DavidP's Learning Log

#19 My 3rd JGversary

And here we are, another year draws to a close.

Today three years ago is the day I took out the dusty old guitar and started Justin’s BC. Happy to reflect on how far I have progressed in learning to play. And at risk of repeating myself, find myself reflecting on having done things that I never imagined as being possible when I started up.

Yesterday, to commemorate three years spent learning and having fun, I posted up a couple of recordings. And the feedback was (as always) wonderfully encouraging and complimentary.

And I got to thinking that it is fair to say that we are wired for Community, to be social beings. And for me I feel a deep connection and sense of belonging here, so much care and support from everybody for everybody. When I made my first post just over 4500 post ago, I had no idea just how important the Community would prove to be, both in terms of enabling the learning and also in terms of life in general, in terms of the many friendships I have made here through our shared love of music.

Music wise, the last few months since the last update have passed by in similar fashion.

I have now played a total of 4 Open Mic sessions. Three of those are posted up in the live performance area, unfortunately to date haven’t been able to get the video of the forth performance from Lionel who records everything. For the record I performed the following songs at that event: Blowing In The Wind, Killing Me Softly and Before You Accuse Me.

I missed the final event of the year, being away for work, and am now thinking about the next Open Mic at the end of January. I have performed the last three sessions without using song sheets, either paper or on a tablet. I do feel an extra pressure and stress to remember the lyrics, so am considering using the music stand again. My thinking being that being less under pressure to remember lyrics may help reduce mistakes, be more relaxed.

The other highlight was completing another full production of my fifth original song, Free. You can listen to that in the latest Contest.

So performing, recording original songs, finger-picking … all things that were impossible to imagine when I started. I was particularly anxious about the basic finger-picking part of the BC and it turned out to be something I really do enjoy.

In the last few months, I’ve made more progress on the Finger-Style Module and am practicing a pattern that uses the high e string plus some bass walks between chords. So far have not identified and settled on a suitable song. maybe time to look at some of the easier Dylan finger-picked songs, though singing his lyrics is not always so easy.

As I said in the reply to comments on yesterday’s post in AVOYP, I am feeling motivated to work a little more on my strumming, more wrist to get better control and accuracy … a little more like how Loefgren plays. Then maybe try and get to grips with two of my favourite songs: Norwegian Wood and Needle and the Damage Done, which both need more pick accuracy than I can currently manage.

I also dream about maybe one day playing or busking, perhaps the local coffee shop just up the road … maybe they’d be open to somebody performing in their garden on a Sat or Sun. Then I’d need an acoustic amp with a channel for guitar and mic, perhaps some pedals to achieve similar sound live as what I can achieve now in my DAW when I record myself playing and singing. A man can dream :grin:

Who knows.

I do know enough now not to limit myself as to what might be possible as I continue the adventure. An Open Mic was a fantasy, even as recently as the start of this year … now I am a regular.

So who knows.

Speaking of Open Mic, the music club that hosts the event also host shows where 4-5 acts, sometimes solo sometimes a full band, perform. Apart from maybe one day being invited to perform there, I am also interested in perhaps getting more involved with the sound engineering on the night. With my experience mixing productions on the DAW I think maybe I could get into live engineering. And it sounds like fun.

As I say, who knows where the path leads, what opportunities will present over time. All I do know is that I can’t imagine life without my guitar, recording and performing.

The learning, the progress, the achievements, the friendships … in this context, life doesn’t get any better.

Once again, I wish you all everything of the best. Keep at it, follow Justin’s lessons, be active in the Community and I am confident you too can achieve your musical dreams.

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#20 5000th Forum Post and 4 Keys to Learning

Today is a good day for a Road Case update. I happened to notice a couple of numbers the other day and they seemed to be lining up to make this fitting:

30 YouTube subscribers … while I am not on a mission to become a YouTuber with 100s and 1000s of subscribers, it seems human nature that having put oneself out there, one hopes that people watch. So I do enjoy the fact that I have more than just my brother subscribing, but shan’t be investing time in building a subscriber base by getting out there on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and others that I couldn’t name.

40 months of musical adventure … a well rounded number of months since starting off with Lesson 1, Stage 1. How time flies.

4999 Forum Posts … this was the number that caught my eye. And I watched carefully, like a batsman in the nervous nineties (apologies to those west of the Atlantic, to whom a cricket metaphor is likely to be lost and I suppose to everyone else, everywhere else to whom a cricket metaphor is lost), having decided that this update would be my 5000th post.

So here it is. But truth be told, haven’t got much of an update since my 3rd JGversary episode posted 4 months ago…

A few more covers posted. A few more Open Mic performances.

Still working on the picking pattern but have started working on an original song, rather than learning one of Dylan’s.

I have started working on the first basic exercise Justin recommends when starting to develop picked finger style. Working on it with a lack of regular attention that suggests it may be a while before I starting using it in even an incredibly poor emulation of Neil Young.

I have also started working on the palm-muted strumming technique. I have decided to produce an original song using the technique and the typical Oasis chord grips I have watched Johan aka Loefgren use so often.

Oh and the odd dabble and noodle over a Guitar Challenge backing track … to really improve that would require some focus on the Blues rhythm and Lead courses … don’t feel inclined right now.

I suppose, in a nutshell, I am consolidating post the Beginner Course, with the E and A shape Intermediate barre chord shapes thrown in and the introductory folk-finger style modules. But mostly consolidating to improve the level of my basics: playing and singing, recording and performing live.

Most importantly I continue to have fun, feel slow improvement and enjoy hanging out here with all the rest of my Forum Friends.

