Now that you know the correct way to play legato technique at a fundamental level, practice these exercises to integrate correct technique into your playing faster.

 

Exercise #1: Use Alternating Legato And Picking Practice

One thing helps you improve your guitar playing super-fast while increasing your finger speed.

What is it?

Integration.

Integrating different techniques together helps you learn faster and practice more efficiently.

A great way to do this is to quickly alternate between legato and picking while practicing a given lick or pattern.

Try this:

Instead of picking a scale all the way, you pick the first few notes…

…then play the next few with legato,

then pick again, etc.

Or even pick the first few, then repeat those same notes with legato before moving onto the next few with picking.

This practice approach is killer for locking your hands together for smooth and easy speed.

Here’s another way to use this concept:

Pick a scale and alternate with playing all ascending/descending legato as fast as possible for several minutes.

Then try to pick the notes and bring the picking version closer to speed of the legato version.

To make this even easier, practice only the first couple of strings of the scale, then add more strings over time.

 

Exercise #2: Stay In Close Positions

A great way to speed up your fingers is to speed up your mental processing.

How do you do this?

Fretboard memorization practice.

Learning how to fluently move up and down the fretboard without getting lost makes playing fast guitar solos and licks effortless.

One method for improving this skill is practicing two scale patterns that are within close proximity to each other.

Here’s how:

See the tab below: