The 1-to-1 Sessions

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 1:54pm

Collated responses & discussion:

Richard_close2u:

@ Brian Serious response time (no Oompa Loompas in sight).

It is great to read your story of the session, the chat, the focus on song-writing (a direction you seem compelled to follow), on progressing to barre chords etc. On the last of those, can I make a suggestion? Get a vibe going with the 4-chord progression. You know the famous one. The I - V - vi - IV progression. Try playing it in G which uses only open chords:

G - D - E minor – C

Then try in C which uses one barre chord (you could use a mini-barre F Major chord or alternate between F barre and F Maj7 so you can keep the progression going without fatiguing your barring finger too soon):

C - G - A minor - F

Then to extend and focus more on practicing your barre chords, try it in other keys.

Key of D

D - A - B minor - G …

Play all as barre chords with roots on 5th & 6th strings or just the last two as barre chords to ease finger fatigue.

Key of A

A - D - F# minor - E … again mix & match barre chords with open shapes.

In technical terms these are all called I - V - vi - IV progressions. (If you don’t know what that is you may want to research it a little).

Other variations using the same chords are:

A minor - F - C - G

E minor - C - G - D

B minor - G - D - A

F# minor - E - A - D

In technical terms these are called vi - IV - I - V progressions.

And another variation:

C - A minor - F - G

G - E minor - C - D

D - B minor - G - A

A - F# minor - D - E

In technical terms these are called I - vi - IV - V progressions.

Again, vary your playing so sometimes you play open chords, sometimes 5th string or 6th string barre chords for majors and minors.

brianlarsen:

@Richard_close2u - This stuff is gold dust. Not only do I get a lesson with the great one himself, I also get bespoke pathways from his right-hand men I shall be coming back to this many times in the not too distant future. I will first need to go back and review the theory. I felt I was within touching distance 5 or 6 months ago on the theory course, but need to refresh.

It’s funny- I don’t really think of myself as wanting to write good songs, it would just be nice to have something to play while singing something I wrote. (I may end up just stealing others’ great tunes ;)).I shall investigate and hopefully put all the above to good use. Thank you again.

@mari - Thank you, Mari. Funny you should say that; Soon after the funeral, I had composed the bones of the chorus of a song I might write for him. Although this one will be too personal to share, I’m afraid It’s really encouraging to see members take an interest in how everyone else is progressing

Cheers

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 1:54pm

@balamuthiahv on March 02, 2019

Balamuthiahv:

Hey all, Wow Brian… reading your experience made me realize the exact feelings I had going into my skype lesson. You put it in beautiful sentences.
I had my session yesterday. I’ve got to admit that it was close to impossible to come up with a list of questions to ask Justin during the one shot opportunity. However, I did come up with a list that I had sent him earlier this month before I came to Japan. Embarrassingly enough, a busy week in Japan, led to a lack of preparation and I forgot the things I wanted to ask him.
I had setup my audio interface and everything so that Justin would be able to hear my voice as well as my guitar. The session began with Justin not being able to hear my voice however (Another embarrassing moment). But he helped me figure that out and we began talking about what I do and what I’m doing in Japan. Justin is an amazingly warm/cool guy and he helped me settle in quite well.
Then he pulled up the list I had sent him and we began with blues soloing. After that he asked me to do an improv solo. He said that I’m able to play but the most important thing that I need to work on is having a “central idea” and linking the other licks with this idea using “threads”. He suggested that I need to explore the guitar more and learn new licks, for you can’t get fluent in a language if you only know a few words and sentences that you repeat (How true is that considering that’s my skill with Japanese). He also talked about how the flavor of the solos is reflected by the kind of music we listen to. Then he suggested that I should try to transcribe more solos and went as far as challenging me to transcribe 5 solos before the end of this year. This, I gladly accepted!
The next thing I wanted to ask him was tips on how to improve the recording and production process. After listening to my song (her light) quickly, he said that I was actually doing good on the production side but suggested that I work on tightening my bass playing which he said was “wobbly” at times. He said that’s probably the one thing producers would want to be improved in the song. Then he spoke about what software he uses to produce his songs and also gave me a run through of the softwares available and a little bit of an insight of which would be suitable for me.
Sadly enough that’s all we did talk about and the things I forgot to ask him were about how to use and target chord notes while soloing, combining rhythm and lead and lead fills. There were a lot of awkward moments of silence from me due to my lack of preparation (and partly due to the fact that I’m actually talking to Justin!). But Justin was a really cool guy and made the session an enjoyable experience.
The one good thing I did do was to properly thank him for the wonderful website and the community and how it had changed my life for the good in the last few years, particularly the last 6-7 months. I was motivated into doing competitions only for this chance of getting face to face with Justin and it did prove to be a wonderful experience. As for the questions I have unanswered… probably will have to wait until my next win It’s not going to be easy, but I’m motivated! Got to work on the transcribe challenge before that though! Thank you all in this forum. You all have been amazing to me and everyone! And thank you Brian for your efforts in the setup as well as the maintenance of the community.
Bala

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 1:55pm

Collated responses & discussion:

Richard_close2u:

@Balamuthiahv

Re: Soloing with the approach of targeting chord tones.

