Quotes from John Petrucci

Don't get stuck in a rut. If you started yesterday's practice playing arpeggios, start today's with scales. Also, try to make a song out of what you're practicing to help break the tedium.

I always get frustrated when I hear someone talking about sweep arpeggios. Though there are plenty of licks and examples out there, no one has ever really broken down the mechanics of the technique. As a result, guitarists have had to figure them out by trial and error.

Chopin was a master of melody, harmony and voice leading - the art of smoothly moving from chord to chord.

You can go on YouTube now and see young kids with massive technique. There's literally eight and nine year olds who can play amazingly. There's no limit to where you can take it.

I've always employed a melodic style with my leads, placing strong emphasis on infusing romantic sensibilities into what I'm trying to say. Those big, epic melodies come from influences like Pink Floyd, Journey, Marillion... bands that have these guitar parts that are just soaring!

There should always be some sort of conclusion or climax to your solos.

Your solos should be as interesting as any other part of the song.

Where I lived, on Long Island, you had the radio stations that always played Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd, Black Sabbath and AC/DC and all that. I grew up on all that stuff.

The guitar is a funny instrument because you have bendable strings and distortion - there's a potential for noise. It is more exposing. Actually controlling the instrument, using proper vibrato, bending notes in tune, not fretting too hard, controlling the noise is a skill in itself that takes many years.

I wanted to go to Berklee College of Music because that's where Steve Vai went - I was total tunnel vision.

You're about to walk on stage and play together for the next few hours so you want to feel connected and make sure that everyone is in the same head space; a good head space.

I don't know if people know this about me, but I'm into Billy Joel. I'm a huge fan of his and always have been. He's just a quintessential songwriter of our time. Talk about a storied career - so many classic songs and great albums.

We are very, very fortunate to have built a career based on playing the kind of music we play. In a lot of ways, it's a very eclectic style. It's not pop; it's not mainstream; so the fact that we have been able to have the career that we have had internationally, with all the success we've had, it's like a miracle. It's amazing.

When you reminisce, you don't say, 'Remember that time you got sued by so-and-so?' No, you say, 'Remember when we played here and it was unbelievable, and we went out for that incredible meal and that funny thing happened?' Those are the important moments.

To me, there's no question that using a metronome develops your speed and accuracy. If you're learning scales or you're jamming on parts that you can't quite pull off, it's a must.

I listen to somebody like Shawn Lane, and unfortunately he is no longer with us, but I hear him playing and I am like, 'That is just absolutely ridiculous.'

In the neighborhood that I grew up in - in New York on Long Island - there were a lot of musicians. For some reason, that time in history in our town in New York, everybody played. So it was all around me.

As a guitar player, you never stop learning, never stop honing your skills.

One very important side of my playing lies in rhythm; I have a very percussive style. It's one I've developed with Dream Theater over the years, and requires the guitar to be very locked into the rhythm of the drums... way more than what would normally entail.

When you use a metronome, you'll start to notice where the notes are falling, if they're on the beat, behind the beat, between the beat, and so on.

When you watch your favorite guitarists play, notice how little their hands and fingers move sometimes. The economy of motion can't be overemphasized.

Before you can apply chromatic ideas to scales and arpeggios, you have to get the chromatic scale itself under your fingers. You should learn it up and down the neck, and become comfortable with the fingerings.

The style of music that we're playing, this progressive metal style, has always been an upstream battle for us. We don't usually get a lot of commercial exposure.

I'll never forget when I heard Steve Morse and the Dixie Dregs for the first time. I was just blown away, and it changed my whole approach to guitar.