Improving Your Speed Using a Metronome

Set your metronome to 60 bpm (beats per minute), one note each second.

Once you can play the exercise perfectly at this speed, you are ready to increase your speed. You can now set your tempo to 63 bpm. After five minutes, increase to 66 bpm, continue until you reach 75 bpm. The next day, your setting should start at 5 bpm slower than your maximum of the day and go as high as 15 bpm more than your starting speed for the day. Continue daily until you reach a tempo of 120 bpm. Once you have mastered 120 bpm perfectly, go back to a 60 bpm setting, but play two notes per beat. Playing two notes per beat, proceed again as above until you have reached 120 bpm (never progressing more than 15 bpm per day, of course.) Once you reach 120 bpm, reset to 60 bpm and play four notes per beat, working your way to 120 bpm again. Usually you can master any exercise or passage within 30 days and your speed will be impressive.

Leif Nelson

Salt Lake City, Utah