Guitar Aerobics: A 52-Week, One-lick-per-day Workout Program for Developing, Improving and Maintaining Guitar Technique Bk/online audio

Final update: after 6 months of working through this book I can say it have improved my playing a lot especially when used in conjunction with fretboard freedom Aerobics and Rhythm Guitar 365. One thing that is clear is that this book can and should be regularly revisited and practiced. I think it will continue to be a fixture in my practice regime as many exercises are excellent warmup exercises. My right hand technique has improved leaps and bounds. Even after months I don’t think I have mastered the material. Week 36 update: 3/4 complete and down the home stretch. As you go through the second half, the exercises do get more difficult, but remain a steady progression. I have not gotten stuck on any particular lesson that I couldn’t at least do 90% speed after 30 minutes of focused practice. Well, except for sweep picking. The great thing about this book, is just when the exercises start to get familiar, they change to something new. So there are similar exercises, which actually helps to integrate what you are learning. Week 26 update: I still really like this book and recommend it. The difficulty of the exercises does get progressively harder. But it’s done in such a gradual manner that you will barely notice if you did each exercise as directed. If anything it became a little easier by the time I got to week 26 since I started as beginner. I have noticed that my bends have become more accurate, and alternate picking string skipping and Travis picking have become noticeably better. Sweep picking and tapping are not as advanced, but that should get more attention in the second half. This book is really focused on technique and right hand practice which is exactly what I wanted. While each exercise is only two or 4 bars, there is a lot going on in each exercise. I would recommend only doing 1-2 hours a day max, and one or two exercises a day. That is more than plenty. Since this book is about building skill and technique as opposed to information, taking it slow and really mastering each exercise is key to getting the most out this book. I would only memorize those licks that you want to integrate into your soloing bag of tricks. I love the approach of this book and the authors other 365 series of books: Rhythm Guitar 365 and Fretboard Freedom. All three books could form the basis of a great daily practice routine. What makes this book and the other 365 books great is that they give you something new to work on every day. This is a great way to engage in deliberate practice and improve your play dramatically. You don’t have to think about or plan your routine, you just need to open the book and go. Guitar Aerobics is an excellent book to really get your technique chops in order. You will see Your picking technique improve dramatically and become intuitive as you work through this book. This book has a rather focused approach on what is covered and I love it for it. It is useful for beginners through intermediate players. I think even advanced players will get a workout out of the latter lessons. I would say it is the easiest of the author’s book in this series. But he gives you lots of reputation to really get the knowledge down cold. You defiantly get your money’s worth. It progresses at a very manageable pace, but If you approach the book as intended every day you have a great way to warmup a daily practice regime. The audio samples are good and very helpful to understand what you need to play. If you really want to supercharge your guitar progress I recommend getting all three of his 365 books and do a lesson or two a day from each for a year, I guarantee you will see dramatic results. Will you be Steve Vai? No, but you will be able to taller Steve Vai’s famous 10 hour practice routine. Don’t skip the audio files, use them to really see how well you are playing.

