Posting your first Audio-Video Of You Playing (AVOYP) is a big obstacle for some.
So, we have this topic just for members taking their first steps. If you have never posted before and would prefer not to create your own topic, with the spotlight on you individually, then you are more than welcome to join in here.
A few house rules:
1]
We would like this topic to be for Beginners only, working through Justin’s Beginners Course Grades 1-3.
Ideally your recording will feature you playing one from the hundreds of songs at those grades on the Songs lesson page and / or in the Lessons & Songs App.
2]
We would ask that you limit your uploads in the Beginner’s Safe Space to a maximum of three per person. This could be three recordings of the same song, showing your progress. It could be three different recordings, perhaps from the same grade, perhaps spread out across several grades of learning.
3]
When you reach this maximum, or before if you feel confident enough, we ask that you then begin to use the wider Progress + Performance Audio-Video of You Playing Area.
Additionally, you can make use of the Learning Log section to create your own space for collating your AVOYP recordings, keep a learning diary / journal, post photos of your gear etc in
Jump aboard and join in.
Be positive - about your own progress and towards others.
For my 2025 New Year’s resolution I told myself if I ever regained the use of my arm and hand I’d try to hold myself more accountable to learning music. Music has been almost entirely on hold for 2 years thanks to a mis-diagnosis followed by two surgeries that have gone wrong. Surgery number three–to correct the fallout from number two–was yesterday and already I can move my arm better and grip a guitar pick.
So be positive that this is the beginning of the end of the ordeal.
So strike while the iron is hot!
Or, in reality: so record something while the wife is out of the house and post it before I totally chicken out … there’s still time to avoid hitting the “upload” button, after all.
I practiced the vocals for a week after finding the acoustic version of this song on YouTube. The vocals are not good, I’m not a singer, and just yesterday had a tube down my throat during surgery, so things still feel weird. You have been warned.
I haven’t really practiced the guitar since holding a pick has been a problem, and since I can’t play and sing at the same time anyway. But if I don’t jump in now I might never do it, so simple down-strums will have to suffice. You have been warned again.
I have never tried to sing within earshot of someone else before. (At least I hope my neighbors can’t hear anything!) Not even my wife has heard me try to strangle a cat. It’s probably better for marital bliss that way. Don’t be mean, it’s been a rough few years.
It’s Pop Evil’s power ballad Torn to Pieces (the acoustic version, which has a different melody than the album version and is played a semitone higher than the album version).
Hi Paul,
Welcome here and I wish you a lot of fun …nice that you are on the road back after a setback, that is always a good moment to pick up or start a new thing or something again …you are clearly not new to music and given your story you can be super super super satisfied with your first video …good to build up that strumming arm slowly to a swinging arm later … calm and slowly
@paul_x Paul … your medical story is terrible to read. Best wishes to you as you seem to be emerging and heading to a good place again. Fabulous wonderful good vibes to you for recording and sharing. What a joy you must have in your heart! Singing and playing and being a musician. Sheer delight. Although you wouldn’t know it from the song choice and lyrical content haha
As the saying goes - all power to your elbow. And that applies literally here doesn’t it. Keep on keeping on and may you be blessed with many more such days.
…nice that you are on the road back after a setback, that is always a good moment to pick up or start a new thing or something again 
…you are clearly not new to music and given your story you can be super super super satisfied with your first video 
…good to build up that strumming arm slowly to a swinging arm later … calm and slowly 