I remember when “key-punch operator” was considered to be a career with a bright future.
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Me too. The first Quarter of my computer class in high school, I don’t think I ever got a program to run due to mispunched card, cards out of order, missing cards (ever drop a deck?), and typos. And the lag time between punching the cards, submitting them to be run on the school system’s main-frame, and getting back the reams of computer paper was at least 1 week. I did get good at understanding error codes 
It’s probably the only time I got a participation grade so to speak. I did alright because my programs on paper were solid. But boy howdy, I couldn’t punch cards worth a hill of beans.
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Which is exactly what I plan to do.
Here’s the method to my madness. I watched some young kid’s learning compilation of songs he was learning ranging from songs with simple 1-4-5 construction to a complex Hendrix song. He charted his journey on Youtube.
The first videos totally sucked. But over time each song he played got better and better. A year later and the kid as doing fantastic. His cover of that Hendrix song was impressive. It was a fantastic video to watch as his playing evolved over time.
So yep. I’m going to crank out a video of a new song every week or so, or so I plan. Then come back to them, say, six months later. And then a year later, and republish a new video of the songs I choose. Well, If I’m still sucking air that is. At 71 you never know if you’ll still be around a year from now 
Btw - I’m not doing this to showcase my playing to anyone else but myself. I’m doing this to watch my own progress over time. But this is an open forum and anything we post is open to the community as these are personal “Learning Logs,” right? I have no plans on putting my playing ‘public’ on Youtube. I consider the Justin Guitar forum to be a Safe Place to publish as I follow Justin’s courses.
Constructive critique is always welcome.
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… I don’t find your sense of humor “quirky” at all 
… good luck on your Sex Machine travels!
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I just started Ear Training yesterday and I’m now on the first lesson of Grade 1 - The prefect 5th.
I sorta had an epiphany in that not only can I now pretty much put my finger anywhere on the fretboard (if my fretboard memorization kicks in I may even know the root note) and can now find the perfect 5th. But as an added surprise, I can see the relationship to the entire scale.
That’s sort of a cool, light-bulb goes off in my head moment. 
Up to this point I’ve used notes to learn scales, but this is The First Time that I have seen the scale as an interval. That’s why, for me personally, this is sort of an epic “Ah-Hah!” moment.
This is neat. Scales have been an exercise in ‘rote learning.’
But!
Now I can imagine where Ear Training and understanding intervals can take guitar playing. I can see playing where rote memorization isn’t needed - sometime in the future.
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ACK!
First video submission. ACK! Ok. Gotta start somewhere. Baseline video. Check back in few weeks or so.
Interesting - I got a “copyright notification” from Youtube but not a strike. I have no idea why as I don’t understand this stuff. Listed as between seconds 40 to 50???
THBBFT!
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The Android phone I have ain’t the best thing in the West to be shooting videos. Primarily the microphone is the weakest part of the phone’s video system.
Soooo, I’ve ordered a video camera for taking video. And I will shoot videos of me playing regardless of how bad the playing is at the moment. In fact, capturing flawed playing at this point in time will eventually provide a great indicator of progress over time. (Well, unless I don’t get better - then “ACK!”) <---- How many of us at this stage of our playing have that fear, 'eh?
Also, creating and posting videos addresses many of our tendencies to be a little shy about playing. One of the hats I wore in the past was teaching - digital electronics and computer technology, and then English here in Thailand. Standing up in front of people and letting it all hang out doesn’t come naturally. You have to overcome the fear of public speaking. I have no problem teaching subjects that I know well, but playing guitar poorly and then publishing it? That takes cajones.
One the the greatest fears of most people is the fear of public speaking and public ridicule. So posting videos of literally a beginner’s level of playing really forces you to address that fear.
So for those people already posting videos? Good for you! 
I’m right behind ya’ll. “ACK!”
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Guitar Warmups That I Use 
Warm-ups
Fret Stretches
(Yeah - I do have neurological issues with my hands 
. Welcome to old age!) 
Anicca.
Caveat: Don’t do anything that causes pain. Nothing I’m doing hurts me. Just a stretch.
If it hurts - stop. Backoff. You are going for a stretch, not pain. 
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For those who venture beyond this post - Beware.
Thar Be Dragons!
The following are mind exercises to fill out a Major Scales worksheet.
In this case, filling it out vertically by interval.
What good is this? Again, it’s a mind exercise in seeing patterns and relationships within the major scales.
Nothing I’m doing here is “memorization” with the exception of the following.
Memorizing:
Your alphabet from A to G
A mnemonic for FCGDAEB
Knowing a few visual clues in the pattern
Trust me - I don’t have the chart ‘memorized’ - but - if I’m handed the blank chart I can fill it out completely without any other aids (like The Cato Key Diagram). There are recognizable patterns within a fully filled in Major Scale chart. Someday I’ll have this ‘memorized,’ but until that day arrives I have a method to accurately construct the scales. And with practice, constructing the scales becomes easier.
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This is not memorization. At my age my memory is shot. This is a pattern recognition methodology.
I’m posting this for my own learning journey. The mind exercises are just that - exercises. Delays in me writing are me pausing to think. The black box to the right is a terminal window where I’m running a Python program to generate a random number between 1 and 7 which I then use to choose the interval to construct.
Construction of the VII interval of the Major Scale worksheet.
Looking that this with fresh eye. I screwed up. Should be G, D, A, E. “ack”
Construction of the III interval of the Major Scale worksheet.
Construction of the V interval of the Major Scale worksheet.
Now looking for patterns on the fretboard. The patterns are consistent with the insights I see while construction the scale worksheets in the previous post. And I see some clearly. Interesting…
This may lead me to giving up rote memorization and attempt to visualize it through pattern recognition.
After a wait of close to a month, I finally received my Video Camera with an External Microphone and Wide-Angle Lens. Welcome to Thailand - it was a cheap piece of junk.
Note to self: “Didn’t you learn anything after buying your Epiphone onliine?”
Guess not. Anyway, sent it back for a refund.
So - I’ll have to make do with the Samsung Galaxy with poor sound quality and no wide-angle feature. Looks like all future videos will be made with this phone while wearing a set of ear-buds with a built-in mic which will limit the space between me and the ‘smart-phone’ camera to about 30 inches. So - torso-and-guitar-only videos seems to be in my future. 
Well, no great loss. Who wants to see my elderly ugly mug anyway? 
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I’m sharing worksheets that I made for the Practical Music Theory 4.1 Course
These are blank worksheets for PMT 4.1 exercises to fill in. Useful if you don’t like doing it on paper. I prefer to use a computer.
The worksheets are intuitive to me. They may not be intuitive for you. But I’m happy to share them if you find them useful.
MT-402 Triad Note Worksheet
In Libre Office Calc Format.
View and download only
MT_403_Triad_Analysis_Worksheet
In Libre Office Calc Format.
View and download only
MT_404_Jumbled_Triad_Analysis_Worksheet
In Libre Office Calc Format.
View and download only
Ear Training
I can’t use Justin Guitar Ear Training app as it is built for an older version of Android then I have.
I found this site which seems useful. You can set up the program to test you on random intervals of your own choice.
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Toned Ear is definitely a tool of have in your toolbox. Opps. That’s actually Toned Ear! (laughs) My bad!
Here is a video of what would be a Ear Training Grade 3 quiz set up for P1 M2 M3 P4 P5 and Octave. This video has a ‘fixed root’ but you can change it to random.
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