Permutation exercises

[Carl23]

In other lives, I am a percussionist and mathematician.

Many percussion exercises are based on permutations.

so, here is something I came up with based on the 1 finger 2 frets rule.

For the first two fingers, the closest spacing is a minor second, one fret next to the other. The widest spacing is a minor 3rd/augmented 2nd (covers 4 frets).

the permutations would look something like this (numbers = fingers, placement =frets)

-12-
-1-2
1--2

I combined this with some string crossing ideas to produce this PDF.

I started on the 7th fret to have close spacing. Ideally you would work you way back down to the 1st fret to expand the physical spacing of the frets.

This is a physical exercise only (though some interesting melodies/arpeggios do come out of this.

Any comments/corrections appreciated. I am not used to working in Tab format.

Carl

[Gary Leonard]

Mike Marshall has stuff like this in his finger busters. Always fun when you get to those hard fingers, the ring and pinky. I need to start doing them again, as it will certainly help me to stretch more, which will help me with me longer scale OM.

[Heady]

I am a rusty old viola player who picked up the mandolin a few weeks ago. I just this morning discovered a sheet music app and the free version let me put down on paper something I've been doing as a warm-up. I have trouble finding the right string when I need it so I do this first. I'm working on a set of these in the app and if any one is interested, I can put them all in a post when I'm done. It's super basic because I'm brand new - you will get the gist just from looking at this first one, but I'll post them all - I am on the spectrum so playing with permutations is kind of like my therapy. I'm a scientist who has been away from a non-verbal form of expression for too long - and between playing and conjuring up exercises for myself, I've been much happier at work this fall.

[Mark Gunter]

I am a rusty old viola player who picked up the mandolin a few weeks ago. I just this morning discovered a sheet music app and the free version let me put down on paper something I've been doing as a warm-up. I have trouble finding the right string when I need it so I do this first. I'm working on a set of these in the app and if any one is interested, I can put them all in a post when I'm done. It's super basic because I'm brand new - you will get the gist just from looking at this first one, but I'll post them all - I am on the spectrum so playing with permutations is kind of like my therapy. I'm a scientist who has been away from a non-verbal form of expression for too long - and between playing and conjuring up exercises for myself, I've been much happier at work this fall.

Great story, thanks for sharing. And do share the rest of your exercises when you're ready. One of the cool things about this forum is hearing about others' goals and progress.

[Carl23]

Very nice. I thought about doing something similar with what I was working on... but the stretch would be crazy!
Basically, imagine taking what you wrote, but playing it with no open strings!

Your exercise looks like a great way to focus on which string you are on... I have a similar issue. (totally going to steal this) ;-)

Have you thought about changing the pattern so that you could try different picking patterns?

say, find something with triplets and try patterns on it. (duu / dud-dud / dud-udu... you get the idea) I've found a few classical pieces where the picking choice made a big difference further down the line.

thanks for sharing!

Carl