Warm-ups and exercises are a crucial component of a musician’s toolbox, they help keep the musician safe and healthy as well as improving overall technique and ability.
Although I am not a pianist, I am composing and producing, therefore it helps a great deal to understand how to play basics and use the keys to visualise aspects of theory (e.g. sharps and flats being different coloured keys to regular notes). What playing piano can also aid with is finger strength, particularly for the little fingers and ring fingers; these aren’t often used in daily life which means they are much weaker – not ideal for any instrumentalist. What this exercise is intended for is freeing up hand movements, warming them up, and giving each finger a greater level of independence. As a guitarist/bassist, I need stronger and more agile fingers to help me play better; this exercise will help me achieve that as long as I remember to perform it.
As an aspiring bassist, it’s crucial that I have enough strength in my fretting hand to be able to press down and hold every fret that I need to, with whichever finger I need to – even including my little finger. This simple exercise from guitargearfinder.com[4] aims to build strength, and performing to a metronome helps improve my sense of timing. It is a basic technique currently which will help but allows room for expansion as I improve and become stronger in my hands. As a clarification, this exercise is usually done for a few minutes at a time to warm up the hands, I just shortened it for the sake of the video.
Continuing on from the last fretting exercise I have been attempting a somewhat more advanced version; this involves moving up and down strings as well as moving up and down the fretboard. Like the one before, this aims to improve strength and dexterity in my left hand and fingers to allow me to play more confidently as well as ensuring that I get as clean a sound as possible, removing the nasty sound of fret buzz. I will begin to do this exercise more frequently and, with any luck, I should be seeing steady progress made.