Any Lesson/Advice in developing a vibrato? - Tomo Fujita Guitar Wisdom Forums

a lot of people use vibrato differently, some do it fast, some do it slow, some do it very subtle and others to it very heavy.

some TIPS: start the vibrato a little bit after you play the notes, because, vibrato changes the pitch of the notes (it goes up and back down again), so if you start doing the vibrato IMMEDIATELY then youre making it difficult for the listener to hear the EXACT notes youre playing.

try this exercise:
start with fret 7 on the G-string
and play with your ring finger,
then place your index & middle fingers right after your index finger.
(so that theyre in a row).
basically, your index and middles fingers DONT technically HAVE to be EXACTLY on the frets, they can be a little bit on top or over,
it doesnt really matter as long as theyre placed beside your ring finger.

Also, put your THUMB on TOP of the neck of the guitar.
this allows your thumb to act as a 'pivoting' point for your vibrato.
[However, be sure to understand that Tomo does not recommend placing your thumb on the top of the neck. from my understanding he believes you can actually get more 'style' without doing that. but im just explaining to you the basics of how i was taught].

so placing your thumb on top of the neck will allow you to have a steady grip on the guitar as your fingers push the strings upward or downward for the vibrato effect. The thumb will act as a pivoting point for the entire vibrato.

for the vibrato effect be sure to keep your ring finger fretted down and move the fingers slightly up or down
(you can do it both ways up or down).

sidenote: most players tend to move the string downwards but if youre playing on a high string such as the highE string then youll bend the string off of the neck fo the guitar if you attempt to vibrato the string downward so in this case, on the high E string for example, you can only do it upwards bc otherwise you will slide off the fretboard.

its very important that you make the vibrato movement FROM your HAND and maybe a little bit of your arm AND NOT from the FINGERS.

doing it from your fingers is way less controllable than from the hand or arm.

Also make sure that you keep pressing down and move the strings a little up and down again just slightly and keep your thumb on top of the neck at all times.

try this exercise: play the Aminor pentatonic scale and 'add' a little vibrato to each note.
follow the scale up and down, adding vibrato to each note.

sidenote: you can also add vibrato to chords. if you play an a-minor chord in open string, for example, if you kind of just shake the fingers a little bit then the guitar will shake as well and the shaking of the guitar will also result in vibrato amongst alll the strings. and if you shake your hand youre also going to shake the strings you fret down.
so, sometimes you can literally shake the guitar itself to get vibrato, which will help you add more 'movement' to the notes.

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