfectly within a certain amount of 4/4 bars if you count it as 8ths. (In fact, it's one bar per finger... which if you do the arithmetic, makes sense.)
This exercise can also hurt your hand if you do it too long, too hard, or too fast. It's like body building, there is a difference between "feeling the burn" and, well, just plain old hurting yourself. If your body is telling you to stop, listen to it. This is also a great place to practice your breathing, since if you hold your breath in concentration (natural) you will go anaerobic real quick and the lactic acid starts to build up. It's an easy experiment: purposely hold your breath and see how long you can go, then watch how much farther you can do it with regular and deep breathing.
I find running the exercise rooted on the 5th fret works best for me. Moving it up the board will make it a bit easier, as you'll have to stretch your left hand less and it creates more tension for your right hand, which I find makes it easier to regulate your fingerpicking.
Anyway, I love this exercise. I've been doing it for 15 years at least, and it really works on all the "mechanical" aspects of playing. I know I went beyond the scope of just getting those 3 fingers behaving, but I figured I may as well go the whole hog.
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- Zach - Canadian Club #198 (born 1976) - Fender Jazz Bass #692 (born 1975) - Metaphors hold the most truth in the least amount of space.
Last edited by brane : 06-25-2011 at 01:19 AM.
Reason: Grammar escapes me once again.
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