Not much of an update, so decided to share something a little different …

As you may know I am also a Toastmaster. A few weeks ago I found myself in a position where I needed to give a speech with almost no notice, no time to prepare. So I resorted to talking about something special to me that I thought might serve as generally inspiration to the audience … it was before confinement, so an actual in-the-flesh audience … my guitar adventure.

That journey from wishing and dreaming but believing I lacked the talent to make the wishes come true, to the dreams becoming reality.

I refined the ideas to deliver the speech again on Sunday evening. I thought perhaps some of the folk new to the Community, maybe those like me who’ve already chalked up a 50 years of living, and wonder if it is possible.

Well I believed it wasn’t in me … that I lacked dexterity, coordination and the most basic feel for rhythm. And yet here I am. And I can simplify it to 4 keys, 4 keys to unlock the shackles and take the journey to this point where I think it is fair to say I can play … not like my most loved Neil Young and the rest, not like some of the people who’s postings I listen to with great appreciation … but play play to an OK level, I never imagined possible.

And it matters not. If I am now as good as I am going to get then I will continue to live the dream, actually more than I ever imagined when I started.

So the 4 keys …

  1. Find the right teacher. Here we are, students of Justin Sandercoe. No arguments on his qualities as a teacher. And he was the right teacher for me.

  2. Adopt a growth mindset. This was important for me, given the limiting beliefs I held about my lack of talent that make learning to play in any decent fashion impossible. I forget where I first read of the Growth Mindset. I do remember Maggie aka Batwoman posting this infographic which sums it up better than my prose can:

And if you’d like to know more, then you can always read Carol Dweck’s book “Mindset”. If a book is too much reading, try this blog post: Carol Dweck: A Summary of The Two Mindsets. And if that is still too much reading then watch one of her TED Talks.

Changing my mindset, and striving to adopt the growth mindset certainly played a part.

  1. Deliberate practice

Now this topic of talent and practice surfaces here periodically. Often based around Malcolm Gladwell’s famous/infamous (depending on your own point of view), best-selling book, “Outliers”. Now when giving the speech, I ask the audience who may have read it, heard of it. Usually only one or two have. But ask how many know of the “10,000 hour rule” and the majority know all about it. That makes a point in itself. And I have no intention to open the discussion here. But it is disconcerting how little people need to know to adopt such a statement as their truth.

Moving on from the conceptual ideas about success and mastery expressed by Gladwell, I think one can find value in the idea of deliberate practice. I think, stand to be corrected, that Anders Ericsson did the research and writing. I recently came across this blog post, which I enjoyed on the topic: The Beginner's Guide to Deliberate Practice - James Clear

And if one sets aside the counting of hours, for me it really doesn’t matter. I find this notion of deliberate practice to be empowering. I can’t say how many hours I have invested, how deliberate my practice was. But for the proof is in the pudding and I can play now like I never could before, having made a few attempts over the decades since starting off as a 19 year old student.

But if the matter of hours remains important to you, take a look this article shared here, possibly by Majik or maybe Stitch, I forget: https://www.6seconds.org/2018/02/09/the-great-practice-myth-debunking-the-10000-hour-rule-and-what-you-actually-need-to-know-about-practice/

And this would suggest that nature and nurture have some influence on your ability and capacity to learn something. At this stage, I aspire no more than to continue to learn and improve, primarily for my own enjoyment and satisfaction. So I am not too fussed. The truth of these theories is of little consequence.

  1. Quality feedback.

I think it may have been Brian who pointed out that the Forum serves to address a potentially serious limitation in online learning. That of not having a teacher who can observe and provide you feedback. Without feedback you will not know for sure that what you are doing is well done, solving problems can be difficult and knowing what needs to be worked on to improve. I say limitation as I am sure you can serve yourself to a degree, some maybe more than others.

For me the feedback from the Community was invaluable. First and foremost encouragement. It works for me to know that I am not alone. The confirmation of improvement has been invaluable. I think I am getting better, but it helps me when others also say so. And finally the pointing out of things that are not quite right, that need attention.

With these 4 keys, I have come along way. As I have said many times before, I don’t consider myself to be innately talented. The 4 keys plus desire and the discipline to take instruction from the teacher and follow the programme, will lead to learning and greater levels of mastery … a degree of mastery. I may never attain a world class level of mastery, but I can achieve levels more than sufficient for the average hobbyist.

If you are still reading, I salute you and hope you have gleaned something of value and even inspiration from my thoughts and experience.

And with that, let me press “post” on this 5000th post

See you round for more magical musical adventures!

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#21 My 4th JGversary

Dec 16th and time for a RC update to reflect on my fourth year.

I began this year determined to keep working on finger-picking and performing at TJ’s Acoustic Music Club’s Open Mic nights. TJs also host evenings where people are invited to play and my aim was to improve as a live performer to eventually be invited to the Big Stage event. Of course everything changed with the spread of the Corona virus and measures taken to combat the Covid-19 pandemic.

But as they say “the show must go on”. And I can reflect on another year of learning, some progress, fun, and achievements to celebrate.

Once Open Mic events were no longer happening I decided to simulate the live experience by recording a set of three songs with talk in between. I named the series “Songs From the Playroom (not the Wood)” You’ll find these and all my other recordings on my YouTube channel. While recording a video at home is not quite as scary as the real thing, hitting the record button remains the cue for adrenalin to begin to pump. I don’t shake and tense up as much as I used to but still find that learning how to be relaxed and in the moment, keeping the mind focused on the performance and not thinking about the performance or worse inner dialogue starting up about not making a mistake is harder than it sounds.

