If you’re learning how to play guitar its almost sure you have read or heard something about “arpeggios”. In this post we will tell you what they are and how to play them.

What are Arpeggios?
Arpeggios are just like chords but played note by note.

Here we have a G major chord:

3 – - – - – - – - – e
3 – - – - – - – - – B
4 – - – - – - – - – G
5 – - – - – - – - – D
5 – - – - – - – - – A
3 – - – - – - – - – E

And here we have a G major arpeggio:

- – - – - – - 3 – - – - e
- – - – - – 3 – - – - – B
- – - – - 4 – - – - – - G
- – - – 5 – - – - – - – D
- – - 5 – - – - – - – - A
- 3 – - – - – - – - – - E

One of the most famous rock arpeggios is the Metallica’s “Nothing Else Matters” intro… in fact, that was the first arpeggio i ever learned, it’s easy and sounds great, you’ll learn that exercise later on this post.

How to Play Arpeggios
Play one string at time, note by note. If you’re using distortion be sure to mute each string you play with your hand’s palm before you play the next string to avoid horrible buzz… unless you want to create that buzz for some kind of effect in a song.

Arpeggio Exercises
This video shows you how to play the Metallica’s “Nothing Else Matters” intro arpeggio… is a great exercise to learn how to play arpeggios.

Here you have Pantera’s “Cemetery Gates” intro arpeggio… great exercise if you mastered the previous lesson.

You can apply some advanced techniques like Sweep Picking to arpeggios and they’ll sound really awesome, but we will be talking about that in the future.
Hope this helps you to understand what arpeggios are and how to play them,