Exercises

Here are some exercises that can be practised daily, they will improve agility, speed and accuracy of playing across the fret board. Play them slowly to start with and gradually build up speed. Accuracy and clarity of the note is more important than speed though so don't try to play these at a hundred miles an hour straight away, spend a lot of time practising them before you try to play at silly speeds.

Very simple ones to start with:


Ni Re Ga Ma Dha Ni Sa'
Sa' Ni Dha Pa Ma Pa Ma Ga Re Sa


Practice this one starting in the middle of the fretboard at Ni and playing the scale up to high Sa and then travel back down again. This is very basic, and is just the scale for yaman but this is a good little exercise to start with and can take a deceptively long time to get it accurately every time, especially when you start playing it at speed.

Play the same but with double notes. You can do this with a whole bunch of different right hand strokes so practice a variety of them, maybe just start with up/up strokes, and then maybe up/down strokes, and then a quick up/down stroke (diri).


NN  RR  GG  MM  DD  NN  S'S'
S'S'  NN  DD  PP  MM  GG  RR  SS


Next, play the same notes but with four strokes on each note. Again, you can play all sorts of right hand strokes with it, try up/up/up/up, then down/down/down/down, up/down/up/down, quick up/downs and a mixture of all. The diri stroke should be practised a lot, the aim is to have a fast and powerful stroke. The masters play these with machine-gun like speed and intensity.


NNNN  RRRR  GGGG  MMMM  DDDD  NNNN  S'S'S'S'
S'S'S'S'  NNNN  DDDD  PPPP  MMMM  GGGG  RRRR  SSSS


After this you can start playing little patterns of these notes up and down the scale. Try sticking to up/down/up right hand stroke:


NRG  RGM  GMP  MDN  DNS'
S'ND  NDP  DPM  PMG  MGR  GRS


Then you can practice groups of four notes:


NRGM  RGMP  GMDN  MDNS'
S'NDM  NDPM  DPMG  PMGR  MGRS