Looking for a good warm up excerise for practicing

[John Keith]

Hi all,

I am looking for a good warm up exercise that can help me with strength/agility/speed for my left hand and ultimately help speed up my right hand picking. What do you guys suggest?

I am starting to get back in playing bass again after almost 15 year break. I am just trying to come with a good practice routine that I can follow everyday. Thanks all!

John

 

[Jloch86]

Just play the music you like. After you learn your scales and junk, there is no reason to continue doing exercises.

 

[fearceol]

First of all, unless you have an injury or such like, you have had enough strength to fret a string, since you were a young child. Speed and agility comes with constant playing. The former is best attained by starting slowly and gradually building up the tempo. This applies to BOTH hands.

As for warming up...before you even touch the bass, spend a couple of minutes doing gentle stretches (see link below). Then pick up the bass and spend a few more minutes playing chromatic scales and/or arpeggios...slowly... and above the fifth fret. Why ? Because playing lower when not warmed up, can cause injury problems. Play for short periods, then take a break, until your hands/fingers/wrists adjust to this "new work" being asked of them.

 

[Gorn]

The Bach cello suite. It's something I'll probably work on for the rest of my life. You're going back and forth across all the strings with your left and your fingers are alternating on your right. I like it. Keeps my playing clean.

 

[Badwater]

I prefer the warm up the hands when it's cold, and get the blood flowing. Then, diving into some riffs, and songs that I like. Or parts of songs where I need to go over to make sure I have it down on time.

So if you have parts of songs that are fast, play them when you warm up.

 

[5544]

Take any song that you know and play it at 50% temp for a warm-up and an eye-opener to see how you need to work on your time.

 

[bassdude51]

Tossing down one of these. Best warm-up exercise ever!

 

[elarue]

The Bach cello suite. It's something I'll probably work on for the rest of my life. You're going back and forth across all the strings with your left and your fingers are alternating on your right. I like it. Keeps my playing clean.

Interesting! I'll have to look into that one.

First Simandl, now Bach.

 

[IamGroot]

The Bach cello suite. It's something I'll probably work on for the rest of my life. You're going back and forth across all the strings with your left and your fingers are alternating on your right. I like it. Keeps my playing clean.

I do Bach violin pieces for the same reason. Great recommendation.

 

[IamGroot]

And the diatonic scales up and down the neck.

 

[40Hz]

I have a bass line I wrote that goes with a song from an originals band I was in back in 1976 that I'm particularly fond of. I've used that as my primary warm up exercise ever since.

 

[Malcolm35]

At home I run some scales up and down the neck. Out we normally jam to a song the guitar starts. The jam session lasts as long as we need. Could be our first song --- or not....

We all enjoy jamming so this is not a "chore".

 

[AFRO]

Arpeggios around the Circle of Fifths/Fourths with a SLOW metronome. start with triads then work towards adding in 7ths.
Pick a day. Major Arps on odd (or even) numbered days and start with Minor Arps on the opposite (even) day. sometimes go clockwise, sometimes counter clockwise.

I also like to permutations of fingerings 1-2-3-4, 1-3-4-2, 1-4-2-3, 1-2-4-3, etc.. start in a comfortable position like 7th fret, so you don't stretch too far, too much, too early..
there is also an exercise called the Spider walk.. that combines finger permutations and string crossing.



Good Luck, and Have Fun

 

[Russell L]

Try this to warm up your forearm muscles: hold your fingers straight out and spread open with a little force. Then, without bending the first knuckles at your hand, bend your fingers at the middle knuckles hard as far as you can, over and over about ten times. Do your thumb, too, along with your fingers. Keep that first knuckle at your hand sticking straight out the whole time. Don't let it bend down.

I learned it as an old golf warm-up exercize.

 

[Groove Master]

I doing open strings every day for a start. To me it is the best, then chromatic scale in first position then scales and arpeggios 2 or 3 octaves

 

[buldog5151bass]

I run through a two measure chromatic scale (starting on open E) at different speeds. Then two measure major scales in all 12 keys. Warms up the fingers, let's you do some position shifts.