Tonight I have just completed (and am happy with my standard) the first five lessons of a "Finger picking guitar" course, totally different from the little bit of strumming I did years ago.
Thoroughly enjoyed it even though it has taken a while to get the old bent and stiff fingers moving again, it does not help that any practice/learning is done late at night when all other chores have been completed and my faculties are not always at their best (which is most of the time according to my loved one!).
Still onwards and upwards, I now need to ready the next few lessons on the old laptop over the coming days.
I must admit that after cleaning the many inches of dust of the instrument and breaking many strings trying to attach them to it then struggling to tune it (which involved breaking more strings) I nearly gave up before I had even started!
Well done, Trev. If at first you don't succeed.....
A friend's husband taught me, but I struggled with the F chord. I haven't played for years and wouldn't know my way around a guitar now. My middle son is musical and plays. When he was first playing, all we heard was The House of the Rising Sun!
I assume you have steel strings? They are mean to get used to.
... the last time I played guitar must be nearly 30 years ago! My parents bought me a guitar when I was 12 but I never learned how to play for at least 5 years because there was no one to teach me (and there were no "beginners books" around back then) There was a new music teacher in high school who introduced musical instruments (the previous music teacher was heavy into choirs) and had started up lunch time guitar lessons (for beginners, intermediate, advanced) By then the strings were in a sorry state so I had to find a music shop and get them replaced!
Despite that, I didn't play the guitar much and in the 1990s I went to evening classes at the local college, first to the beginner's class then on to the intermediate class. I preferred the finger picking (is that what it is called) to strumming. I used to enjoy going to the classes as everyone was in the same boat. However, I never felt confident of moving up to the advanced level and sadly the guitar went into storage thereafter.
Yes, if you don't have an incentive to practise (e.g.a class next week) it tends to get left.
Same with my recorders and piano accordion though after playing in pub sessions for a week at a Folk Festival my fingers start to link what my head is humming to the holes on the recorder. I come home vowing to keep it up but...
I now take the accordion to little group (keyboard, concertina + another accordion) so am improving, but must master the left hand buttons. Again I should practise.
The one thing I do work on is choir music. We get an email waiting for us at breakfast time after practise night telling us what we need to know for the next week. So I try to do 30 -60 minutes most days. Takes me a while to get from sight reading (guessing really) to concert ready, but I'm usually there or nearly. 4 concerts a year and a hard one coming up in March. Monteverdi's Vespers - 8 parts + soloists, so even knowing what line I'm supposed to be on needs work.
I've been spending time this week sticking removeable highlighting tape on the copy. Have to pull it all off again before handing it in to go back to the library.
Mo wrote: ↑29 Dec 2023, 17:00
Yes, if you don't have an incentive to practise (e.g.a class next week) it tends to get left.
The problem I have here is there are no classes etc. anywhere near us (our choice to live out in the sticks) also we work to daylight hours so it is often gone 10pm before we sit down and in winter (now) I am still working on the new pens till late and with all the rabbits about to give birth you are constantly checking them so any practice is in short bursts.
I'd like to say the internet makes things easier but we are lucky if our download speed reaches 1 Mps it averages @ 0.4/0.5 and that is when we get a signal (again due to our location).
I put the lessons I am learning into a programme called Tuxguitar so I can play along to it adjusting speed etc. as I (hopefully) improve. Takes a while to do but worth it.
Not too bad thanks, another couple of lessons completed. I have settled into a practice routine where I recap/practice one lesson from the first five as a warm up/focus exercise then move on to the new lesson.
I am currently learning to do small string slides (ONLY spanning up to five frets), but having issues completing it, fingers hurt and I cannot get the string to sound for the length of the slide. Obviously doing something wrong but I have yet to figure out what
Trev62 wrote: ↑13 Feb 2024, 21:26
Obviously doing something wrong but I have yet to figure out what
Maybe someone on https://mudcat.org// would be able to give you a hint. It's a site where people ask about folk and blues (and all sorts else, and just chat)
Trev62 wrote: ↑13 Feb 2024, 21:26
Obviously doing something wrong but I have yet to figure out what
Maybe someone on https://mudcat.org// would be able to give you a hint. It's a site where people ask about folk and blues (and all sorts else, and just chat)
Thanks for the link, I have had a quick look at the site and will join it and see where we go from there, thanks again.
Mo wrote: ↑29 Dec 2023, 17:00
Takes me a while to get from sight reading (guessing really) to concert ready, but I'm usually there or nearly. 4 concerts a year and a hard one coming up in March. Monteverdi's Vespers - 8 parts + soloists, so even knowing what line I'm supposed to be on needs work.
Well Mo, are you concert ready and raring to go? Let us know how you are getting on and how it goes.
Here I have got another couple of lessons completed and am progressing albeit slowly with the next ones. Figured out that my guitar is not actually set up very well so I have taken the strings off and filed/smoothed down the fret bars so I can get the string slides done without ripping my fingers to shreds also lowered the bridge so the strings do not sit so high. These things seemed to have helped and amazingly the guitar still sounds reasonable when attempting to play it!
Mo wrote: ↑29 Dec 2023, 17:00
Takes me a while to get from sight reading (guessing really) to concert ready, but I'm usually there or nearly. 4 concerts a year and a hard one coming up in March. Monteverdi's Vespers - 8 parts + soloists, so even knowing what line I'm supposed to be on needs work.
Well Mo, are you concert ready and raring to go? Let us know how you are getting on and how it goes.
Concert tomorrow. So if I don't know it now I never will. The notes and words (in Latin) are OK ish but entries are hard with so much going on
Trev62 wrote: ↑13 Mar 2024, 21:27
Here I have got another couple of lessons completed and am progressing albeit slowly with the next ones. Figured out that my guitar is not actually set up very well so I have taken the strings off and filed/smoothed down the fret bars so I can get the string slides done without ripping my fingers to shreds also lowered the bridge so the strings do not sit so high. These things seemed to have helped and amazingly the guitar still sounds reasonable when attempting to play it!
Mo wrote: ↑22 Mar 2024, 20:18
Concert tomorrow. So if I don't know it now I never will. The notes and words (in Latin) are OK ish but entries are hard with so much going on
then struggling to tune it (which involved breaking more strings) I nearly gave up before I had even started!
