Greetings fellow guitar player. I hope you are practicing as you read this post. But anyway, I this want to talk about practicing proper technique with a metronome. I finally had to examine and critique my technique on playing the guitar. One of the very first ways I noticed what I was doing a lot, was while having the pick in my hand, playing a series of notes, the side of my picking hand would constantly rest on the pick guard while playing the guitar. Playing this way, was to keep as little movement in my picking hand as much as possible.
But I realized that was improper technique! Most guitarist play the guitar with their arm or forearm resting on the front body of the guitar to support the picking hand, while their picking hand floating over the neck, middle, and bridge pickups. And this is what I saw from most guitarist. So, I corrected my technique and started playing properly like everybody else. Secondly, I noticed that my fingers when getting ready to play a series of notes or playing a series of notes, I noticed that my left hand (my fretting hand to play notes on the guitar) would be laid face flat facing the strings. I done realized that your fretting hand is supposed to be arched and you are supposed to play with your fingertips. But, me... my fingers were never arched. My fingers were always laid flat across the fret board and never arched high in the air when playing a series of notes. And so I was never taught that your are supposed to play with your finger tips of your fingers, and that your fretting hand is never supposed to be laid flat when playing a series of notes or any note. Period!
So, now I practice proper technique with my fretting hand and wrist is bent now to the point where my fretting hand and fingers are arched; and I play with my finger tips now with my hand and wrist bent and fingers are curled up creating a arched and are high in the air. It has taken me some hours practicing getting used to playing the guitar this way, but results were far beyond what I imagined! And so I only noticed a few guitar players that were actually playing the guitar that way. And I mean a few! So when I corrected my technique, I started playing and practicing those techniques with a metronome. So what I do with the metronome, I would set it to 60 bpm and set the metronome to 2/4 time signature. So instead of hearing 1/4 time signature or 3/4 or 4/4 time signature. I'd set the metronome to a 2/4 time signature and practice quarter notes, eight notes, eight note triplets, sixteenth notes, etc... But setting the time signature this way (2/4 time signature) it actually helps you understand the metronome that much better. For it is like hearing a drummer hitting the snare and then bass drum. Anyway, later keep practicing!
