Get The Most Out Of A Metronome
As we play the guitar, and learn about playing the guitar,
we focus quite a bit on getting the notes right, on getting the elusive electric guitar tone we are after, and about a myriad of things melody related.
Another very important component of really great guitar playing is a good sense of timing and rhythm. These 2 concepts tend to get the short shrift and get overlooked or neglected once in a while. Anyway, each of us has been given our own personal amount of natural instinct for rhythm and timing, some of us have more and some of us have a little less. Like everything else. No matter how much natural talent we have in us for timing, we can always improve with practice and determination. And one essential tool that will definitely help us a lot in this area is the metronome. As soon as you decide you want to learn to play the guitar, and you go out and buy a guitar, an amp, a guitar tuner, some effects pedals, etc, you ought to also pick up and learn how to use a metronome. This is a basic and essential tool that you will use a lot as you learn to be a great guitar player.
When will I use a metronome? you might be asking. Well, you will use a metronome when you practice working on guitar calisthenics like learning to play scales and things really quickly. When you want to play something faster and faster with practice you can use a metronome to benchmark where you are at in your learning,
keep a record of how much progress you are making toward your goal as time goes on, and see where you might need to do some extra work in a certain area.
You will also use a metronome for learning a particular piece of music. When you look at the sheet music for a piece of music, the standard notation will almost always show a number at the beginning like 78, or 120 that tells you the number of beats per minute the song is played at. The tempo of the song. As you start to work out the musical piece on your own before playing it with other musicians, you will use a metronome set to this tempo setting in order to learn the piece correctly.
What kind of metronomes are available to buy?
You have a variety of options open to you as you look for a metronome.
Some can be as simple as a swinging bar that swings back and forth, making a toc sound as it does. Most guitar players opt for some type of electronic metronome. They are easy to use, and they don't cost a lot of money, and they are small enough that they don't take up much space in a guitar case or gig bag.
Here is a photo of an electronic metronome from Sabine. It has a rotary dial that you can use to adjust the tempo from 40 to 208 beats per minute. It runs on a 9 volt battery. It has a series of LED lights that swing back and forth as a way to approximate a swinging metal bar which is a popular style of metronome. The swinging bar and LED lights help to anticipate the beats that are coming. This particular model also has a setting on the dial that will output a the sound of the A string on the guitar, so if you don't have your electronic tuner around, you could use this metronome to tune your guitar if you had to.
This is just one of the many metronome options you have available to you. The important thing is to just pick one you like, get it and use it. Make it a part of your daily practice session and your sense of rhythm and timing will get better and better. And you will be prepared for when you need to learn a piece of music at the tempo marked in the notation.