As I continued to work on how I make the home live videos, I succumbed again to GAS and picked up a TC Helicon Play Acoustic pedal. The purpose being to be able to make live videos that have similar sound quality as what I produce in the DAW but without using the DAW. Eventually the pedal should allow me to play live with that same sound quality, with the guitar plugged in rather than being mic’ed up. An extravagance no doubt but am enjoying being able to make the home videos with a webcam, rather than a phone, the DAW, and the process to marry the two together. And who knows, when the day comes to play on the Big Stage, I will be ready.

In preparing the list of posts below, I noticed that I’d acquired the Hohner Resonator in July 2018. Finally this year, two years later, I was ready to start down the path to learn some finger-style blues. My first step is to learn the first piece, Steady Thumb Blues, from Justin’s Solo Blues course. I posted a WIP video and it remains a work in progress, along with the second piece Walking Easy Blues. My progress is slow, but I enjoy the process, and I know in time I will get better and develop the control of the thumb and fingers of the right hand, be able to make chords and play lead lines, and do all together. And yes Darrell, DaddyStovePipe’s pieces are also on the to-learn list. Justin has also posted up some lessons recently that I have watched and will come back to. For now learning by learning pieces, studies or etudes, is appealing to me.

Along the way some more covers and a couple of original songs. Four years in the process, my progress this year feels less significant than in previous years. I feel like I can’t really call myself a beginner anymore and that disrupts my expectations, self-assessments. The inner judge now starts to mess with my mind pointing out that I ought to be better than I am after four years. And when progress is less dramatic, being more on a plateau of small, almost indiscernible, improvements rather than making the big improvements, I can struggle a little. The mental side of learning has its challenging moments for me.

So I make the most of the little wins. For example, being able to revisit Wonderful Tonight and be able to play and sing it from memory, playing the D/F# with the thumb over the top, and the camera recording, felt great.

And at risk of blowing my own trumpet, I was fortunate to be recognised with a Community Award … totally unexpected when I look at all the other folk who’ve been recognised. I had the opportunity to spend time with Justin talking about song-writing and production. I have written up my experiences and suffice to say, I learned a great deal and was able to apply it to great benefit in the most recent original song I produced.

When I began, I posted all my recordings up on SoundCloud. Having taken the plunge to post videos rather than just audios, I’ve decided that in due course I will close the SC account and just use YouTube. But I did want my YT channel to include the most memorable recordings shared on SC, mostly my own original songs. And in porting them across I decided to remix the songs. An opportunity to see how much I may have improved in that aspect. So far so good and I feel the mixes already released have been significantly better.

As I reflect, I would now consider myself to be continuing to consolidate the Beginner Course skills with the ability to play E and A shape barre chords while working slowly at finger-style, via the Folk Fingerstyle module or the Solo Blues Course. I continue to enjoy producing original songs, when the muse comes a calling. And I have made progress as a mix/sound engineer (that sounds ever so grandiose but can’t think of a better word)

That said, I find myself tending to practice with far less determination and investment in time than when I was doing the Beginner Course and spend far more time learning and playing songs.

Having read how other folk have set themselves what some in the consulting world call BHAGs (Big Hairy Audacious Goal) and are driven to practice, I got to thinking about my own approach. I am quite happy puttering along. And when I look back over the year I think I have improved as a player and singer but haven’t advanced my skills significantly in the year.

And I wonder if that may be due to the fact that when I began four years ago, it was a last chance saloon moment, with me not believing I had the necessary innate ability to really get very far. Having achieved so much more than I imagined I might, maybe the drive to push on to become even better, to set and work towards my own BHAGs, is just not there. I don’t know. Not that I am unhappy or frustrated, I just tend to think, maybe over-think, things.

Time to stop thinking and analysing and just appreciate the fun had, the achievements, the continued progress, even if on a more gentle trajectory. I can celebrate four wonderful years, having made so many friends here in the Community. I look forward to continuing to play and sing, work on my finger-style and blues playing, produce more original songs, and maybe some more opportunities to collaborate and produce some songs with folk here will present (I do enjoy the mixing and mastering).

Thank you all for listening and reading, for all your encouragement and support. Without it I am sure I would have packed it in again in Feb 2017.

Keep on keeping on with your own journey and adventures, sure and confident in the knowledge that if you stick with the programme, persevere, you will progress and achieve your own goals.

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#22 Funny how it goes, just going with the flow

In wrapping up my 4th JGversary post I looked ahead and then plan was summed up as:

I look forward to continuing to play and sing, work on my finger-style and blues playing, produce more original songs, and maybe some opportunities to collaborate and produce some songs with folk here will present (I do enjoy the mixing and mastering).

And all went according to plan for the next couple of weeks. I kept working on a few songs, towards another episode of Songs From The Playroom, and focused finger-style learning on a simple (but still a stretch) arrangement of Deck The Halls to be entered in the JustinGuitar Forum Festive Season contest.

I duly entered with an as-good-as-I-could-learn-in-the-timebox performance. The contest was a success in terms of the quality of the entries, be it my best effort entry or the pro-quality entry that ultimately won but was a disappointment in terms of the number of entries. Something for Justin’s team to think about in future, if the ultimate goal was to bring people to the Forum, to grow the Community.

The limited number of entries played into my hands: I received an honourable mention and a reward for entering:. a Guitar Pro 7.5 license.

And then the unexpected happened …

Over the years, a number of folk here have encouraged me to work on my singing, that it has potential. My brother had begun to tell me in response to my last couple of recordings that he thought I was starting to sound like somebody starting to learn to sing, to become that Neil Young-esque singer-songwriter, rather than somebody growing as a guitar player and singing along for the sake of their being a vocal rather than just an instrumental. I’d begun to try a little Doh Ray Me over the major scale as part of my guitar time.

