GRADE 2 CONSOLIDATION WEEK 8
Week Ending Friday 25 October 2024
Only managed to get 1 practice session in this week. I think the work commitments should ease off next week and let me get back to more regular practice. Fingers are going to be sore after 2 weeks away!
@MacOneill That’s the second shortest update ever 
I hope for you there wont be a third 
Practice Routine Changes
The last couple of weeks of very little practice has given me the opportunity to review how I’m structuring the sessions. The most recent ones were a bit ‘just going through the motions’ simply to get it done and I don’t feel like I made much real visible progress. I’ve decided to change things up a little
I have cut down my ‘official’ practice time down to 60 minutes (was previously 90) and will split into two 30 minute sessions, morning and afternoon. I’ll still have the other 30 minutes identified but they will be electives. I still want to do most of them every day but the key is to get the 60 minutes done first. Having the 90 minutes all in one block just became a chore and I was losing motivation to sit down and get started - 90 minutes of scheduled practice is about 2 hours sat in the chair in reality with breaks and futzing about. I was OK once I actually sat down and started.
I watched a YT video by a piano teacher for how she structures practice for her students. She recommends sessions to be 30 minutes or less before you take a break and I’ve seen other psychology papers recommending to split up practice across the day (spaced practice). I’ll give it a go and see if it helps me to focus better.
I’ve also gone back to pen and paper for my practice log. It helps to keep the extraneous stuff out of the log if you have to write it by hand. Each 30 minute session is only 5 lines in the notebook (1 item per line). My Word document was recording too much information to be able to make sense out of it 
If anyone is interested in the psychology of practice you should check out https://bulletproofmusician.com/ and this YT channel by a Classical/Flamenco teacher has some science-based practice advice https://www.youtube.com/@DiegoAlonsoMusic
GRADE 2 CONSOLIDATION WEEK 9
Week Ending Friday 1 November 2024
Target: min 7 hours of practice. Actual: 5 hours
60 minutes/day routine, 2 sessions of 30 mins each.
Summary Progress and Observations
Managed to get significantly more practice done this week and managed at least some practice every day except Friday (I was away all day and overnight). As noted above I changed up my practice routine as I felt it wasn’t really sticking. This week seems to have gone better, once I got back into the regular sessions.
Splitting practice up into 2x 30 min sessions seems to work better for me as it doesn’t seem like such a chore half way through. Most days I continue to play after the 30 minutes, mostly keeping songs fresh and some playing along with recordings.
I’m reading a couple of books on how to structure practice sessions and have started to incorporate some of the suggestions. It’s early days so we’ll see if they stick around! When I finish the books I plan to do a review post here with the main points.
Going back to pen and paper for my daily practice log has helped I think in that I don’t spend as much time collecting data and spend more time actually playing! Having the paper notebook open during the session is less distracting than having the computer on. I spend a few minutes at the start and end of each session to think about what I’ve done and to record one thing that went well and one thing that needs more work. These end of session thoughts will start to become the goals for future sessions and should direct the sessions to the things that need work rather than trying to play through everything every time. I’ve done 2 months of this bulk practice and the final 2 months of consolidation will be more targeted on the things that need the most work.
Chords: Still working my way through the various changes and trying to get as many of them at 80bpm as possible. Looks like I’m left with the more difficult ones now as I’m only really completing 1 chord per session. The Stuck 3/4 continue to be the most problematic.
Scales: continuing to work on the major scale and minor pentatonic scales. I was running these at around 200bpm but have slowed them right back down to 70-80bpm as I was getting too many errors. I’m focusing more on getting good quality clean notes rather than calling it done if I just manage to hit it. Also trying to concentrate on producing a consistent volume.
Fingerstyle: continuing to learn the 4 beginner patterns from the Intermediate course, mostly concentrating on pattern 1. Still trying to work out position of right hand so that I can cleanly pluck the string without catching it with the fingernails. Working at 70bpm I can mostly do it cleanly with consistent volume for a couple of minutes but any longer than that and it’s a problem. I plan to start with the other patterns at a slow tempo for variety.
Alternate Picking: continue to run chromatic scales from the 1st to the 12th frets and have started to be able to this error free at 80bpm. Will look to increase tempo now. I’m also alternate picking the scales exercises.
Hammer Ons: using the minor pentatonic scale and running at 160bpm. Getting more consistent notes ringing out with decent volume for the most part and it feels more relaxed than it did previously.
Strumming: running ‘Old Faithful’ and ‘Accent 2/4’ patterns at around 100bpm. Generally have both down with consistent volume but occasionally miss an up-strum. I’ve also been going through 12 bar blues patters in A, E, and G. The G pattern continues to be a stretch.