Ok, I enjoy this book but you have to create you own strategy around it. I like learning a new lesson every day. It motivates me to pick up the guitar and go right to this book and learn something new. It fits exactly to my style of learning. I am not a DVD guy and this helps give me what I need to do to keep progressing my skills. I also am developed my own strategy. I plan on redoing every daily lesson in a 10 week block. So, I start on Week one. By Week 10, I still practice my warm ups on Week 1 on every day and then I go all the way up to the most recent day lesson. Then when I get to the 11th week, I start on warm ups on Week 2 and play them all up to week 11. So, I am constantly practicing each daily exercise to make them more precise. I don't play one and then forget it. I play it every day for 10 weeks straight. Now, I am only up to week 8, I haven't essentially implemented this strategy but for now, it is my plan on doing so. Overall, the book is great for my ability to play and learn. I hope to start his other books when I complete this in August 2017. ***UPDATE#1: I have finished week 26 and still do the past 10 weeks of exercises. I am happy that I half way done and I have a couple things to note. First, my finger strength is really getting good. I can tell because I use one of those gimmicky 4 finger exercise tools and it is getting easier to do it, especially my pinky finger. But I also do daily extra finger exercises outside this book that I copied from YouTube. I am also learning the full Rust in Peace album by Megadeth. I started around the same time, I started guitar aerobics, working in them daily and I have to admit, it is getting easier to play those songs. Don't get me wrong, it has been a lot of work and I am no where near completing those songs but it is slowly getting easier to play. On average, I put in at least 90 minutes a day on guitar. In the past 200 days, I only missed 24 days of playing (11 of which was because I had surgery). I am still excited about this book and already have purchased Fretboard Freedom to start when I finish this book in August (hopefully). *** UPDATE#2: I just finished week 37. I am still progressing along pretty good. As other mentioned the daily lessons get repetitive but I tend to think it reinforces technique over and over to master it. I keep working pretty hard on clarity of notes and precision and I think going over similar structure is really beneficial to developing long term technique. For example, I find sweep picking easier and easier to do and now I implement subtle sweep picking into my improvising. I only have 15 more weeks to go (+10 extra weeks of follow up - as mentioned above) and less than 4 months feels like I am finally seeing the end at the light of the tunnel. I still recommend this book but it does take time to really fully dedicate to it. You really need to commit the time. I have a friend that recommended this book to me and he admires my tenacity at keeping up with it, he says he doubt he could've. With where I am at, I am committed to finishing the book and I started pre-reading Fretboard Freedom, so I can pick up when I finish Guitar Aerobics. ** FINAL UPDATE: Today, I just finished the last lesson. I feel this took my guitar playing ability to play to a whole new level. But this was a lot of work! I can easily tell that I am faster, more precise and my overall fretboard and music knowledge is 100x more than I started this. I am still weaning myself off the final weeks, like I explained above but each lesson, I feel I've mastered each lesson because of the time I took to really listen, practice and learn each lesson. Playing the same lesson over and over for 10 weeks, really helps make you think and sink in all the small thing of each lesson to perfect it. Now, I will start Arpeggio Madness by Rusty Cooley, then in 2 months start Troy Nelson's Fretboard Freedom and repeat Guitar Aerobics for the 2nd time in parallel with Fretboard Freedom. And I've already bought Troy Nelson's Rhythm 365 to start when I finish Fretboard Freedom/Guitar Aerobics tandem in 2018. I can say, I am a total fan of Troy's books and method of learning. If you want to get better at guitar, it is a no brainier. Get this book but be prepared to work!

I think this is a really good book. I wish the audio content that accompanies this book had been organized a little differently, though. This book comes with 2 CDs. The first CD has an audio track for each week. Each weekly track plays thru all the licks for that week so you can hear what they're supposed to sound like once you get really good at them. However, for example, you can't just select Thursday's lesson of week 1 - it's just one audio track for the entire week, so you have to listen thru the previous lessons for that week to get to the one you want (they are very short - just plays the lick for each day, but it is still frustrating to not be able to go directly to the exact lesson you are interested in). Disk 2 is a bunch of metronomes/rhythms at different speeds for each lesson that you can use to help get your timing down. So, for example, this is how you might use them: let's say you're on Friday's lesson of week 2. You put CD1 in and select the track for week 2 to listen to ALL of week 2's licks. Then, you take CD1 out and put CD2 in to play the rhythms/metronomes that go with that lesson (as indicated in the book for each lesson). But, if you want to hear the lick again you have to take out CD2 and put CD1 back in and then play thru the entire week's licks to get to the one you are practicing. What would have been really nice is if there was a separate audio track for each daily lesson that combines the example lick for that lesson along with the accompanying metronomes/rhythms. It's still a good book and the audio content is very helpful, just realize that it's a little cumbersome and frustrating to use the CDs that come with the book. As far as the book itself, there are a couple of things that I really like. First, each day's lesson shows the music with notes, the tab, the chords and the strum/picking pattern. So, if you're familiar with any one of those you can see how it relates to the others. Second are the repeating techniques each week. Every Monday is 'alternate picking', Tuesday is 'string skipping', Wednesday is 'string bending', Thursday is 'arpeggios', Friday is 'sweep picking', Saturday is 'legato' and Sunday is 'Rhythm'. Where appropriate they are related to each other and build upon each other as you progress from week to week. All in all this is a very good book and you will learn a lot of useful techniques. If a little more thought had been given to the organization of the audio content this would have been a top-notch package.