First, you need to know the notes (triads will work) of the chords in the progression. These will become your target notes, comfortable landing places when the chords are changing. So for your chosen chord progression / backing track, chart the chords as triads on the top three strings. Visualise the five moveable CAGED barre shapes and just mark the notes on the G, B & E strings. If you know your intervals, mark the root and the 3rd and 5th too. Definitely the root. Have these neck diagrams in sight when playing.

The sort of backing track that will work best with this will have only three or four chords, be fairly slow and hold each chord for at least two bars.

To begin, play just one note per bar of the progression. Start with the root note of each chord as it comes around. Just the root.

Then repeat but with either the 3rd or the 5th.

Then repeat but play any two notes per bar over the chords, root & 3rd, root & 5th, 3rd & 5th.

Then repeat and extend the idea. Make up a little run of notes that either start and / or end on the root note of each chord per bar. Because the chords last for at least two bars you could progress to runs, licks & phrases that start in one bar and end in the other. For now, still limit your choice to notes that are only from the triads – the root, 3rd or 5th.

Note – for minor chords, the 3rd is a b3rd.

Try this for a few weeks over a variety of backing tracks in different keys.

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 1:56pm

@Garfield on March 05, 2019

Garfield:

Hi Everyone
I had a lesson with Justin on Saturday. I can’t say enough nice things about this guy, he’s great to chat to and he’s straightened me out.
So where I am on my guitar journey is lost – or I was. The beginner’s course is fantastic because what you need to learn next is very obvious. I won’t say I’ve completed the IM but I’ve got to the end of it and I’m comfortable with most of the syllabus. I don’t see it as something to be completed before moving on, as I will be working on the some of those skills for years to come maybe forever. As many have commented the more you know about guitar the more you realise there is to learn; and what order should it be tackled? It’s a bit bewildering and I wasn’t sure what direction to go in.
After much agonising I’ve started the Blues Lead 1 and as I couldn’t bend very well on my acoustic I’ve bought an electric. I want to learn the fret board and my plan was to do this via the 5 minor pentatonic shapes. My question to Justin was am I doing right, or should I tackle the major scale first as this is where everything comes from. We then had a long chat about why I want to play and what I want to play. I can’t recount the whole conversation here but the outcome is that I am going to proceed with the Blues Lead course and learn the minor pentatonic patterns. The reasons being that I want to play blues, blues is an easy starter and as Justin said you can always learn other scales and styles later on.
So onto the technical stuff. I struggle with muting on the electric. I find it really hard to mute at the top of a bend. I also asked if I should be anchoring or float with my picking hand. On the acoustic I have always floated but I had the body of the guitar to rest my arm on. Justin anchors. I’m going to anchor. He said that you can’t really get away with floating completely you do need something to keep your hand in a fixed position. I have tried it the past few nights and found it’s not too uncomfortable. On the muting Justin noted that my hand position was wrong and needed moving back toward the bridge. I have noticed that‘ve hit the middle pickup when picking a scale before so I’m too far forward. By moving my hand back and dropping a couple of fingers down I’m in a much better position to mute (it’s a smaller movement) and I do feel a bit more secure when picking. It doesn’t feel natural yet, far from it, but I think it will come with practice.
Also a good tip he dropped in was to roll up my jumper. I was wearing a long sleeved top and he commented that it’s unusual to play in long sleeves and that by rolling up a sleeve I’d get better contact with the guitar.
I’ve been struggling with vibrato. I naturally seem to do the classical style vibrato, it’s lots of hand and arm flapping but as Justin said “that’s just not going to work on electric”. He ran over what I should be doing, and when explained 1:1 I felt I started to get it a bit. Basically I just need to pivot my hand, I was flapping my arm and elbow around, I also need to be locking my fingers. Again this does not feel natural but it will come with practice.
I asked Justin about a lick that I start each jam with and cannot stop playing. It’s become an unconscious tick. To take Justin’s analogy of licks being words, this word is “um” and I can’t stop saying it. He asked to hear the lick which I obviously fluffed and then almost forgot. He said you just have to try not to play it. Try and record yourself so you can see when you play it and if you’re not capable of not playing it then take the strings off. He was serious. He gave me a shuffle in A and told me to play over it but don’t touch the G string, again I didn’t really rise to occasion and without my default lick it was a pretty lousy 12 bars – but I can say I’ve jammed with Justin!
Lastly I asked for some help with rhythm. I have a looper pedal and set loops up for myself quite a bit, but I often find that I’m playing the same or very similar rhythms. He said I could start the blues rhythm course as well if it have enough practice time. I don’t but I’m going to. He said there were backing tracks on the course and that at first I should try and play along but then try and loop them.
That’s about it. He also encouraged me to play with others I’d mentioned that I was trying to set up a jam with a few guitar playing dad’s I’d met at a kids party recently. That’s happening next month.
Hope you found this interesting I certainly did.
G