Repertoire: working on ‘Margaritaville’ and ‘Take Me Home Country Roads’ and can play both from memory and have started talk-singing with the chord progression. It’s starting to come together but need to start isolating the problem parts and just working these in the practice slots. Leave the playing through until after the initial 30 minute period. Synchronising the lyrics for Margaritaville as the verse changes into the chorus was problematic but I think I’ve managed to sort out where I was going wrong and it’s been a lot better the last couple of days.
Next Week: I want to finish the books and start to put into practice more of what I’ve learned. I still have a couple of days work to finish but will try to get the 7 hours of practice done in the week.
For those interested the books are
Learn Faster, Perform Better: A Musicians Guide to the Neuroscience of Practicing, by Dr. Molly Gebrian, Oxford University Press
Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning, by Peter Brown, Belknap Press
The Musicians Way: A Guide to Practice, Performance, and Wellness, by Gerald Klickstein, Oxford University Press
GRADE 2 CONSOLIDATION WEEK 10
Week Ending Friday 8 November 2024
Another hit and miss week for practice due to other commitments. Only managed 2 sessions this week but I did take the time to finish the first of the books I am reading whilst away from the guitar. I’ll make a separate post reviewing the book below.
BOOK REVIEW: Learn Faster, Perform Better
This is a long post. The first section gives my general thoughts and the part below the line gives my major takeaways from the book.
General Thoughts
I’ve recently read Learn Faster, Perform Better by Dr. Molly Gebrian (2024, OUP), which seeks to present strategies for music practice by relating them to research in learning and neuroscience. Dr. Gebrian is a music teacher and a performing viola player. She also holds qualifications in neuroscience and cognitive psychology and is perhaps uniquely qualified to present her arguments in this manner. The book is written for classical players at undergraduate level but there is plenty here for beginners playing popular music on any instrument.
The books main argument is that many musicians, particularly amateurs and undergraduates, don’t employ effective practice strategies and seeks to suggest alternatives backed up by the latest scientific research. The author intersperses descriptions of the research with discussion on what it means when applied to music practice. She will often describe what she sees in her students and shares how they have addressed a variety of issues in their playing ability. Rest assured, the science part is easily understandable for the lay reader and doesn’t require any prior understanding of neuroscience. This book is highly readable and clearly explains any jargon used.
I’ve started to include some of the suggestions in this book into my own practice but, as suggested by the book itself, I am not trying to completely overhaul my routine in one fell swoop! The book advises an incremental approach, allowing each change to bed in before looking to make further revisions. I think most musicians, at whatever skill level, can get something out of this book and it is certainly beneficial if you feel your practice sessions are merely going through the motions.
Many of the book’s findings back up Justin’s teaching and recommendations. It should be a good complimentary read to anyone following his courses and lessons. Cross-posted with Just Chatting
My Main Takeaways from the Book
The book has 5 main sections:
Section I: Brain Basics
Section I describes how the brain, and specifically memory, functions and identifies what ‘good’ practice should look like. The author argues that successful practice is not simply endless repetition of the same thing. Good practice should focus on identifying problem areas, developing solutions, and then repeating those solutions to reinforce the correct way of playing.
The book discusses various strategies for correcting mistakes and makes the point that mistakes are inevitable during practice. The important thing is how the musician recognises and deals with these mistakes; “playing without analysis is just playing, it is not practice”. The author argues that each practice session should have goals related to the identified problem spots, these goals kept in a practice journal and reflected on at the start and end of each practice session. The focus of practice must be the parts you cannot play, not the parts you can (a message continually reinforced by Justin).
The author discusses bad habits and describes strategies for fixing them; amplification of error, and old way/new way. Both methods rely on the exaggeration of error and playing them on purpose to isolate the issues to fix them. However, the book makes clear that this approach can be damaging if you don’t already have the necessary playing skills and so this technique appears to be aimed more at intermediate and advanced players. Beginners should probably not use them and should be focused more on technique exercises to improve their skill level.
Section II: Using Your Time Well
Section II outlines the importance of taking breaks both within and between practice sessions. The book argues that continuous practice for hours without a break is not effective and it’s better to use a concept called ‘spaced practice’ that includes time for breaks. The research has shown that it’s especially important to engage in spaced practice when learning new material and to be careful of learning pieces that are too similar – research shows that subsequent pieces, if too similar, will interfere with the brains ability to learn the first piece making your practice ineffective.
The author argues that getting enough sleep is critical to learning and preserving in memory what you have learned. Not getting enough sleep risks losing what you have learned that day. There is an abundance of research in a variety of fields that backs this up and has to do with the brains process of moving things from short-term memory to long-term memory whilst you sleep. The author states “If you take nothing else away from this book, take this: sleep is absolutely essential for learning and if you want to maximise the results of your practice, you have to prioritise sleep.”
