Scale Work: Right-hand alternation on open-strings

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Scale Work: Right-hand alternation on open-strings

Download the free PDF of this exercise: CLICK HERE (updated Jan 17th, 2011)

The below exercise is something you must be able to do proficiently. If you can get these exercises feeling natural, relaxed, and up to speed, you’ll have a right-hand that you can switch onto autopilot and cruise your way through scale passages. You can’t always carefully finger i, m, a combinations like the RCM Guitar Series, you need to develop your ability to navigate the awkward string crossings.

The multiple right-hand fingers represent different finger combinations. If you are just starting out on the guitar I would recommend free-stroke i, m for a couple of weeks before introducing rest-strokes or the a finger.

Start the metronome at about 45 beats to the quarter note and work your way up to 120. I would recommend only moving up one metronome marking every day or until you are in complete control. That means it may take you 75 days or more to get to the goal. However, do not move past the marking that allows you complete right-hand control.

Other tips:

• Try playing the examples with staccato and legato articulation
• Make sure to use both rest-stroke and free-stroke.
• Accent the first note of each eighth note grouping.
• Trying free-strokes but with a rest stroke on the first of each eighth note group.
• Try playing each example in a different musical style: like a lute player; like a violinist; like a flutist; like a harpsichord; avoid static one-sided playing.

Copyright © 2010 Bradford Werner.
c/o www.classicalguitarcanada.ca
All rights Reserved. Do not redistribute.