And then I got an email offering me a discounted price on Chris Liepe’s Discover Your Voice course. At the same time a few Forum Friends had signed up. A case of that old adage “when the student is ready, the teacher will arrive” playing out.

So I signed up and began the course. This Forum is all about guitar, our learning, our support of each other asstudents of Justin, so I will not expound on the course. In fact my initial thoughts had been to keep quiet and one day, when I am ready, to return to AVOYP, a better (hoping with confidence and optimism) singer … much to your great surprise.

Then I got to thinking some of you may be wondering why I am not recording and sharing, what is going on, so have opted to share now.

For the same reason, I decided to delay re-mixing my original David’s Summer Songet, until I have completed the course. The vocal never quite worked. I mashed up the lyrics to be able to sing over the chords and the poem no longer scanned, the melody was a little monotone. I hope in due course that I can tweak those lyrics and produce a far better vocal performance. It may still end up as an idea that never quite works, but should be a better rendition.

The same goes for the originals I was starting to work on.

From a finger-style perspective, I’d been reminded of Justin Johnson’s (Richard/Lieven, I think this is OK but sensitive to focus of the Forum, so you can delete the reference if not appropriate) simple finger drills to help develop control and dexterity of the right-hand fingers. When learning Deck the Halls my right pinky, which serves as an anchor, started to feel some stress during the longer sustained practicing. So I have started every music session doing the drills without the anchor. I think eventually anchoring my hand position by using the forearm on the guitar body will allow for smoother blending of fingerpicking and strumming … we’ll see.

About this time, Maggie aka Batwoman started a conversation about rhythm. Cut a long story short, it felt like the right time to refocus on strumming. I acquired the Strumming Techniques programme and have begun to refresh 1/8 note strumming, to work again on foot-tapping, with the intention to now turn my attention to 1/16 note strumming. We’ll see how that goes.

So I feel I have gone off to a proverbial mountain retreat, to focus for a while on some learning, without less drive to learn, rehearse, and perform songs. I have a couple I am playing as part of guitar time, for fun and to apply learning, both playing and singing, so I’ll be ready to record songs in due course.

And the day I made that decision another opportunity presented. And funny how it goes, having Guitar Pro was such a benefit in working on this project. And when a great opportunity presents, you just gotta go with the flow. Will say nothing more about this for now … good to leave a little unsaid to create some tension that will resolve when all is revealed :wink:

Funny how it goes, but I’ll go with the flow and see what happens, enjoying the adventure, and confident that I can only continue to improve as I apply myself the tortoise way … slow and steady.

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#23 About the 3Ps: Practicing, Playing, Performing

Over the last few months I have spent more time practicing, a little less time playing, and a lot less time performing. After releasing Episode 4 of Songs from the Playroom, wanting to have a record of me performing a few of the songs played live at the Forum events, I was thinking about the 3Ps so thought I’d share.

Firstly, to be clear on what I mean by the terms:

  • Practicing: working on drills and exercises to improve skills and develop technique
  • Playing: learning and rehearsing songs. I suppose there is an element of practice in learning a new song but for me it is more about applying practiced techniques.
  • Performing: playing for an audience, either live or recorded and shared. The proof is in the pudding as they say. Performing may not be for all. Nothing wrong in just playing for yourself.

I’d slipped into the habit of just playing and performing (or producing originals, to add another “P”). I feel that getting back into a more disciplined routine of practice has paid dividends. I’ve focused on a few things and not surprisingly I feel it shows in the performance. And some of that may be in how I feel when the moment to perform comes.

I have personally come along way in dealing with that inner critique, the voice that puts me down. A little healthy self-deprecation is fine but that inner critical voice really doesn’t help me. It is not the same voice that encourages me to strive to learn, to improve, to not be complacent with where I’m at or become overly satisfied when accepting positive feedback and compliments.

I have pondered the matters of self-belief and self-confidence over many years, struggling to come to terms with my own doubts.

At the present I’d suggest that it is practice and playing, but especially practice, the fuels self-belief. The belief that I am ready to perform.

And it is performing that builds self-confidence. Confidence grows when one overcomes the fears and anxieties that come with stepping up and being vulnerable and just steps up.

Hence, I would encourage people to begin to record and share early in their learning journey. It is a progression from the first steps that may be sharing practice routines to form, strum, and change chords, to playing songs perhaps with the aid of the app, to playing without that aid, to performing live at a Forum OM.

We are so fortunate to have these opportunities. To have a safe and supportive Community to offer encouragement, answer questions, point out issues that we might not be aware of. As I’ve said before feedback is a key to learning.

And learning to accept feedback is an essential skill. I find feedback comes in three flavours:

  • Feedback that makes sense to me and that I can apply and act on
  • Feedback that makes sense but is pitched just a little too far beyond what one is working on and able to act upon
  • Feedback that you don’t relate to and one needs to learn to let that go

I always assume that all feedback was given with positive intent, so don’t get upset by feedback. Needless to say that is sometimes easier said that done.

And to this aspect of errors. As Richard rightly said, we should not be setting perfect or error-free as a goal. It may happen, hasn’t yet for me, that one delivers an error-free performance. But as I am very much learning and developing as I go, continually stretching, such a performance would be a positive outlier.

I am no mathematician or statistician, so take this as such.

