play fast, but clean?

the conventional wisdom is to focus more on the clean aspect. pull it back if you have to until you are at a comfortable rate that you can play without straining, and move the bpm up slowly, always making sure you can play it without over straining.
as you keep playing, your fingers will develop their own intelligence and muscle memory, naturally finding the next note quicker with less effort. personally, i often try to play fast, but i almost never try to play as fast as i can. what i find happening instead is that as my fingers loosen up and i become more familiar with what i'm playing, i naturally speed up without even thinking about it or trying to, until i'm actually just tearing around unconsciously. but when i push myself, i find myself often frustrated and playing sloppily. basically what i'm saying is don't force it.

The solution is to play some chordings...then shadow them with the appropriate runs.

Learn to chew what yer eatin', in other words!

Cat

Another suggestion... Practice slow (with a metronome) and focus on accuracy. then speed up faster than the desired speed. And then when you pull back to the correct tempo it will feel like everything is slowing down for you. It takes some reps, but this approach has worked for me. Kind of like practicing pool on a large table, and then when I get to a small bar table, the angles all seem easier.

Good luck and keep it up!

Yep, it is more important to play precisely and clean than fast. If you practice faster than you can actually play you will develop into a sloppy player. Take your time, practice with a metronome at a speed you can play without mistakes. Then slowly speed up, maybe 4 BPM at a time. When it gets too fast and you start making mistakes, slow down about 10 BPM and start over. If you practice consistently using this method, in a month or two you will probably be able to play runs about 20 BPM faster than when you began. As you start getting really fast, it then takes even longer to gain speed. But just stay with a good method, concentrate on playing clean and precise, and you will get there. It takes time! :D

thanks guys you are a great group of people

no doubt. but full disclosure partially cancels of the scumbagginess. not all. just some.

i firebomb third world orphanages and put it up on my pay website http://www.barbecuebabies.com . my heroes are godzilla and dick cheney.

edit: lol. you gotta love the censor on this site some times.

I'm an older dude and I don't want to come across like an old "fuddy duddy" but here's my take on playing fast. First of all, nothing sounds good if it isn't clean so that's the real priority here. My thing is that I play from deep down in my soul and bring out my inner feelings through the guitar. I can play fast if I want to and some things I play are faster than other things but I can't "feel" it right if I just try to play as fast as I can all the time. I see these speed players who are technically brilliant, but how do they get a chance to really feel what they're playing? Just my opinion so take it easy on me guys.(and girls)

I'm an older dude and I don't want to come across like an old "fuddy duddy" but here's my take on playing fast. First of all, nothing sounds good if it isn't clean so that's the real priority here. My thing is that I play from deep down in my soul and bring out my inner feelings through the guitar. I can play fast if I want to and some things I play are faster than other things but I can't "feel" it right if I just try to play as fast as I can all the time. I see these speed players who are technically brilliant, but how do they get a chance to really feel what they're playing? Just my opinion so take it easy on me guys.(and girls)

playing fast for the sake of playing seems to be the trend.
I don't understand the satisfaction of shredding meaningless notes for hours.

well, i grew up in the 80s, so i'm ok with the shredding. what i don't like is strict patterns or arpeggios that don't go anywhere. if someone can play at a million miles an hour and have it do something interesting with the progression and rhythm(like john mclaughlin does), i'd love it, but a lot of times i'll listen to these metal guys doing really boring stuff at lighting speeds and just get irritated and bored. oh, here comes another minor arpeggio on the one. oh wait, another minor arpeggio on the one. and back to the first one.

as good as he is, John M seems to spend a fair amount of time playing fast for the sake of playing fast. true, he is going somewhere, but I've often found myself thinking "hey, why is the pedal always to the floor with this guy?" I expect a person who claims his music to be spiritually influenced to pause and reflect once in a while. maybe Shakti is all we get of that.

a lot of people have a lot of different ideas about spirituality. what he's influenced by, especially indian sitar music, is generally very fast music. then again, maybe he is pausing a lot, and he just thinks faster than the rest of us.

Ah, to be 15 again and be able to practice for 2 hours a day, every day...

Everyone here is correct - play slow and clean.

Although, since I started late I subscribe to the "more distortion so you can't here my broken chords" theory.

I prefer playing what sounds like 'music' and 'melody' to my ears. Sometimes it is slow, sometimes normal and sometimes fast. All sounds good if played well.