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 1:56pm

Collated responses & discussion:

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 1:57pm

@aloise1 on August 30, 2019

aloise1:

Sorry for the delay, finally taking a few moments to post about my Skype session with Justin on August 15th…

As some of you may know, my performance of my original song, “I Hear My Own Music” ( "I Hear My Own Music" acoustic fingerstyle by Len Aloise (original music) - YouTube ) was selected as the “winning” entry for the song competition that concluded in June. There were so many excellent entries this past quarter so imagine my surprise (and honor) to be chosen!

Justin Sandercoe as you all know (or should know) is exactly in person as he is in his videos! He is very down to earth, interested in helping you learn and most importantly I think, wants everyone to succeed in their own way!

I prepared for my meeting with Justin by thinking thru where I am in my guitar journey right now, six years in, so much I don’t know or think I should know! I sent Justin some examples of other things I have done, expressed to him what I like to do at this moment in time and then lastly gave him some specific things that I hope to discuss during our hour session.

My questions probably centered around these 3 main topics (although we did discuss other things as well)

soloing

fingerstyle

dynamics

On my end, I was ready to go! I had warmed up the amp, had an electric guitar plugged in and tuned for my soloing questions, an acoustic ready for the fingerstyle and dynamics discussion. Justin knows that these sessions are important to each of us that earns one so after some brief pleasantries, he dug right in!

And he is fast, he can see things that I am doing and immediately pick up on something that can help me! A pinky not being used, weaknesses in my soloing “method” (had to do with my partial knowledge of the fretboard. He demonstrated for me, listened to me both play and talk and pointed me in the right direction on all three topics!

I couldn’t have asked for any more! It was a great hour talking and interacting with one of my guitar heros as if we were equals! What a great person and what a great session! We concluded on time, spoke about some of his off site sessions, asked if he was coming to the states! He wished me great success, assured me I was doing great, suggested some of his courses for what we had spoken about and our session concluded.

…or so I thought! About 3 days after our session, Justin posted this video:

Strumming Dynamics for Beginners | Transform Your Play! - YouTube

You can hear the shout out he gave me a few seconds into the video! (and I NEVER said “dude, why haven’t you got a lesson like this on your site!?”) … again, I just have to say, thank you Justin for teaching me to play the guitar!

Len Aloise

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 1:57pm

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Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 1:58pm

@DanniTSI3 on January 29, 2020

DanniTSI3:

Part 1.

Hey all! I’ve not been posting much on the boards to crazy busy school holidays etc, but I had my lesson with Justin on 6th January and let me just say, when you see yourself on camera, it is clear why someone like Justin with his easygoing nature comes across so well in his videos, whereas I on the otherhand say “like” a lot and laugh when I’m nervous haha ;D

So my lesson could be broken into 3 components: 1 part guitar counselling, 1 part forward planning, 1 part technique

I’ve posted before about my struggles with time management in a busy life of work and kids, and what it comes down to is finding the time to have even 15 mins I can dedicate to guitar practice without interruptions. I usually do a little bit of practice when the kids are in the bath, but I end up just playing songs and once I’m playing songs, its hard to go back to 1min changes or other exercises.

The first song I played was House of the Rising Sun - it was a dog’s breakfast as my nerves were peaking, but the feedback was:

need to use the metronome and force the changes as I kept stopping

having trouble with F to Am

need to go back to basics and playing well with one strum down, then strumming on each beat… THEN ADD THE STRUM PATTERN

That conversation lead to my issues with Mr Metronome. I avoid that sucker at all costs: I find it difficult, frustrating, and ultimately so unenjoyable that I dumped the metronome and rode of in the distance on my very out of time horse ;D My excuse to Justin was “well I don’t have any desire to play in front of an audience, its really just for me” to which he responded “timing is the whole thing… even non musicians notice if your rhythm is off… even the earliest music such as banging sticks was in time without stopping and if it wasn’t the listeners would notice”. Fair call Justin.