My performances of a song over time will tend to vary in quality and form some kind of normal-like distribution. I’ll have an average number of errors per song. Some performance may be better, some may worse. Over time, as I improve and the songs don’t increase in difficulty then the average number of errors decreases and the negative outliers less frequent and extreme. I’ve noticed this as I continue to perform. Knowing this helps me to deal with an error when I make one and just keep playing … an error know longer triggers that immediate inner voice of criticism.

As I share this I think I’ve also largely eliminated that habit of the positive inner voice offering that “encouragement” … “almost there, keep it going, don’t mess it up”.

Note this is conceptual. I don’t make a note and record the number of errors, the nature of the errors etc. That is not my nature. I am not a stats keeper, far more intuitive and in the flow, following a structured approach.

So the combination of upping my practice to balance my time between practicing and playing in a session plus working on the way I think and feel about playing and performing, seems to be paying-off for me.

Would love to hear your thoughts, what things you may be doing to enable both learning, enjoyment, and satisfaction.

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#24 Biennial (The SoundCloud Years)

This post is inspired by RC updates made by Gordon, Toby, and Richard. When I started this they were recent posts but it has taken me a while to get to post this.

For the sake of completeness I decided to reflect back on the recordings made and shared on SoundCloud, prior to making the switch from audio-only to videos to be hosted on YouTube.

Firstly, a little bit of fun. Good Vibes to all who can identify the reference in the post title. And to make it a little more fun, if you know then to earn your vibes you need to let me know in such a way that you provide others with a clue but not the answer directly.

Secondly, as I was putting this collection together, I dipped in and listened to the majority of the recordings. I can draw a few conclusions from this:

  1. As a Forum you are all incredibly encouraging and supportive. The singing and production of some of these recordings were tough for me to listen to again. Yet, I only ever received encouraging and supportive comments. So folks, know with certainty that this is a safe place to post your recordings, whatever level of playing and singing (if you choose to sing) you have reached.

  2. Following Justin’s courses, lesson by lesson, will lead to learning and improvement. It has been most encouraging to be able to go back and listen to recordings made four years ago. I urge you to make recordings early in your learning. We often forget how far we have come as we look ahead at all we are yet to learn. Your recording archive will remind you of that, which is priceless.

  3. This is a Forum focused on learning to play guitar, but I have to say, I can now see how much investing similar time and effort into my singing has paid off. Just like learning to play, one can learn to sing, if you put your mind to learning. Yes, there are a super small percentage of people who may be “tone deaf”, the majority have just not yet schooled their voice and ear.

This collection is not complete. Fortunately the first two recordings are missing. They were made using Audacity and my laptop headset’s mic as the input. Why I did this rather than an audio recorder on my phone, I have no idea. The first was a single verse of Hallelujah, which I played in 4/4 rather than 6/8. The second was Walk the Line.

There are also a few recordings that I have re-released on YT so excluded them from this collection.

After struggling to make the first couple of recordings, I jumped in the deep-end and acquired an interface and microphone, downloaded a lite version of Ableton, and began recording by learning songs that related to the stage of the Beginner Course that I was in. By this stage I’d also treated myself to a 12-string. I never fell in love with it and eventually sold it after I bought my Fender 6-string.

I’ve thrown in comments every now and then, just when it made sense (to me) to do so.

Apologies for some of the double blank lines … the editing and rendering seem at odds.

To be clear, I’m certainly not expecting people to listen through this lot. Maybe one or two based on songs that catch your eye or based on some comments. But honestly, there are but a few that I would say are somewhat enjoyable to listen to.

And so to the recordings …

20170326 - The Beatles - Love Me Do
20170409 - Johnny Cash - Walk the Line
20170414 - CCR - Bad Moon Rising
20170422 - Woody Guthrie - This Land is Your Land

20170430 - St James Infirmary Blues

20170430 - Tears For Fears - Mad World (the Gary Jules way)

This next recording is my first real attempt at a multi-track production. I think it was the first time that I entered the Forum song contest, a monthly event at the time —


20170515 - Ben E. King - Stand By Me

There were two things that made me nervous after starting the BC, the first of those was the B7 chord. I picked these next two songs to learn, play, and record songs to slay the B7 dragon.

20170520 - Otis Redding - Dock of the Bay
20170520 - Roberta Flack - Killing Me Softly

20170602 - The Troggs - Love Is All Around

20170616 - Rodrigues - Jane S. Piddy

Another multi-track contest entry. The only way to learn is to do, have to start somewhere —


20170617 - Neil Young - Like a Hurricane

Working out on the F chord —

20170702 - The Animals - The House of the Rising Sun
20170805 - Bob Dylan - Knocking on Heaven’s Door

20170805 - Johannes Kerkorrel en die Gereformeerde Blues Band - Hillbrow

Another multi-track contest entry. I’d discovered effects plug-ins. You can most certainly have too much of a good thing.Then I tried a simpler version. And finally, while in the moment, the third version was just a single take play and sing … the best of the bunch (best being a relative term)


20170812 - David Gray - This Year’s Love (Forum contest versio)

20170812 - David Gray - This Year’s Love (simplified mix)
20170813 - David Gray - This Year’s Love

I was inspired to learn this after watching Mari play and Krista sing it. A simple strummed version. Maybe one day a more Clapton-esque finger-picked version will be doable —

20170818 - Blues standard written by Jimmy Cliff - Nobody Knows You When You’re Down
and Out

Another contest entry. A simple play and sing, which I was quite pleased with, felt like a significant personal best at the time —

