Most novice guitar players are easily recognized by their choppy sound. The ability to  sustain notes is essential to good guitar playing and it is achievable at any level, but it doesn’t come without attention to every note. By focusing on this skill in your daily warm-up, you will develop the strength and awareness that you need to create a consistently connected sound in everything you play.

Begin your warm-up exercise by playing the first fret of the first string with your first finger, followed by the second fret with your second finger, third fret with your third finger and fourth fret with your fourth finger. As you play each note, keep the previous finger or fingers down, so that by the time you have the fourth finger down, all four of your left hand fingers are pressing a fret. Repeat the top note (fourth finger) and come down one note at a time (fingers 4,3,2,1). Think and count in 4/4 time, playing one note per click, which means you will be playing quarter notes. If this exercise is easy to perform well, try playing it in eighth notes, using the pick with a down, up alternating motion. Be sure to keep a strict beat with the metronome and press only as hard as you need to in order to produce a clean sound.

Move to the second position (first finger on the second fret) without pausing and repeat the exercise. Continue to repeat the exercise, moving up one fret at a time, without pause. Go up the fretboard as far as you can comfortably play and then repeat the exercise on each of the remaining strings. If you don’t have the time to complete the exercise on every string, do one, two or three stings a day. Go slowly enough to produce a clean sound and guard against tension in your left hand.

Each note should flow smoothly into the next note. Listen carefully for any notes that sound choppy, paying special attention to the notes you play with your fourth finger – those are the notes that people most commonly cut off, due to the fact that the fourth finger is generally the weakest one. Remember that the most important thing that you do as a guitar player is to listen, and in this exercise you will be listening for consistency in the volume and sound quality of the notes and a smooth, uninterrupted line (sustain). Go however slowly you need to go to meet this goal – this is not a speed exercise!

If you find that you are unable to reach the optimum place on each fret, try starting the exercise on the fifth fret and going up from there. As your fingers become stronger and your hand learns to stretch, you can go back to the lower positions. Make your stretches gentle and be persistent, but never force your hand into painful or difficult positions.

It may take days, weeks or months to master this exercise. Don’t worry about how quickly you progress, just relax and get into the process. Warming up this way will help your practice session to be efficient and satisfying.

When you feel that you are playing the exercise well on 12 frets of all six strings, you can move up to the full exercise, which follows:

1 2 3 4

4 3 2 1

1 4 3 4

2 4 3 4

Each time you put the 4^th finger down, put all of the other fingers in place as well. Hold each finger down until it is necessary to lift one or more fingers in order to expose the next note. By keeping your fingers down in this way, you will increase your hand strength and finger independence, which will serve you in everything that you play. Play steady eighth notes with a down/up alternating pick direction. Remember to use the metronome and listen!