5 minutes with the metronome now in my practice routine.

Will do a part 2… off to take my kids to Karate

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 1:58pm

Collated responses & discussion:

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 1:59pm

@DavidP on August 12, 2020

DavidP:

I had my Zoom Session with Justin this morning.

Once again I count my blessings to have the opportunity to spend the time with him. Have to say again, what a pleasure it is to talk music with Justin. He has that ability that all good teachers have to be able to engage at just the right level, to offer loads of encouragement, some tips and suggestions, and to point out the problem areas. And striking the right balance means one hears those problem areas without any adverse reaction.

Main focus of the session was on song-writing and arrangement. I am busy with another original and we used the current cut of the song (drums, bass, acoustic guitar, and lead vocal) as the basis for the conversation.

Overall he was really positive and encouraging about the song, the arrangement and the production, which was a boost to confidence. I think many of us tend to be quite tough on ourselves, always wanting to do better, which is good, but sometimes not appreciating what we have achieved to this point, which can be not so good if those doubts hold us back.

Most interesting suggestion, and one I look forward to trying out, is to really give attention to the drums and bass at the outset. Work towards having a cut of the song that is just drums, bass, and lead vocal. And if that is sounding good then you have a solid foundation to build on. Useful tips about varying the drums in between sections to keep things dynamic.

Much like the session with Len, we spoke a lot about the dynamics, keeping things interesting through the whole song.

Biggest issue for me is to work on one section of the vocals, to actually compose the melody, and make sure the notes are all good and then pitch them well. Sounds obvious but this is probably the weakest aspect of my journey…the singing and the vocal melody. But he was extremely positive and encouraging on the bridge section. So I will put some more effort into the problem part of the song. And he was positive as to my potential as a singer … now at some point it is up to me to put some effort into improving my singing.

No promises here as to when I will be done with the song … best I can say is I reckon before George RR Martin publishes the next book in the Song of Ice and Fire series (Game of Thrones) … I know that is not saying much.

Many thanks Justin, Richard, Lieven, and all of you … the lessons and Community truly are a place to come and make your musical dreams come true.

PS Wasn’t sure where to post this, so Richard, if you would rather it was a continuation of the award topic then feel free to move it on over there.

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 2:00pm

Collated responses & discussion:

DavidP:

“Most interesting suggestion, and one I look forward to trying out, is to really give attention to the drums and bass at the outset. Work towards having a cut of the song that is just drums, bass, and lead vocal. And if that is sounding good then you have a solid foundation to build on. Useful tips about varying the drums in between sections to keep things dynamic.”

In chatting off line, I realise that in trying to keep it short, I have maybe made it confusing.

The first step in this process is to create a rough version of the song with a simple drum track, guitar and vocal. Then compose the bass, refine the drums, and thereafter can go back and add the rest of the instruments. Confident that the song with just the bass and drums with vocal sounds good.

Sorry of you were wondering about working on vocals with just bass and drums, which I guess would be tricky …

DavidP:

Thanks Mari.

Such wisdom in the notions to enjoy the moment, every step of the way on the journey. To have a direction but not be obsessing about reaching the destination. And in music and in life there is always another destination.

As for GoT … what odds might we get that the next book will be written by Brendon Sanderson, like the final books of WoT … Wheel of Time. Disclosure time … I got as far as the forth book in that series and ran out of steam. My son loves to tease me about my weakness and lack of stamina, it being one of his favourite series.

It is indeed, Alex, still have a sense of disbelief that I have been so fortunate to have hung out twice. As you say, hanging out with a few bevvies of your own taste, to chat, and play some music would be great fun. I saw his adverts for his workshops … Italy or the Carribean … would be fantastic.

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 2:00pm

@kontenda on September 30, 2020

kontenda:

I had my lesson with Justin yesterday. It was delayed because the time difference, my work hours and Justin’s own work load made it difficult to arrange a time. Anyway as with others he asked me to send him a note on things I would like to cover, which i did (they were posture, flat picking, and song writing). The areas I chose deal with specific problems I have with my playing - so I am not sure how much use this will be to other members of the forum - hopefully some of it will be - anyway here goes.

