2022-05-10
Last weekend I started my Level 9 Beginner Guitar Course [Classic] practice.
I’m having my 40 minute practice routine of the lessons split into two 20 minute sessions. Saturdays are for finger style accompaniment patterns and scales, and Sundays are for chords and strumming patterns.
After each day’s practice of the lessons, I spend from 10 to 20 minutes playing songs I know and practicing new ones I’m learning.
I still have some Level 8 and below practice items in my routine to consolidate them and for a warm-up before practicing the Level 9 items.
In addition, I’m reviewing my F#m and Bm chords to correct my finger placement on them as @DavidP advised me in regard to my Saber que vendras post in the AVOYP section.
I’m practicing my slash chords included in the chord sequences Justin says they are often part of.
It looks it won’t take me very long to play decently the finger style accompaniment patterns introduced in Level 9. I’m looking forward to use T, 1, 2, 3, 2, 1 with Can’t Help Falling in Love in the near future.
It looks it’ll take me a while to play decently the Am scale patterns introduced in Level 9. For the blues improvisation, I think that it should be more fluid once the patterns are wired up in my brain.
I am not satisfied with my 12 bar blues. I don’t think I’m feeling the rhythm, just playing the patterns mechanically. I’m planning to try practicing with some of the blues rhythms of the drum machine of the modeller as backing track.
At this point I prefer work on a single new song. I’m working now on Elvis Presley’s Don’t’ Be Cruel. I’ve memorized the structure and the lyrics. I practice separately singing the lyrics only and playing the chords only without the lyrics (Verse: 4 bars of D, 2 bars of G, 2 bars of D and so on) and after that I give it a try to the whole thing. I wanted to play a bass line for the intro I saw somewhere but it looks is beyond my current skills. I’m using the DUDUDUDU strumming pattern Justin suggests in the app. My songbook suggests to use as rhythm a variation of the “old faithful” with an up strum at the end, but I can’t sing and play with that rhythm. I’m trying to speed up the rhythm but I do not think 161 b.p.m. is within my reach now so I’ll settle for whatever I feel comfortable playing and singing.
In parallel to the Level 9 practice, I’m reviewing the lessons of the current Beginner Guitar Course Grades 1 and 2. Just a quick look for now, later, when there is a chance, I’m planning to include in my practice routine the new content of those grades to strengthen my guitar foundations.