How to get less rusty

I’ve been playing more guitar recently and one thing that’s helped me get less rusty is learning other people’s solos. Guitar was my principal instrument at Berklee College of Music and I played for multiple hours a day when I was there. Here’s a video of me playing some music from Banjo Kazooie that I recorded while at Berklee. After I graduated I played less and less guitar and more piano. So I got a little rusty.

But I’ve been learning solos from different guitarists and they’ve helped me get less rusty with my technique and with my knowledge of the fretboard. I started learning songs by The Black Keys and solos by their guitarist Dan Auerbach. I started with these because they’re fairly simple and aren’t very fast. They’re pentatonic based so they refreshed my memory of those shapes. Next I started learning some songs by Royal Blood and some solos by the bassist Mike Kerr. Their riffs are a little faster and a little more involved so that was a good next step after The Black Keys. Then I started learning solos from songs by Band of Skulls and their guitarist Russell Marsden. Now I’m learning songs by Guthrie Govan and Deep Purple, as well as solos by Ritchie Blackmore.

So why did I chose these specific people?

First reason is that I’m a fan of their music, but I did learn songs by these people in this order for another reason. The reason I started with The Black Keys and then went to other similar rock bands is because I knew the technique wouldn’t be difficult for me. I’d learned more involved songs when at Berklee, so I knew these would be easy enough to start with.

Then I progressively moved to more difficult and more difficult music. Royal Blood’s stuff is slightly faster and more involved than The Black Keys. Same with Band of Skulls.

Now I’m learning some solos by Guthrie Govan and Ritchie Blackmore, which are pretty shred-y solos. They’ll definitely be the most difficult. They also move around the guitar the most. The solos in songs by Band of Skulls that I’ve learned stay within a few pentatonic shapes. Ritchie Blacakmore’s stuff tends to use a lot of the fretboard. Same goes for Guthrie Govan.

So if you’re rusty on an instrument here’s what you can to do get less rusty:

1. Make a list of some songs you want to learn
2. Start with a song that you know will be incredibly easy
3. Choose pieces that are progressively harder
4. Repeat step 3 until you’re amazing at playing

I think the most important step in doing this is starting with pieces that are easy. Start with pieces that are incredibly easy. Songs that you’d likely be able to learn in a few listenings or by sight reading. Something that doesn’t have any challenging sections. A song you could learn and play well in a day.

Think of this as the warm up, but rather than a warm up lasting 5-10 minutes it lasts a few days. Start with the easy stuff to refresh your memory of technique and of the instrument. You don’t want to struggle at the beginning. Don’t even choose pieces you used to play all the time that used to be easy. It won’t be easy if you’ve had some time off practicing. And there isn’t much worse than thinking you’ve regressed because you haven’t practiced in a number of months.

You likely won’t have regressed much if at all, it’s just that you’re a little rusty. Give yourself a week or two back practicing regularly to get back to where you were. Then try to play pieces you used to play all the time.

I promise it’ll feel much better because you may have regressed a little bit or forgotten some parts of the song, but you’ll likely be able to play most of it almost as easily as you could before. Definitely with some practice it’ll come back.

So start with the easy stuff.

ISJ