I'm a beginner and have found this book extremely useful. First, what it is not. This book will not teach you to play guitar from scratch. It is not that kind of instruction book. What it will do is improve your knowledge of the fretboard, improve your speed and improve your technique. Actually, it kinda forces you to! The exercises are fantastic, but sometimes strenuous. This is where the sound clips come in as they are often very necessary to help you get it right, at least for me as I often learn by first seeing it on paper, then bring it all together by hearing it played. If you are the same, then you will appreciate the audio as they are very short and to the point. Like I said, it is not an instruction manual, so I use it as a supplement to my regular courses. This is where this book excels. The exercises are stepping stones designed to move you along as a guitar player and make you better, faster and more aware of what you are doing. I do use it every day. That said, with my other courses, I often do not have time to complete a particular exercise in one day/session as intended. That's ok, I just take an extra day or so to perfect the exercise. Some are so good, I go back and practice them as well. No way, I'm going to complete the entire book in a year, and I am just fine with that as I am just getting so much out of it. Though, I'm a beginner, I can see that I will make use of this book for quite some time going back to review exercises, etc. For that reason, I would recommend it for all levels of guitar players. However, if you are a beginner, then it is pretty much a must have for your music book collection.

There seems to be some controversy with this book as to whether it is well-suited for beginners, intermediate players, etc... I'll give my 2 cents worth from a beginner's perspective. First, understand that I have only been playing guitar about 9 months and started a bit late in life. So I'm not some high school kid that picks things up at warp speed and is shredding Yngwie in a few months. I do a lot of reading, though and watch a lot of youtube to understand techniques. This was actually my first real book, though...unless you count the excellent Practical Music Theory pdf from Justin Guitar. Anyway, the point is that the techniques covered in this book were familiar to me even though I had not mastered them. So, I would agree that if you just picked up a guitar yesterday, this book is likely way over your head unless you have someone more experienced available to help walk you through it. It does not "teach" you anything per se, other than to provide exercises/drills to help you hone some really good techniques. The CDs included are helpful. I've only used one so far, but it helps to understand how the exercises are supposed to sound with respect to TIMING. This is one thing I have seen emphasized over and over so I am focusing on timing as I learn new material. As for the exercises themselves, I confess I'm only on week 3 and I've had the book about 4 months. I don't use this book exclusively, though. I revisit it from time to time to go back over the exercises. Some of the exercises are not too difficult and just take some time to get up to speed. I try to get most of them up to 80-100 bpm before moving to the next week. The difficult one for me is sweep picking. It just takes a lot more time than the others. I did peek at some of the more advanced exercises and found them pretty interesting. Some of those are not necessarily that much more difficult, just more notes to play. So overall at this point I'm pretty happy. It provides some good exercises for helping with techniques and it changes things up slightly each week. If you've been playing a little while I think it would be helpful. If you are just starting out, I would recommend something different to actually "teach" you how to play first then come back to this to work on your chops.

This book is great for improving your technical skills on guitar on your own and it also has videos that play how the solo should sound. I would recommend this.

The long and short of my story as a guitar player is that I am by and large self-taught. I am a good student, but a terrible teacher. I have been playing for almost 10 years. The first 3-4 years were basically memorizing chords and the various places to play them along the neck. Bar chords were never very difficult for me, embellishments made sense for the most part, and my rhythm is natural, so by the end of year 4 I could play rhythm to darn near any song I wanted. It didn't sound as good as the original, though, because my technique wasn't good. There were numerous chord versions that I didn't know. And my arpeggio picking was ad hoc at best. The next 3-4 years were, thanks to a good buddy, my introduction to and expansion of pentatonic and blues scales as a mechanism for soloing. Suddenly I needed a buddy or a jam track. Suddenly I was scrapping my Beatles and Jack Johnson tabs for some Pink Floyd and Jimi Hendrix. I could put very, very primitive (but improvised) solos together. But my pinky finger was practically useless. And most importantly, my alternate picking didn't exist. I had lasted 8+ years with innate alternate strumming skills, but could only flat pick my way through boring, slow and predictable solos. Imagine going that long blindly denying yourself 50% of your potential playing speed! Then I had kids and nothing changed for a couple years. Then I found this book, bought it, and got down to business. While some exercises/instructions don't make tons of sense to me, it had vastly improved my speed, fluidity and confidence with both finger work and alternate picking within a week. After a few more weeks, I'm moving up and down the scales and the neck in ways that feel much more creative and fun now. My practice time now consists of way more disciplined, focused and guided exercises that build skill, and way less time fiddling around just learning and playing songs. But the songs I do play sound so much better already. I wish I had bought this book sooner, and I highly recommend it. Coupled with some guidance on chord and fretboard theory and the inevitable youtube tutorials, it'll do wonders for your playing and your enjoyment.