First of all he asked me to play him something to give him an idea of where I am in my journey. So I played the 1st verse and chorus of a song I have been learning to play recently, Crowded House’s “Distant Sun”, with thankfully no singing, just guitar. He complimented me on my rhythm but said he saw certain parts of the song where I added extra concentration and could be smoother. One particular section was a chord change from a D minor to an F Barre chord. He advised that I should pick out the weak areas and just play those portions rather that playing the whole sequence. I should video myself performing, figure out the areas that weren’t up to scratch, figure out why (a difficult chord, a difficult change, picking out a note etc…) and just work on those specific parts until they were right. He mentioned this is something he does himself and is something I should continue doing for as long as I play guitar.

Basic Posture

Then we moved onto the items I asked to cover. First was posture. I have never had a lesson with anyone before, so I just wanted to confirm that my basic posture was correct. The wrist of my fretting hand becomes painful when I play barre chords or scales and recently the pain remains with me even after I stop playing - so I asked if he saw anything that I was doing wrong. He gave me a very detailed discussion about carpal tunnel syndrome - about how ligaments and nerves controlling your fingers run the length of your arm and through a tunnel in your wrist and if you put a strain on this area it can cause pain and numbness in your wrist. So he advised me to try stretching exercises for my wrists before playing. He also advised me to drop my shoulder (as shoulder pain is also a common complaint of guitarists) and try to bring my wrist up so it is in line with the rest of my arm (i.e. the wrist doesn’t bend). After straightening my wrist, it felt strange as I wasn’t used to this pose, but with much less tension than my normal position. This is something I am going to have to work on - but I feel this will probably resolve the pain issue.

I also mentioned a problem I had with anchor fingers, specifically my ring finger on the B string. I find after playing songs that require constant anchor fingers while changing chords (like ‘Wonderwall’) my finger can move ever so slightly causing a slight buzz to occur on the B string. He thought this could be related to the previous position of my wrist and tiredness. He advised also to video myself and see where and when the movement occurs. He also mentioned that using certain areas in the song to reset the fretting of the fingers - lift the anchor fingers up and reposition them - not to rest them but just to prevent them moving too far away from the fret.

Flat Picking

The second item I asked to cover was flat picking. I cannot play riffs correctly. A few years ago I entered the Kinks ‘Lola’ in the song competition which had a simple riff (for most people) that I couldn’t master then and still haven’t mastered now. I played it for him and he played it back the way it should sound. He explained unlike my strumming, when picking I wasn’t concentrating on the rhythm of the riff. Which was a big aha moment for me. So he didn’t mean that I had to keep my hand moving like I was strumming, but in my head it should be moving, keeping the beat, if that makes sense. He suggested slowing down the riff in Transcribe or Audacity, writing it out on tab - working out which are up picks and which are down picks and practise from there - without worrying too much about hitting incorrect strings at the beginning. The important part was to get the rhythm of the riff correct first. He also mentioned a few other song lessons I could use to practise riffs such as Lenny Kravitz “Always on the Run” and “Le Freak” by Nile Rodgers.

Song Writing

The final item I asked to discuss was song writing. Initially when I learned that songs could be written using the chords from a key, it was a revelation for me and allowed to write my first songs. Lately I feel the songs I write can sound very basic and have an almost nursery rhyme feel to them. He talked to me about moving outside the chords in the key and changing keys within a song. I hope I have this part right. He gave an example of starting a song in the key of G, and after for example playing a D chord, make the next change to the 5 chord of the key of D which would be an A major chord. This can be tried in any key and it generally sounds good. We talked again about the song Lola and I couldn’t work out its key because it had an E major, A Major, D Major and C Major in its verse. He said it was in the key of E because E felt like home, this was why the riff was played on the relative minor pentatonic of C#m.

He told me it was important to know the craft, as he called it, but there were no rules and it was ok to explore chords outside the key. He mentioned that a lot of songs are written just by experimentation. He told me to try figure out why I like the songs that I like and maybe take bits from some of them to combine into my own composition. He played me an example of a Gomez song (‘Make No Sound’ I think) where the chords in a signature riff sounded off when strummed by themselves but the way Gomez combined them, and by picking only certain strings, it sounded great. So I need to try stuff out and see if it sounds good.

And then all too soon it was over. He was really easy to talk to throughout the lesson - exactly like he is in his lessons. I feel very fortunate to have got a lesson from him, what I learned from him in such a short space of time was very insightful and a really enjoyable hour. I feel extra motivated now to go work on my guitar.

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 2:01pm

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Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 2:02pm

@brianlarsen on October 01, 2020

brianlarsen:

I’m afraid I’ve been a bit selfish with my forum prize. There’s an expectation that when we receive a personal lesson from Justin, we share the experience with the forum- both out of interest and as a learning tool. It’s good practice for personal reflection as well.