20170902 - Tom Waits - Chocolate Jesus

20170902 - Van Morrison - Brown Eyed Girl

This was one of the songs I tried to learn when first trying to learn to play. A good choice as it introduced me to F from the outset. I keep coming back to it. In this version I was playing with effects to give it a more NY and Crazy Horse sound —

20171008 - Neil Young - Like a Hurricane

A second attempt. The full song plus some single note runs between chords. Still 4/4 time. One day I’ll come back and do it in 6/8 —

20171021 - Leonard Cohen - Hallelujah

Shortly after posting Chocolate Jesus I received an invite to collaborate from Schlaffenwagen. I nearly declined, thinking I was not up to it. Thankfully I didn’t and with his ability to add drums and bass, tighten my contributions up, and Kasper on electric guitar it turned out pretty good —

20171029 - Neil Young - My My Hey Hey (Out of the Blue)

A contest entry made only after Mari encouraged me to give it a go. Before recording this I managed to work out most of the melody, Mari correcting and filling in the gaps —

20171202 - Auld Lang Syne

A recording made to exercise triplet strumming. Not the rock ‘n roll chunka chunka that would be more appropriate and stumbled over the instrumental verse. Also struggling with the vocal phrasing, as I can hear so much more clearly now —

20171204 - Bo Diddley - Before You Accuse me
20180101 - Neil Young - After the Goldrush

20180107 - Edwyn Collins - A Girl Like You

This may have been another Contest entry, I don’t recall. Another of my early experiments in producing multi-track recordings —

20180210 - Leonard Cohen - Hallelujah

Next couple were recorded to practice playing a bass note (or often the lowest 2 strings of the chord) —

20180317 - The Troggs - Love is All Around
20180427 - Neil Young - From Hank to Hendrix

This recording felt like one of those “breakthrough” moments. First attempt to record finger-picking, another multi-track production, with a guitar lead —


20180428 - The Rolling Stones - As Tears Go By


20180609 - The Troggs - Love is All Around

20180721 - Rodrigues - Jane S Piddy

20180727 - David Gray - This Years Love

While my primary focus is the singer-songwriter solo acoustic thing, like probably all lovers of music and guitar, there lies within the desire to be able to improvise. Periodically I take a detour from my usual activity and get into the jamming. It is great fun. And in those moments, it seems to me that I improve. And that is without any deliberate learning, beyond knowing some scale patterns, and practice. Maybe one day, I’ll give this focus —

20180929 - Guitar Challenge 06 - Improv over a I VI IV V backing track
20181003 - Guitar Challenge 10 - Ballad indie folk guitar backing (80bpm in D maj)

20181007 - Guitar Challenge 07 - Minor blues shuffle in A

20181012 - Guitar Challenge 08 - Improv over a mild bluesy groove in Bm
20181020 - Guitar Challenge 09 - Improv over a dreamy rock backing track in C lydian

20181020 - The Animals - The House of the Rising Son
20181021 - Bob Dylan - The Times Are a Changin’

20181027 - Guitar Challenge 05 - Improv of Justin’s backing track in G maj
20181111 - Guitar Challenge 01 - Improv over Justin’s 12 bar blues in A
20181116 - Guitar Challenge 11 - Retro 80s synth jam in Gm

20181117 - Fleetwood Mac - Don’t Stop
20181209 - The Rolling Stones - Dead Flowers


20181213 - Guitar Challenge 14 - Acoustic jam in G

This is one of those songs that I always dreamed of being able to play and sing. Another when I listen back I can hear how stilted my singing is —


20181213 - The Rolling Stones - Ruby Tuesday

Supposedly the “easy first song”, well I’ve always struggled to play and sing it. Still do. This seemed a good choice for a celebration of a second year of Justin Guitar —

20181222 - Bob Marley - Three Little Birds

Finally able to have a crack at playing and singing this classic with the riffs. Another I think I do better know (gosh, I hope so :) ) —

20190104 - Neil Young - My My Hey Hey

Inspired by the various folk who’ve played this classic, in particular if I recall correctly Lynn aka Redhodie’s version on her semi-hollow body guitar. Must come back and learn to play and sing this from memory —

20190108 - Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here
20190216 - 4 Non Blondes - What’s Up

Another I’ll eventually add to my camp-fire repertoire —

20190302 - Bob Marley - Redemption Song
20190309 - Stray Cats - Stray Cat Strut

20190330 Nine Inch Nails - Hurt (the Johnny Cash way)

In May of 2019 I decided to have a go at making videos rather than just audio recordings. The remaining recordings that are audio only are either Guitar Challenge jams or collaborations with my wife, Lesley.

20190720 - Bruce Springsteen - Hungry Heart

20200308 - Guitar Challenge 15 - Funked Out Dung Beatle

20200315 - Guitar Challenge 16 - Brooklyn Garage Beat

20200321 - Guitar Challenge 19 - Turn On, Turn Up, Turn Off (a backing track)
20200410 - Guitar Challenge 18 - Big Room Wonderland beat
20200411 - Guitar Challenge 17 - Slider

20201010 - Saturday jam with Lesley

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#25 The three types of songs

Justin posted the video “3 Types of Songs You Should Practice (To Play Guitar Better)” in August 2021. It recommends an approach to learning and improving based on working concurrently on three types of songs:

Campfire - Songs that you can play (and sing if that’s your thing) from memory
Developers - Songs that you are working on as part of practice to develop technique and ability
Dreamers - Songs you want to play in the future, likely above your current play-grade

If you’ve not watched the video, I’d recommend it.

In this year I’ve made unexpected progress developing my Campfire Repertoire . I can’t put my finger on any particular reason but I’ve found myself able to memorise lyrics more easily and effectively, and am markedly more comfortable to perform from memory. Perhaps it is just more playing years behind me or maybe my playing has become more on autopilot, freeing up mental capacity to focus on lyrics and singing.

