A 30-minute guitar metronome routine
0-8 minutes · chord changes
Start at 60 BPM in 4/4 with no subdivision. One chord per bar, and on the final beat of each bar do not strum at all — use it purely to move the left hand into position. Cycle four common chords, changing the order every time.
Once the gap has disappeared, keep playing through that final beat while still arriving on time. Then raise by five towards 90 BPM. The aim of this block is not speed; it is the disappearance of the gap.
8-16 minutes · strumming patterns
Switch on eighth-note subdivisions and work between 70 and 90 BPM. The strumming hand keeps moving continuously in eighths and only touches the strings where the pattern calls for it. That ghost-strumming feel is the whole point of this block.
When the pattern is steady, move to sixteenths for funk-style cutting. Spend the final two minutes with subdivisions off, playing the same pattern, to confirm it holds without help.
16-25 minutes · scales and picking
Choose one scale for the day and find the tempo where three clean passes are possible. Raise by five after every three. Note yesterday's best and start below it rather than at it.
For alternate picking, leave subdivisions off and place sixteenths against a quarter-note click. What matters is confirming that a downstroke still lands on every beat as the tempo climbs.
25-30 minutes · into the piece
Take the two hardest bars of whatever you are learning and play them at today's new tempo. The speed you reached on scales usually does not transfer intact, and that difference is tomorrow's assignment.
Spend the last minute with the click on the downbeat only, playing eight bars. If beat 1 still agrees at the end, today's work stuck.
Read next
-
Building speed
Speed is not the product of repetition; it is the product of accurate repetition.
Read the guide -
Practising with subdivisions
If the space between beats is empty, nothing that happens in there is being checked.
Read the guide -
BPM by genre
The number is only a starting point, but a starting point saves a great deal of time.
Read the guide