5 Guitar Scale Exercises For Speed To Help You Solo Expressively With Your Skills

One of the biggest problems for guitar players isn’t just “lacking guitar speed”, but not being able to use their speed to play something musical. This especially applies to learning scales on guitar.

Whenever you learn scales, it is critical to learn how to use the patterns in a way that helps you express emotions and ideas. The better you get at this, the more effortless it feels to play awesome solos that shred and make people feel something.

Use these guitar scale exercises to develop speed and musical expression:

 

Guitar Scale Exercise Idea #1: Frequently Improvise With The Scales You Know

Simply learning scale patterns on the fretboard is not enough to turn you into a badass lead guitarist. However, it’s both easy and fun to begin improving your guitar soloing skills using scales.

The secret is to practice improvising at the same time you practice scales.

Don’t only practice playing the notes of a scale correctly to the click of a metronome.

Invest time into improvising while playing your scales as well.

How?

Here’s a few tips:

·         Play scales using a call and response approach to create and resolve musical tension.

·         Play slower, more melodic ideas with fast bursts in between.

·         Imitate the melodies of singers to make your playing more melodic and memorable.

 

Guitar Scale Exercise Idea #2: Stick To One Position & Master Scales With Arpeggios

Learning how to combine guitar scales and arpeggios helps you develop smooth phrases so your soloing doesn’t sound like a bunch of patterns/exercises.

Make it your goal to move interchangeably between scales and arpeggios.

Get started by using this exercise:

Step 1: Improvise by playing a single octave of any scale of your choice for 1 minute. While doing this, try to create as many different phrases as you can in this time.

Step 2: Using the notes of the scale as your foundation, create an arpeggio that begins from the first note of the scale and stays in the same position. Then improvise with it for 1 minute as you did in step 1.

For example: Em7 with the lowest note beginning on the 7th fret of the A string, made from the notes of the E minor scale that starts on the 7th fret of the A string.

Step 3: Combine both the arpeggio and scale together to create more phrases for 1 minute.

This video gives you another idea for how to smoothly combine scales and arpeggios while soloing:

Here is a tab example of combining scales and arpeggios together:

Guitar Scale Exercise Idea #3: Combine Different Scale Patterns Without Becoming Overwhelmed By Too Many Notes

Practicing too many scales at once can feel overwhelming. Learning just a couple of scales that are close by each other on the fretboard is much more manageable.

Better yet, learn modes that are close by in position.

Why?

This helps you map out the fretboard and start playing flowing solos in an effortless manner.

Playing modes means you learn how to play the same notes in many different positions.

For example: There are two close patterns around the position of Dorian.

Practice playing each of these 3 modes for 1 minute separately.

Then combine two of them together: C Major and D Dorian.

Next, try D Dorian and E Phrygian.

Finally, combine all three together.

Begin moving up the fretboard slowly by adding more mode patterns until you eventually map out the entire fretboard. This makes playing guitar solos MUCH easier and effortless than ever before.

 

Guitar Scale Exercise Idea #4: Practice Scales In Different Position, On Different Strings

Don’t limit yourself to only practice a guitar scale in the same position every time.

Gradually introduce patterns into your vocabulary that start from new positions and new strings until you are able to play the scale anywhere on the neck.

Here are some examples of how to get better at playing a particular scale anywhere on the fretboard:

·         Practice it only on the 6th string and above for 1 minute.

·         Practice it only on the 5th string and above for 1 minute.

·         Practice it only on the 4th string and above for 1 minute.

·         Practice it only on the 3rd string and above for 1 minute.

·         Practice it only on the 2nd string and above for 1 minute.

·         Practice it on a single string only for 1 minute.

This stops you from getting too used to playing in only one spot every time, so it becomes easier to use the scale when it comes time to solo with it.

 

Guitar Scale Exercise Idea #5: Improve Your Picking Technique, Muscle Memory & Cleanliness Of Playing All At Once

The more times you repeat something, the easier it is to memorize it.

This concept applies for learning scales too. Many times, people just practice a scale one note at a time up and down. Playing each note MANY times helps you learn the pattern faster and has the potential to improve other aspects of your technique as well.

Try these creative approaches to help your scale practice improve your technique:

·         Pick every note with heavy picking power to articulate them better and improve your two-hand synchronization.

·         Double pick every note to lock both hands together and make playing scales feel much easier when playing them like normal.

·         Pick every note using upstrokes only. This makes your picking attack more balanced and smooth so that your overall picking technique improves.

Use efficient picking technique like shown in this video:

Now you have many effective exercises to help you play scales on guitar faster than ever. It’s time to expand to cover your entire guitar playing to achieve incredible speed in all areas of your skillset.

Learn how to become a super-fast guitar player while cutting your practice time in half using this resource on how to double your guitar speed.