The repertoire now includes 12 songs. The trick is to keep them all fresh. Ideally I would like to be able to play all 12 on any given day if asked to play a set rather than just one song. Within this set, my ability to play flub-free varies. My aim is to reach a level where flubs become more rare and less obvious to a listener.

The proof of the pudding is in the eating, and I was able to enjoy performing a 4 song set at a local mic a couple of days ago at short notice. You can check out an audio-only recording of that performance here.

While Justin has a sub-category of Campfire songs, I have two types of Developer songs.

The first are songs as Justin defines the category. Currently in that category is Neil Young’s Only Love Can Break Your Heart, another great song from Neil off the After The Goldrush album. Firstly, it includes a G7 chord. I struggled with the stretchiness of G7 when taking the Beginner Course, now I can make the chord. Secondly, it requires a change from G to G7, which is achieved by playing a two finger G (ring finger 3rd fret 6th string, pinky 3rd fret 1st string). This is my first time working on this and as is to be expected, the pinky was initially not cooperative.

The second are songs I am working at adding to the Campfire Repertoire. These are songs that I can play and sing with the song sheet in front of me. Just a matter of memorisation and practice to reach a performance consistency so as to be comfortable to play live. Currently I’m working on Deep Purple’s Wasted Sunsets. Then perhaps Bad Moon Rising, JC’s version of Hurt. I am not short of options.

[ EDIT - shifted focus to Bad Moon Rising and played it at the Community OM5 event ]

Like everybody I have songs in the Dreamer category. I’ll just trot out a few as I sit here: Needle And the Damage Done, Powderfinger, Norwegian Wood, One … I’ll stop there. Right now I practice the chord progression for One periodically, the strumming pattern from Justin’s Songbook. And one day I’ll be able to sing the song at the same time … boy, I find the phrasing tricky over the strumming pattern. The beauty of this adventure is that with time, learning, and practice dreams do come true :grin:

It has taken me nearly five years to reach this point. I have watched others here achieve more in less time (I applaud and celebrate with them) and seen others begin and lose motivation as progress perhaps fails to meet expectation. Learning to play and sing is a joy for me, not a race nor a competition, not a quest to achieve specific time-based goals. So if you are dreaming, then take it one step at a time, at your own pace, and you can make those dreams come true.

3 Likes

Impressive documentation :smiley: Good thing you already copied it here!

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#26 5th JGVersary

Today’s the day: 5 years since I started my musical adventure with the very first lesson of the JustinGuitar BC. I love to look back on the year gone by and reflect on all that has been achieved since day one. I celebrate, irrespective of how much progress has been made, the time it may have taken. For me a healthy balance between looking forward at the road ahead and looking back at the road travelled, while being always in the moment keeps me motivated and satisfied.

This year was quite a year.

NB I shan’t embed links throughout, you can find all the videos on my channel if you are of a mind to take a look and listen.

It began working on a simple finger style arrangement of Deck the Halls to be submitted in a Festive season contest. Simple it is, easy it wasn’t. It ended working on the Simple Blues Lead project that I have just posted in AVOYP. Simple it was. Easy perhaps an overstatement, but it was pleasing to find it not too big a stretch to get the parts under the fingers and recorded without too much blood, sweat, and tears.

Between then and now, the biggest focus and gain in this year was on my singing. Just after Christmas I signed up for Chris Liepe’s Discover Your Voice course and following it has delivered a huge improvement in my singing. Much like following Justin’s BC did for my guitar playing. It is early days and I look forward to more improvement as I continue to follow his path.

During the year, I opted to cut back on AVOYP recordings while working on the singing. But I did get the call from @Richard_close2u to be the vocalist (I love to stretch a word to its max) on a production of Love In Vain, the Robert Johnson classic, which was based on The Rolling Stones cover. It was a wonderful project and came at just the right time to be able to make the most of my singing lessons.

At the same time, I applied myself a little bit more studiously to practice, rather than just playing songs and having a good time. I invested time in some finger-picking drills, worked through RUST 1 (I still got no further on RUST 2 than counting the 1e&a, foot-tapping on the beat, and an accent on the beat; maybe next year), and worked on learning the notes on the neck.

The second highlight of this year was the Community virtual Open Mics. The brainchild of our own @Rossco01 these events that were held every couple of months on Zoom were the perfect way to continue to build my ability to perform live. It was also good to get real feedback on the progress I was making in my singing (bless you all for all the super encouraging comments on that).

These events build on the YT series, “Songs From the Playroom (Not the Wood)”, that I recorded in which I’d play 3 songs with chat in between to simulate an OM performance.

So when our local music club began to host live OMs again, I was ready. It really felt like a second first time when I went back. The benefits of the singing lessons and our OMs translated into the live OM being a completely different experience. I found myself so much more relaxed and confident. Still a long way to go before I’d dare consider myself to be an entertainer, but the performances were a step up from the pre-pandemic days.

Towards the end of the year, I’d decided to try my hand at power chords again, and long story short, the muse showed up and I produced another original song, “Self Destruction (Wine Women 'n Song”, my 8th. Most of my originals have been acoustic guitar driven. This one made use of the power chords, played on the electric. Loads of fun to get down and rock a little harder.

In between a few improv noodles inspired by @sairfingers and a couple of explorations to make use of Borrowed Chord theory shared by @Richard_close2u

Since moving from SoundCloud to YouTube I’ve always wanted to consolidate my SoundCloud recordings. That was done in this year, the subject of a previous RC episode. I’m almost done with that migration. Just one more original to re-work, re-mix, and re-publish on YT; something for 2022.

