How to shred?

[D1smemberer]

Hi , I have been playing guitar for almost 2 years now but I have learned online so I haven't gotten that good at guitar. I want to learn from the beginning so I can get good at the basics first. So I'm doing all the lessons in this app in order. My goal is to become a shredder but I'm not sure what I should learn so I get better at shredding. Can you guys suggest what I should practice to be able to shred and play really fast solos? My favourite guitarists are John Petrucci, Synyster Gates , Jason Richardson , Nik Nocturnal and the guitarists from Archspire Dean and Tobi. I want to play these artists' songs. Should I make a practice routine? If yes, what things should I add in it?

 

[Andrew Milner]

Well, shredding can be done using a number of techniques and a number of scales. Based on the info from the site, I'd suggest getting accustomed to the following:

- 7 positions of the major scale
- pentatonic scales
- sweep picking

When you have a good grasp of these, you can jump into Syn's etudes on legato, sweep picking and so on and cry yourself to sleep get better at shredding.

 

[Låww]

The tldr of learning to shred is just keeping at it, and practising songs that you enjoy a lot from the artists you named that include this. A very good source for routines and exercises in order to learn how to better play guitar apart from the synner school is the youtube channel named Bernth, where you can find many videos explaining guitar exercises and their use cases!

 

[Chris Johnston]

There are some great answers above If your goal is to play quicker, the first thing you'll want to get practicing is playing to a metronome and making sure everything you play is clean at a very slow tempo.

Basically, anyone can play fast, but what makes the speed sound good is the synchronisation of the left & right hands and the cleanness of what you're playing.

Working on your left & right hand muting when using distortion is key for this - especially with Syn's eco picking & sweeping style. You should work very slow, with a metronome and make sure you can play whatever you want to be shredding, really slow and controlled. Being in complete control of what you play, rather than upping the speed, is what will really help your speed in the end

 

[William B.]

Is shredding like making combos with the guitar?

 

[Bdog1466IBZJM]

i would honestly just say to find some exercises to help sync up your hands, that’s what I’ve been doing for only a couple months, and my playing ability skyrocketed.
Personal opinion; knowing the notes means nothing if your hands are out of sync. Good luck!

 

[mericksonmusic]

There are some simple patterns within each scale shape that you can use to go faster on the fretboard, usually without much motion. One example would be taking three notes on one string then moving to the string above or below in a triplet pattern. More of a flashy trick, but sounds pretty cool!

also yes metronome practice and start slow as molasses