Six months ago, I decided to further improve my blues guitar skills through the JustinGuitar Blues Immersion Course. This video shows my progress during the course.
Recording from Unit 0 shows the state of my playing before the course starts. What’s your impression of my progress during and after the course? I feel there’s a noticeable improvement, but I could be biased.
Blues Immersion Course - Review
A few words about how the course helped me. I’ve been living and breathing blues music and its history for the last 6 months. This was a super important part of the course because it helped me understand blues and get the sound of the blues language in my head. The course unlocked the fretboard and made me realize how many notes are available, important, and useful in the blues language. I can improvise all over the neck, and my licks vocabulary is much broader. I can do various blues intros, turnarounds, and outros. I’m much better at hearing the blues progression so that I can tell over what chord I’m playing (I, IV, V). I’m slowly starting to target chord tones during the solos. My ear improved thanks to the transcribing lessons. My blues rhythm playing and timing got better. I received direct feedback from Justin, approved teachers, and other BLIMmers. I was often inspired by BLIMers and various guests from master classes. I could keep going… This has been an amazing 6 months and I’m grateful to the JustinGuitar team and BLIMmers for this time.
The course scales to different players’ skill levels. There’s so much content… Justin gives stuff to practice for years to come.
If you are serious about learning electric blues guitar, I highly recommend signing up for class 2. There’s still 1 day left to enroll.
Kamil, it’s been good seeing you take things up some more notches during the course. You’ve definitely made noticible improvement throughout the course as you’ve progressed putting in the yards learning and practicing. Well done fella.
I thought you were very good at the start, but you’ve pushed yourself up even higher using BLIM - well done, now keep going and keep posting your stuff!
Have to agree with all that’s been said. Looking back to Unit 0, you were one of the Blimmers sharing their starting point, who looked to have a good foundation to build on. Well in 6 months you have definitely done that for sure. Great progress, congrats !
You had got the basics down reasonably well in the first place, but what you lacked was the vocabulary and the feel for blues in its rawest form. Blues has to come from your feelings and emotions, that’s what makes it special. At your current stage you are well on the way, I feel that you’re on your way down the path to becoming a good blues player. Experience is what you need now, playing with others and improvising with them is the best path. My biggest breakthrough was improvising and not playing covers; covers have their place but once you get to a certain level they become a hindrance to your progress.
@kamkor
What a great video Kamil. I’m sure you could have edited in many more key moments as you progressed.
A great testament to you and the BLIM course.
You’re a bluesman!
Thanks a lot for the feedback. I appreciate all the kind words, and I’m glad you hear progress too.
@DarrellW thanks a lot for the tips. I plan to work extra on these aspects next year. Improvisation is also a big part of the Blues Immersion Course.
@Richard_close2u unfortunately, I don’t have many recordings between Unit 3 and Unit 6, because It’s been super busy after Summer. I did practice a lot though. It’s hopefully audible in unit 6 solo where I could finally play something sensible in patterns 4 and 5, and even hit chord tones here and there.
@TheCluelessLuthier enjoy it, I’m sure you will have a great time. I’d love to hear your thoughts and progress in 6 months.
@Stuartw thank you, and don’t worry. When I also feel blue like this, because there’s always someone who plays better, I remind myself of Tomo Fujita saying: “Don’t worry! Don’t compare! Don’t expect too fast! Be kind to yourself!”
Generally I don’t compare and usually don’t watch any of the videos posted for that reason. The BLIM title caught my attention. Glad I watched it but should have known better!
You are just dipping your toes into the deep waters of impro, lead and Blues. Don’t write yourself off so quickly. Believe me, sometimes things just click into place, like your barre chord eureka moment. And when you are ready, the course will be waiting for you. Hang in and keep doing what you are doing !
You sounded not too bad at the start, but the last clip on your video sure shows your development and that you’ve come a long way. That’s some nice playing!
Wow. That’s amazing - you’ve got the blues mojo for sure. To be fair I’d give anything to be as good now as you were right back in June, but you’ve stormed ahead even from that great starting point. Incredible stuff.
Kamil, you’re sounding great! Looks like BLIM has given you a huge confidence boost. I know what you mean about the class unlocking the fretboard. Patterns we always knew were there got put to use. Pure magic! Congratualations on making such great progress. I especially like the clip with you rockin it with the band.
