‘Rules’ of Shredding – Fact or Fiction? ~ Part 1 ~
By Angel Zamora

Have you ever wanted to be a shred master, or some sort of?
I think you’re saying yes, if not you are losing your time (just kidding)

The problem is that many guitar players want to be shredders or some sort of shredder but don’t know what to do to achieve this. It’s like a mystery – but it’s not really, believe me.

There are some mistakes that are repeated a lot of times ( A LOT!!!) by  almost all the guitar students, even pros. I can see a lot of false doors in this labyrinth of advices with myths, silly traditions, wrong understanding, etc. to reach the goals of a shredder.

Ok, so I will show you what is fact and what is fiction (and a lot of times some of both) in this sea of shred advisers, so you can take the right way to the shred world.

What I’m going to do now is put a list of advices and (briefly) explain what is fact and what is fiction.

-Practice 8, 10, 15 hours a day to be a shredder-
Well, the most important is not how many hours you practice, it’s how much focus you keep in your practicing time and how good is your guitar guidance, that’s why there’re lots of guitar players with 20 or more years of vain experience. You can practice 2 hours a day and make a bigger improvement than practicing 15 hours, just keeping the focus of what you are doing.

-Always
use a metronome-

There’s a trick here, if you’re learning something new, it’s not good to push yourself right away with a metronome because you need to absorb the sound and enjoy the flow of notes in your fingers and body, that’s why there are lots of sloppy shredders, take your time to UNDERSTAND THE FEELING behind a fast passage before you touch your metronome and your learning experience will be more solid and FASTER without being another sloppy player.

-Learn these licks, chops, etc. and you’ll get a good song-
Wrong! If you think like this you probably know a lot of licks, chops, etc.  The chops are tools to improve your skills, if you only learn chops what you’ll get is just a frankenstein song of chops without any sense of dynamic. Because the most important element in a song is the feeling due to the dynamic (the motion).

-Do this routine and your playing will improve-
If you follow a routine during much time without any change, you’re wasting your time.
You need a routine that keeps you in constant progress, what is good for another player is not necessarily good for you. Keep in mind your long term goal so you can make the list of short term goals to achieve your main goal, each short term goal will need a different routine or routines.

Of course, this list of advices is extremely short, but I’m just giving you some common advices that you are hearing (reading or whatever) with your friends, family, instructional materials and teachers (yes, I said teachers, there are thousands and thousands of ignorant “guitar teachers” out there [including some in the “best” guitar schools] preaching lies mixed with truth and mostly they aren’t conscious of that) that are fictions, facts or some of both. But be sure to check out Part 2 of this article.

With this, you are clearing up your vision to be a shredder.

See you next time!

Angel
Zamora
shredmetalx@yahoo.com
www.shred-metal.com

©2006
Angel Zamora All Rights Reserved. Used by Permission