I always enjoy reading others’ accounts, so easy to imagine him saying all those things, having watches so many videos.

I thought long and hard what I would like from a lesson and found my attitude had not changed much since the last great Christmas competition giveaway. All the information, advice, tips and demos are available at the click of a mouse. I have a good grasp of where I’m at and no shortage of areas that require attention.

Whilst it would be extremely enjoyable to shoot the breeze with Justin, proudly demonstrating the bits of progress since my last lesson and grunting for more pearls, I felt happier returning the favour and donating my hour back to him to spend as he pleases.

It made me smile to hear he chose to play guitar

He donated the prize money to NHS Charities.

This whole episode reminds me that just offering to do something nice for someone else brings happiness. (The action itself is not a necessity.)

Who knows, if I stick around long enough, karma might cross our paths again

Cheers

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 2:03pm

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Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 2:04pm

@Majik on October 08, 2020

Majik:

I had my Google Meet session with Justin this afternoon. As others have said, he’s a really great guy to talk to.

The main focus of the session was where I was on my guitar learning journey and where I go next. As I had told Justin, I consider myself an Intermediate player but between work, travel, and learning the bass I’ve not picked up the guitar that much over the last couple of years.

I had some great progress with a local guitar teacher up until a couple of years ago, and a few years ago I had passed the RGT Rock Guitar Grade 5 exam and was looking at grade 6. I learned the songs I needed to a reasonable standard, but I always felt lacking in the other areas.

I think, on reflection and after discussing this with Justin that I had met my original aims that I had when I first started playing, and now was more interested in consolidating and using those skills than in chasing Grade 6. For me the grading system was a way of focussing my learning on something concrete and that worked for me up to Grade 5 but not so much after that. After all, like most of us, I do this for pleasure, and developing the skills for grade 6 was requiring a lot of time and effort and creating a lot of stress and I think I wasn’t enjoying it any more.

The other area we talked about was focus: I think I have said this on the forum before, but I may have a little ADD because I sometimes find it hard to focus on one thing and stick with it. I find it really hard to stick to a practice routine because I find myself exploring other things and drifting away from my routine, or just forgtting to do it.

Justin pointed out this wasn’t uncommon and suggsted some strategies to help with this. For a start he suggested that I build multiple schedules covering different aspects of guitar playing, which could be technical exercises of different types, but could also include just learning songs. The idea is that I select the schedule that appeals to me when I sit down to practice. And that I should give myself permission to not play guitar at all if I don’t feel like it.

We also discussed recordig myself, as this is something that I really want to try to do more of. Justin re-iterated how useful it was as a way of checking your playing and progress, as well as focusing on the performance aspects of playing. He supported the idea that I try to build some multi-track pieces from the ground up using my DAW and other tools as it would give me a great insight into song construction and production techniques as well as allow me to develop skills in other areas. He felt it might appeal to my ADD nature too.

Finally we talked about some Major Pentatonic techniques and how I might develop my playing there. He gave me a couple of exercises that I’m going to put into one of my routines as well as road-map of how to develop beyond those once I had them under my fingers.

So it was a really useful session for me. I just need to start putting things into practice. Once again, thank you Justin.

Cheers, Keith

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 2:07pm

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Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 2:07pm

@batwoman on November 04, 2020

batwoman:

I had my lesson with Justin last night. Pure gold. My heart is filled with so much appreciation for the time he spent with me.
Buying an electric guitar
It’s a super personal thing. Might not be the most expensive it’s about finding the vibe. The most important thing is that I like it, how it looks, how it feels against my body and in my hands, how it plays. Look at second hand guitars. Buying a new guitar is like driving a car, as soon as you drive it, it’s lost value. Justin buys most of his guitars second hand.
Electric guitar posture.
With an electric I can’t rest the forearm on the top as you do with an acoustic. If there is a jumper in the way the muscles in the upper arm have to hold the arm up. Roll sleeves up so the skin on the forearm creates friction with contact with the guitar for a grip.
Stage Fright
First step is to figure out where the problem comes from. I’ve done that. It’s like plotting a course, make it incremental or some throw themselves in the deep end, face the nightmare, do an Open Mic. Gentler would be to do it for a small group of friends and family. Awesome and super courageous that I’ve faced my fear with my first Open Mic last year.
Almost everyone he has met who performs, including himself, feels these feelings. Dry mouth, sticky hands, elevated heart rate. All a normal reaction. Learn to recognize this collection of feelings that would be categorized as nervousness or anxiety as being normal feelings. Even Keith Richards and people who’ve done a gazillion shows talk about these feelings. Keith said ‘Oh my hands are sticky, it’s time to go on’. It changed Justin’s perception of these feelings. ‘Oh I’ve got butterflies, I’m about to do that thing that I really love doing. This is a precursor that I’m about to do the thing I like to do’.
Expect those normal feelings. The only thing that can muck it up is the mind games, the psychological response.
My motivation is that I’m doing the thing the thing I love that connects me with others.
Posture and Stage Fright
I played a song I wrote last year, haven’t posted a recording of it as yet. It’s called Hope Dies Last.
To say I was nervous would be an understatement. It’s taken me months to find the guts to make a lesson time with Justin. How he made any sense of my incoherent babbling is testament to his perceptiveness and talent. It was some of the worst stage fright I’ve experienced. :o ??? : :-[
When I’m nervous I can’t lift my eyes from the guitar or look at anyone. It took me most of the song to be able to lift my head and look at Justin. This song I play with my eyes closed very often. I have no need to look at the fret or my right hand.
Never hold a flag up and make something I’m not happy about obvious to the audience. No flagging mistakes, no commentary, no shaking my head if a chord doesn’t go right. It’s habit forming, the more I do this when I practice the more it becomes a habit. Then it becomes more likely to happen when I play for an audience. Get out of the habit. If the audience thinks I’m not happy with what I’m doing, this interferes with the connection with them, it can break the connection. If it becomes part of my practise routine it becomes part of my performance.
The self critical commentary breaks my connection with the song, and the guitar and if I’m performing, the audience. The same thing applies with recording. When I practice, practice being in my happy place. It’s a place where nothing matters. It doesn’t mean that nothing is important. The space of Nothing is important. When I play, get to a place of playing where I’m not thinking about anything, it just happens. Get lost in this place.
Practise is to automate it so I can switch into that other zone, a place of nothing. It’s very much like the space called meditation. Thoughts come and go, it’s an empty place but it’s not.
Stop looking at my hands when I change chords. The frantic motion of looking at every chord change takes me out of my happy place. Constant head movement gives me an air of not being confident. It makes the connection weird. I don’t need to do this with either hand. As my head moves back and forth, this squeezes the voice box, mic won’t pick me up. Play in a black room, blindfold myself, close my eyes. Build up my confidence doing this over the months ahead. There are times I’ll need to look, a big jump, something complicated, when something goes wrong.
Future Direction
I’ve been feeling lost and to be honest, like a loser going backwards at a rapid rate.
Writing and the creative thing are the strongest drives in me. A specific course eg Jazz Chords, Blues Improv isn’t really compatible with my goals. The most inspiring would be to continue to learn songs I love and as I find things in the songs that I love, explore them further eg drop D. Look at how I can use these chords in my own songs.
Recording is a good adventure for me. It gives me something tangible I’ve made in a few hours. That builds a sense of achievement and progress. The feedback can be enlightening and super valuable. Don’t let it be a self-critical thing. Allow it to notify me.
This next bit is pure gold.
Tears mist my eyes every time I read it. It brings an enlightenment and an expansive perspective that gives me permission and impetus to grow with grace, ease and joy in my own way. I’m liberated from feeling driven by the lists of all the things I should be learning and mastering and never getting there.
Let go of the idea of having to progress in a linear fashion. Just because someone can play fancy st doesn’t mean they’re a better musician. It’s an art. Find the things that resonate with me. Focus on those rather than thinking I need to be better. Do things that are fun. I can improve myself and how I sound, how well I get in the zone, how I express myself in the zone. It’s about learning things that resonate with me and exploring those things, finding things I think are really cool, and absorbing them into my palette of things I can use when I write.
Thankyou Lieven and Richard for putting my name forward, thankyou Justin for this precious gift you’ve given me. :- :- :-

Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 2:08pm

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Richard_close2u · December 27, 2021, 2:09pm

@mari on February 25, 2021

mari:

I had my video lesson with Justin this afternoon. After hoping for a lesson with him for such a long time I did wonder yesterday if I had built up my expectations too high. As it turns out – nope! I really enjoyed having the opportunity to meet him, and to get a bit of guitar guidance from him. He is really really adept at narrowing the focus to determine what it is you want out of learning guitar, and how he can help you in a lesson. Because that’s what it is all about, really, what is it that YOU want. And then he is also great at helping you sort a path.

