How To Create Guitar Speed Practice Riffs That Help You Become A Fast & Clean Player Right Away
Gaining more speed on guitar doesn’t have to be about repeating the same one scale up and down over and over… This boring approach often makes guitarist give up before making any real progress. The more creatively you practice, the more fun you have and the faster you get the results that make playing guitar with speed easier than ever.
One way to practice creatively is to create your own guitar speed practice riffs. This engages your mind differently than just repeating a random tab you found somewhere many times. It challenges you to apply the technique you are practicing in a musical way (which is critical for improving your overall musicianship).
Having the ability to integrate speed into real music creatively puts your skills on a whole new level when compared to most guitarists.
Use the exercises below to create your own guitar speed practice riffs and start playing guitar faster, cleaner and more creatively:
Make Your Riffs More Intense Mix In Fast Leads With Power Chords
Many guitar players get stuck using only plain power chords to play their rhythm guitar riffs. This gets old fast when you don’t use other methods to make them more interesting.
One great way to play cool speed guitar riffs is to practice integrating fast runs together with power chords. This is done as easily as inserting just a few quick notes at the end of a repeating riff.
For example:
Notice how this speed guitar riff integrates plan power chords with alternative chords for a more varied sound: 3rd chord = quartal chord and 4th chord = minor chord (without a fifth).
Experiment with combining these types of chords together with a quick flourish of notes at the end of a riff to make your rhythm guitar ideas sound more creative while utilizing speed in a cool way without needing virtuoso level skills.
Note: To make this even easier, start by only adding one or two fast notes at the end. Then add more and more until it feels natural.
Move All Over The Fretboard With Speed By Using High/Low Guitar Practice
One of the coolest sounds on guitar is playing a riff in a low octave, then suddenly moving it to a high octave to finish it off. This rise in pitch naturally makes the riff sound more intense and is sure to grab anyone’s attention.
This phrasing approach is easy to pull off and adds a cool creative option to your guitar playing for whenever you need it.
Get good at moving across the fretboard like in the riff above very quickly by:
- Watching where your fretting is about to go (rather than where it is lower on the neck) to prepare your mind for the big position shift.
- Practice playing one note of the lower part of the riff followed immediately by the note exactly an octave above it.
- Play the lower part, then just one or two notes of the higher part. Then slowly add more notes as the transition becomes smoother.
Play Speed Guitar Riffs With More Precision Using Excellent Palm Muting Like A Pro
Using consistent palm muting is the sign of pro rhythm guitar technique. This means you consistently palm mute using the same amount of pressure and in the same location of the strings (unless you purposefully intend to achieve a specific sound).
Fact: Most guitarists have very sloppy palm muting and don’t even know it.
A great way to ensure your palm muting is consistent is to record yourself, like so:
- Record yourself picking the open string using light, medium and heavy palm muting. Then listen back to hear how each approach sounds different than the other.
- Then record yourself playing a short guitar riff (that you can play without mistakes) 10 times in a row. Listen back to it closely to hear if your palm muting is consistent. Also pay attention to your picking hand location – it has a tendency to move when fretting hand moves.
Hearing inconsistencies in your palm muting becomes natural after just a few times practicing with this approach. This makes it so you correct yourself automatically and play with consistent palm muting in all of your guitar riffs.
Get help correcting subtle mistakes in your rhythm guitar playing to play with speed and accuracy using this free rhythm guitar test.
Play Guitar Riffs With Speed And Melody Using Repeating Open Strings
A fun and easy way to play cool speed guitar riffs is using a repeating open string in between notes. This also serves as excellent practice for consistent palm muting:
Practice this guitar riff above using palm muting where indicated. Then try it using no palm muting, heavy palm muting and any variation of the two that you can think of.
Riffs like these add tons of speed into your playing with little effort and sound awesome. Improvise your own riffs by simply using an open string and the notes of your favorite scale for a great practice warm up.
Get more cool ideas for how to play killer speed guitar riffs by reading this rhythm guitar article.