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Limbering Up

The limbering up exercise is one that will prepare your mighty index finger for the barre chord madness that is heading its way.

This exercise, which for the record is most certainly not musical, serves an extremely important role in developing a feel for barre chords and the strength necessary to create clean sounding ones.

The focus of this exercise is twofold: 1.) You will be identifying how much pressure is necessary to get good solid sound out of your barre chords, and 2.) By implementing the “button” motion on your index finger you will give the muscles involved in barre chords a workout.

It is with time that this exercise shows its benefits so if barre chords are your nemesis make sure to work this into your repertoire.

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STEP 1: Watch the video to learn the bite-sized piece of music
STEP 2: Click the “PLAY” tab below the video to play along with Tony until you can do it on your own.


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Responses

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  1. This is a good exercise and I didn’t have any problem with it. what I don’t get is, he says he will take you through various speeds but to me, the speed never changes. I know you can change the speed of the video, but that not what he says.

  2. I can definitely see the benefit of this exercise BUT try as I might my finger doesnt fit across the entire fret board. I can get from A down to high E, so I HAVE to move it slightly.

  3. Put this exercise to the side for a bit as it is not an easy one, yet I do come back form time to time to practice it. Still hard for me at this time. I know I will be successful in time, yet not rushing this one. I do find that when I play the F chord barring the hi e and b strings with the index finger I am getting better. As the line goes from the martial arts TV series, Kung Fu, from the 70s, with David Carradine, “Patience grasshopper!”

  4. Hand cramp! Holy cow. Was okay for about 5 minutes then my hand started to cramp. I think I’m pressing too hard on the neck with my thumb.

  5. Wow, I wish I had started this course before the basics course with the F major and B major Barre cords – I might have felt less frustrated LOL.

  6. BTW, I just came from the Open D Tuning lesson were you tune your guitar to D Major and indeed I was using the full finger barre in that tuning to play chord progressions. It was actually pretty fun!

  7. I’m missing the tip of my left index finger. If I stretch to cover the low E, then it takes a lot more pressure not to mute those high strings. Best sound for the upper 5 strings is to just Barre 5, because then the finger bends naturally at the PIP joint.

  8. I’ve been reading some of the responses how some of you out there are having a hard time with this barring lessen, yes its not easy at first your forearm hurts and your hand crams but its worth it, if other guitar players we all can do it to

  9. I wish Tony would have talked about using the fretting arm to help get the barre cord vs just using the first ringer and thumb for pressure.

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Responses

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

  1. This is a good exercise and I didn’t have any problem with it. what I don’t get is, he says he will take you through various speeds but to me, the speed never changes. I know you can change the speed of the video, but that not what he says.

  2. I can definitely see the benefit of this exercise BUT try as I might my finger doesnt fit across the entire fret board. I can get from A down to high E, so I HAVE to move it slightly.

  3. Put this exercise to the side for a bit as it is not an easy one, yet I do come back form time to time to practice it. Still hard for me at this time. I know I will be successful in time, yet not rushing this one. I do find that when I play the F chord barring the hi e and b strings with the index finger I am getting better. As the line goes from the martial arts TV series, Kung Fu, from the 70s, with David Carradine, “Patience grasshopper!”

  4. Hand cramp! Holy cow. Was okay for about 5 minutes then my hand started to cramp. I think I’m pressing too hard on the neck with my thumb.

  5. Wow, I wish I had started this course before the basics course with the F major and B major Barre cords – I might have felt less frustrated LOL.

  6. BTW, I just came from the Open D Tuning lesson were you tune your guitar to D Major and indeed I was using the full finger barre in that tuning to play chord progressions. It was actually pretty fun!

  7. I’m missing the tip of my left index finger. If I stretch to cover the low E, then it takes a lot more pressure not to mute those high strings. Best sound for the upper 5 strings is to just Barre 5, because then the finger bends naturally at the PIP joint.

  8. I’ve been reading some of the responses how some of you out there are having a hard time with this barring lessen, yes its not easy at first your forearm hurts and your hand crams but its worth it, if other guitar players we all can do it to

  9. I wish Tony would have talked about using the fretting arm to help get the barre cord vs just using the first ringer and thumb for pressure.

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