I should say right off the top that I perhaps gushed rather a lot, but he took it all in good humor I think. I will also say though that gushing notwithstanding I did feel quite comfortable sitting and chatting with one of my guitar idols. Cross a lesson with Justin off my bucket list, now the much bigger bucket list item for ‘someday’ is to be able to go to a JG residential workshop .

For my lesson, we started off talking about what I wanted out of a lesson. I talked about my guitar goals, which I set out as being able to play cool songs / recognizable stuff, being able to add something different when playing with friends where the other guitarists are mostly strumming open chords, and song writing. And then what I’ve been thinking of as my primary goal – figuring out how I get from here to there. Justin actually really helped me to realize that I haven’t actually quite figured out where ‘there’ is yet. It’s one thing to want to be a guitar goddess (and yes I did use that phrase lol), but what does that actually mean to me. Wanting to play cool stuff is not necessarily the most focused goal. That reminds me of the Alice in Wonderland quote, and I may have seen it at some point on Justin’s web site, paraphrased, “If you don’t know where you’re going, any road’ll take you there”.

Speaking of focus and structure though –

By the end of it Justin had helped me sort my learning priorities into 2 streams, Song writing, and Theory / Knowledge. He gave me a lot of good ideas for each stream.

Song writing – muck about and have fun, explore, experiment, search for ‘seeds’. When you’re looking at gaps in your knowledge, you might not necessarily want to fill them all for this part of it. Leave room for creativity.

Knowledge – Justin has just finished rewriting his Intermediate Course and will start to tape soon, first lesson might be out in a couple of weeks, probably be released over the year. It’s got a different flow, so you can follow it by lesson, or by topic. Go through what works for you, to fill the gaps you want to fill. Pick a focus – fingerstyle, percussive playing, CAGED, blues. Write a riff each week, using a chord or a scale, and develop it into an entire song. (Okay that’s also song writing.) Record the song. Explore and find sounds you like to find the ‘cool’ stuff. Experiment with different tunings. Jam.

Back to the beginning – after some chit chat and talking about goals I played parts of 2 songs for Justin so he could see where I was, Honky Tonk Woman (a dropped D version), and Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out. I was quite happy to have Justin say a few times over the lesson that I have good rhythm, it’s nice to get a compliment from your hero lol . We then talked about confidence, and how that builds up the more you develop your skills. We also discussed some specific practice techniques, especially breaking a solo down into small sections, riff by riff, and working on each section long enough that you get through the ‘omg Justin why do I want to be practicing this riff for 5 entire minutes!’ thinking and find I guess the heart of that moment in the music. And then we talked about emotion in music. HTW is a much easier song for me to play, it’s just fun, so it’s a lot more carefree, but I can get much more stifled in something more complicated like the solo in Nobody Knows You (and no, Justin did not call me stifled!) So we talked about breathing, and stress raising the rhythm of your heart, and that can drive the rhythm of the music, so now you’re not playing the feeling you want you’re playing more mechanically, getting the notes right (or close enough) but not finding the rhythm of the music (and no, Justin did not call my playing mechanical either lol). The point is to practice enough so that you are confident enough that you don’t have to think about it. “The more you think the more you stink” – good quote. (Possibly Neil Young.) (He also said that being nervous from a lack of confidence is different from recording-button nerves.)

We also talked quite a bit about tone, and exploring tones to find a sound palette that I like for different types of songs. I keep meaning to do that but so far I know next to nothing about either my Katana 50 or the new (used) amp that I got from a friend recently, a Vibro Champ XD. Exploring was a key theme of my lesson overall today, so exploring tone is going to be included in that.

I was thinking about my lesson afterwards, specifically about where ‘there’ is, where do I want to be as a guitarist. Justin had talked about jamming, and that idea suddenly just felt like it put everything into place. My overall takeaway from my lesson is therefore to know my guitar goals as song writing, and jamming. And I haven’t been doing either of them! I can put together a practice routine now that will help me work towards my goals (including with all the various tips from Justin today). And I have watched through Justin’s various videos on effective practice, and goal setting, so I will review what I want out of my guitar journey from time to time, but I’m completely happy sitting with these 2 overarching goals.

And when I say my overall takeaway has to do with figuring out my goals, well that’s not the entirety of it at all. My real overall takeaway is to keep having fun, explore, be creative, relax, breathe, and don’t mind what anyone else thinks. And that reminds me of a Dr. Seuss quote – which I may also have seen somewhere on Justin’s website – ‘those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind’.

Happy guitar playing everybody,

A happy guitar-goddess-in-training,

Mari

Ps yes of course I wore my favorite tee, a JG tee, ‘You can’t buy happiness but you can buy a guitar, and they’re kind of the same thing’.