First of all, the exercises are great and build upon each other and are laid out well in a way that makes sense, even if the actual techniques aren't really discussed. 'Sweeping' is just pick in one direction and try not to make the notes ring into each other. You kind of have to figure it out yourself. The audio....sucks. First of all, the entire week exercises are back to back in the same audio file, so you can't loop them. If you use the online tool, the loop tool is garbage. Secondly, the book tells you the BMP you should play the exercises at, but there is no way to set the audio playback at a specific bpm. You can only change from 100%, but it doesn't tell you what 100% means. It's horribly laid out and pretty much a guessing game and a headache. Anyone would common sense could see the audio is all but worthless. Again, great book, but I really wish the audio was created by someone who actually tried to use it to practice.

small well thought out technical challenges for everyday practice. i have many other technique books that require you to work out by yourself a program. easier done than said. this takes all of that stress away.

As you can see. I’m a drummer. (And multi-instrumentalist). I practice snare (on a practice pad) every day with the famous George Stone book, Stick Control. But I also wanted a rigorous book to practice guitar. So I did a bit of research and got this. It’s amazing. I use it every day. I like it so much and have made so much progress in a couple of weeks that I have ordered others in this book series, like Piano Aerobics and Bass Aerobics. In the age of darting around from one disjointed YouTube video to another, nothing beats actual deep methodical and perfectly graduated study and practice like this. Thank you Hal Leonard for persevering. The online player is neat and has good features. Tempo stretch works well enough. And the loop markers perform well. Highly recommended. A bit of background in posture and technique and basic theory is presumed and this isn’t the first book to buy for a player just starting out, IMO. This is for someone who knows their way around the instrument - best if someone advanced has schooled them. Do not practice any aerobics book if you don’t know how to hold and play your instrument ergonomically. For best results, I prefer to play standing up and in front of a mirror (I turn around to the mirror after memorizing the day’s phrase). Anyhow best of luck to anyone with the tenacity to get through this book. Use a metronome. Start slow. If you can’t play it slow you can’t play it fast. Enjoy!

Efficace, consigliato

J'aime beaucoup ce livre, il m'est très utile pour progresser sans professeur. Les exercices concernent la guitare électrique et plus particulièrement pour solistes, seul 1 exercice sur 7 concerne la guitare rythmique. Les autres domaines sont donc, Alternate picking, String skipping, Bending, Arpèges, Sweep picking et Legato. Les exercices sont tous placés dans un contexte musical réel, ce qui est appréciable Les exercices sont très courts, les conseils aussi. Noté que les techniques abordées ne sont pas expliquées en détails, soit il faut les connaitre, ou faire des recherches en ligne. De fait je ne recommande pas pour les grands débutants, mais plutôt pour ceux qui ont 2 ans de guitare ou plus . Perso je ne fais pas un exercice par jour mais j'en travail plutôt 3-4 par jour et je change toute les semaine.

I returned to the guitar 7 years ago after a 30year lag. As a beginner, the book was for me too much at once and after several attempts to make it routine I put it on the book case with the intent to return to it "at some point". Recently I have and I was right to keep it as opposed to relegate to a charity shop. My thoughts for what they are worth... If you are truly just beginning, then hold fire for 6 months or more. Get your hands and fingers toughened up , with an element of independence and basic rhythm. It does favour an electric guitar but don't be put off. You can work through this book with an acoustic (I swap between) and get the benefit. Set aside 5-10minutes only for the exercise. Concentrate on understanding the pattern very slowly and concentrate on getting it to the beat. The goal, get that bit right. It will seem dull and lack musical interest but this is more about skill than wowing the crowd with speed. Set timer and stop. To cement the skill, find a favourite lick that uses the concept of the exercise (I sought out a few bars from Pink Floyd). You don't have to but I found it more interesting to then spend 10 minutes putting the skill into a context of something I knew and therefore more likely to play it when just noodling around. If you try to get perfection at high bpm, you will stay there for a while or get frustrated. Move on and don't dwell; the exercises increase in complexity therefore tackling something harder each week is the progress you need. I was tempted to go back a few weeks and see if I was faster. I wasn't but was able to pick up the tempo by about 30% within 10minutes. I decided that was interesting but then just proves I am progressing in ability by following the program. As mentioned I returned to this recently so have been playing for many years. I started at the beginning but did two exercises a day as some I could master quickly. I did struggle on some (stuff I had avoided in the past). If you are an intermediate then the choice is yours. The author suggests entry points and I was tempted but decided that accelerating through the stuff I could do was better that ignoring it as I did have to work out some bad habits. My conclusion, this is a good structured routine that is varied, relevant to pretty much anything you may want to play, will give you a great sense of rhythm / technique and does not need you to spend hours a day. I give 5 stars only but I don't think it is truly for a start out beginner. As with an aerobics class (I have done one or two), you need to get the steps right in your mind apply to the rhythm before you can go crazy.