TE-002 • The Spider

[justinguitar]

Questions...

[Guitarhead]

hiya justin, ur site's really awesome, really gets me in the groove to start practising, thnx a lot... ok, this spider thingy(i just began with it), what speed do u recommend i should be able to do with about 4 months of practice... i can do it at about 100 bpm, but i just can't seem to be able to go any faster and end up spoiling my carefully-constructed technique... am i being too ambitious because i actually put every free minute of my day into my guitaring.. thnx again

[mickmetal]

  I think the Spider's a very useful lesson when you dedicate your practicing to not necessarily playing it fast but being able to play each note clearly in your cross alternate picking.  Guitarhead- What I found useful in developing my technique to a faster tempo is playing the Spider front and back at a much slower tempo than your ability's limit.  (For me about 60 bpm) and only after you can play it perfectly several times, then move up slowly till you eventually reach your limits.  This should be done slowly, don't practice on a tempo you can't do perfectly.  When you can do the Spider perfectly on a faster tempo, 100 bpm or so then and only then should you increase your tempo. 

p.s. When you do increase your speed it shouldn't be a big change, only like 4 bpm or so (60 bpm - 64 bpm for example)  Perfecting something slow is the fastest way to perfecting something fast in my opinion, hope this helps.

[Brenno71]

hey justin sites lookin madd umm this spider thingy been havin a hack at it for a few weeks now and just can't get the coordination down pack....ummm dunno if its just cause i'm retarded or what lol but yeh tis getting a little frustrating at time.....so if you had any tips or technique corrections that would be awsome dude


cheers man

[Jaden_ph]

im having problem w/ alternative picking because i kept forgetting to up pick .. any ideas?

[DeadlyChicken]

set your metronome quite slow, and only pick on  the beat using all down picks. make it so that its way slower than you can play.

Then using just one string  and fretting just one note do a few downs on the beat and notice that each time you down pick you are having to come back up for the next down pick, now just make sure you hit the string on the up pick.  Once you have that rhythm going, on that one note one string, keep it flowing and start the exercise again.

Think of your picking as beign like tiny strums .. keeping it moving and maybe even exaggerating how far your pick moves to start with so that you start to feel the constant rhythm and pace, maybe even say "down" each time you hear the metronome click too.

its tricky and you have to go a lot slower than you might normally, which is frustrating, but you quickly become used to it and will be able to speed up.

[Adlai]

I happened to get my hands on a copy of the "Ten Hour Workout" interview with Steve Vai, and interestingly enough he uses this exact pattern, but to practice economy picking rather than alternate picking.

I understand the difference between the two, but my question is: would it be bad to exercise two such radically different techniques with the same pattern?

My inclination would be that it would actually help to separate them mentally and physically (finger-ally), but I'd be interested to hear some other opinions.

[stymye]

 personally I would get really good at alternate picking first,, like you don't have to even think about it good. before  thinking about economy picking
I see no benefit of practicing different picking techniques at the same time.I think it will slow someone down bigtime actually.


 this same exercise is used to practice sweep picking.but thats annother whole level.

[Dakota]

Funny, but on day 1 when I tried it I was terrible at it. It wasnt really my alternate picking, it was just the way the left hand crawled up the fretboard. Now, a week later its really come natural. 

[justinguitar]

@Jaden - try saying the down and up out loud. That usually fixes it!

@ Adlal - I would choose a different exercise, just to keep things clear in my mind, but I don't think it would matter.

@Brenno - it's just hard dude - stick at it!

@ Guitarhead - it's a slow process - don't rush it - just move the tempo up very slowly. It will help even at slow speeds!

[scorpiomike79]

i spend many hours on this site and i donate and buy your products...but damn this a nasty little lesson justin, and i really struggle to get my head around it......if only i could quit my job and be payed vast amounts of money to practise all day, but i wanna thankyou again for your awesome site!!!!

[GuitarMomentum]

@scorpiomike79: At first, it is a bit mind blowing. The right hand is simple - down, up, down, up, etc. etc. That's the exercise part. Getting it going quickly and without a lot of conscious effort. Really working in the movement of moving your pick around across strings while keeping the down, up sequence going.

To begin though, I needed to know the why of the left hand first. When I tried to attach images to my forum post, it wouldn't let me. So I posted this mini-tutorial at http://distractedgeek.blogspot.com/2009/04/spider-exercise.html. It specifically focuses on the left hand with respect to the Spider Exercise.

Good luck.

Alex

[brett911]

Hey Justin or someone lol

In the Advanced Exercise Tab in pdf form should not the bottom line start on the 2nd fret since you are moving up the fretboard?

It looks like a mirror image of the 1st several bars from the exercise?

[DSX_Guitarist]

would it be a good idea to practice finger picking with the spider or is that unnecesary?

[jimmynitcher]

How many notes do you people play per metronome beat? I guess it doesn't matter as long as one plays within one's own limits but I'm curious .

BTW it sounds a bit like something Robert Fripp might do.