All in all another wonderful year. I’m more than satisfied with progress made. I continue to have fun learning, playing, performing, recording, and being an active member of this Community.

I cannot express enough what the Community means to me, the support and encouragement, the friendship, without it I may well have packed up at the first challenging moment 5 years ago.

And now we find ourselves in a new house. A more modern house, with new shiny fixtures, for us to get used to and learn how to use. But a house becomes a home through the people who live their lives in the house. I look forward to making new friends, sharing more experiences, in the years to come.


My Music

My YouTube Channel | SoundCloud Years Archive

Gear

Guitars: Fender Paramount PM-1 Deluxe | Honer Resonator | Epiphone LP Standard Pro | Celebrity CC67 (Nashville strung)
Amp: Blackstar ID15:TVP
Pedals: TC Helicon Play Acoustic
Mics: Samson CO3 | AKG D5 | Shure 545SD Unidyne III
AI: Focusrite Scarlet 2i2
Software Tools: Reaper | Guitar Pro

RC Episodes

#25 The three types of songs
#24 Biennial (The SoundCloud Years)
#23 About the 3Ps: Practicing Playing Performing
#22 Funny how it goes, just going as it flows
#21 My 4th JGversary
#20 5000th Forum post and 4 keys to learning
#19 My 3rd JGversary
#18 First Open Mic and setting up the Playroom
#17 My 2nd JGversary
#16 First live performance
#15 First two originals and winning the Forum Contest
#14 18 month update
#13 My 1st JGversary
#12 Going beyond my dreams
#11 September songs and success
#10 RC up to date, 8.5 month reflection
#9 A severe attack of GAS
#8 It’s not a linear journey
#7 Consolidation, Forum Contest, and BC Stage 4
#6 The onset of GAS
#5 Joining the Community and my first recording
#4 First time playing in public
#3 Beginning Justin’s BC
#2 Starting the guitar adventure
#1 Discovering a love of music

4 Likes

Wow David. That is quite some RC. I think you’ve regained the longest post trophy!
You perhaps think you’ve not come far but that is a guitar packed 5 years.
Well done and have little love heart thingy from me. (Couldn’t we have a thumbs up or a vibe icon rather than a girly heart?)

Thanks Gordon, appreciate that. I guess you didn’t need a full packed lunch to read today’s episode :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

I’m happy with my progress and have enjoyed every step of the way.

As for “Good Vibes” that particular sign of recognition/appreciation doesn’t seem to have a close equivalent here. But from where I sit the all the rest of the experience makes the shift worthwhile.

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5 years, that’s amazing. Whether you’ve been meandering or disciplined doesn’t really matter when there is fun in the journey, but you’ve achieved quite a lot in these 5 years regardless of your methods: you’re a guitarist, a vocalist, and a performer! And you know a whole lot about recording!! Enjoy the next 5 years just as much, David. :smiley:

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Just saved that graphic as a reminder !!

Boy that was a good read or for most revisit. Wow and I thought mine was a long un ! Very comprehensive but a compelling story that will never end as we never stop learning and developing and having GAS attacks !

And a very extensive back catalogue ! You’ve come a long way in a short time sir. I hope this not only inspires other to write and the maintain a Roadcase but to also record themselves and share in AOVYP. However, cringeworthy it may seem at the time when you look back, you’ll see how far down the road you have come.

Thank you for sharing.

Cheers

Toby
:sunglasses:

This wouldn’t by any chance be a reference to what Steven Van Zandt placed at the top of his list of the most essential albums of all time, calling it:

“The greatest collection of music by the greatest rock & roll band there will ever be” :wink:

I’d think again and just make a list like you did above for the SC years.
For those of use who have been following each others journeys on the forum it would remind us of what you shared, without having to leave the platform and search YT :smiley:

Thanks Toby and Brian, appreciate you both taking a look.

I expect, hope, that 5 years from now I may look back and cringe at today’s recordings. Though for me cringe is probably not the word I’d use, if I am true to myself. That was what I could do then, and hopefully we all continue to improve. And it matters not that I may never reach the kind of level that Kasper considered cringe worthy some years back.

And in addition to this RC being my own journal, which I enjoy keeping, if it serves to encourage people getting going then so much the better.

Brian, thanks for playing along … you’re the only one. Now I have trawled the 'net to try and find the SvZ quote but without any luck. Given that you are the only one, you might as well share your guess here.

The SC list made sense to me sense that is a closed chapter of the adventure. If I start a list for YT then I’d need to maintain that. I guess I could do that, especially if I could edit it in perpetuity. Or it could be done as another Post that gets replaced with a new version periodically with a link to the latest version in the latest episode of the RC. I’ll give it some thought.

That would make the RC even longer … an appealing thought :rofl:

@brianlarsen while I was browsing, seeing as I can edit, and never found the answer, I’d love to know what that ‘greatest collection’ was, as per your reply

This wouldn’t by any chance be a reference to what Steven Van Zandt placed at the top of his list of the most essential albums of all time, calling it:

“The greatest collection of music by the greatest rock & roll band there will ever be” :wink:

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Wonderful David…I started reading… will let you know when I finish… maybe next year, like in 2023. Love the story so far.

Thanks Sandra, glad you are enjoying it.

:rofl: well it took me 5 years to write all those episodes, so a year to read them all is fair enough

2 Likes

Just read this top to bottom, very inspiring and lots of interesting song choices - I appreciate that you included the recording date when you posted the links.

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