The book states that there is no ‘perfect’ schedule of breaks. The brain needs time to assimilate new information, but it also appears to need to forget in some form to make it effortful trying to remember it. For new materials the time between sessions should be shorter and can expand when there is some familiarity with the material. The author suggests starting with micro-breaks within a single practice session, then come back to the piece a couple of times a day, and finally, once you can play the piece well, leaving it alone for several days before practicing it again from memory.
A variation of spaced practice, Interleaved Practice, is discussed as a method for improving the eventual performance of a piece and being able to play it right first time. It’s important to note that interleaved practice is best used once the piece is known well enough to be played from memory but needs to be polished. Other strategies should be used for learning new material and the book outlines this process and the approaches that should be used at each stage including blocked practice, serial practice, and interleaved practice.
The author suggests that changing some aspects of what is practised rather than practicing the same thing multiple times can make practice more effective but there must be solid technique underlying the material before this is tried and care must be taken not to make the variation too dissimilar to the piece. Suggestions for variations are to change the rhythm, the tempo, even detuning your instrument!
Section III: The Power of the Mind
Section III focuses on the beneficial use of mental practice or practicing inside your head without your instrument. The author argues that adding mental practice to your routine enhances learning over just doing physical practice alone. However, some knowledge of the physical process is required to derive maximum benefit from this approach. The book recommends that we start with physical practice and include mental practice once there is at least some familiarity. The author recommends the use of video and watching back, even if it includes mistakes, if you can identify that these are mistakes.
The book presents research demonstrating that mental practice works and suggests several strategies to be included in practice routines. The author notes that mental practice is a skill and itself needs practice, so start with just one aspect of playing and don’t try to do everything all at once.
The author describes the difference between having an internal versus external focus during your practice and presents research to support why having an external focus is better. Internal focus is focusing on what your body is doing e.g. finger position; external focus is outside your body e.g. the instrument or how it sounds in the room or to the audience. Internal focus is fine when learning the mechanics of a skill but try to refocus externally as soon as possible.
The book discusses the most effective ways to memorise music and describes the 3 steps of the memorisation and recall process: Encoding, Consolidation, and Retrieval. The research suggests the use of ‘chunking’ (e.g. learning phrases and then assembling them) to ensure deep encoding and the use of structural and performance cues to help remember where you are in a piece. The research again suggests that sleep is essential for the consolidation of memory and that retrieval practice must be done from memory, no cheating! The author recommends begin playing from memory right at the start of learning a piece as getting it wrong and correcting it soon after helps to form the memory.
Section IV: Challenges Specific to Music
This part of the book discusses practice strategies specific to music, in particular improving rhythm and tempo, pitch and intonation, and playing at speed.
The key to improving rhythm and tempo is not to practice with a metronome all the time as you won’t have a metronome going during performance. The research shows that continual practice with a metronome does not ‘lock in’ your sense of time beyond a very basic level. What has proved effective is moving the body in time with the music to strengthen your sense of time. The metronome should be used only to test your sense of rhythm e.g. by having it periodically go silent and seeing where you are when it comes back in.
Pitch perception is important for all musicians but for guitarists intonation is taken care of by the frets and with good setup and accurate tuning. Audiation, the ability to hear the pitch of a note in your head, is important and is a skill that should be developed (ear training, also stressed as an important skill by Justin).
When the book describes the strategies for improving speed most of the suggested methods are more applicable to classical pieces than to popular songs. However, the suggested strategies involving metronome clicking-up are applicable and can be easily implemented even by beginners. The book describes some more advanced techniques involving interleaved practice but suggests that these are more appropriate for advanced players. Beginners and intermediate players should begin with the simpler strategies. The author stresses that, whichever method is used, be patient and don’t rush as you can harm your ability if you practice the wrong thing (another Justin recommendation).
Conclusion – Bringing It All Together
In her conclusion Dr. Gebrian discusses time management, focus, motivation, and strategies to cope with feeling overwhelmed. The main recommendation is to keep a practice journal, record in it what problems you are having, what you are doing to solve them, and what your goals are for each practice session. Your session goals need to be structured around the problems and your strategies for overcoming them. Make your goals specific and measurable for best results.
The author suggests breaking your practice into 25-30 minute sessions and to schedule short (5-10 minutes) breaks in between. Never practice for more than 90 minutes (3x sessions in a row) without taking an extended break of at least 90 minutes. Avoid mindless practice and learn how to focus. Understand how to motivate yourself and try to do something, however small, each day (another Justin recommendation). Prioritise sleep and don’t try to change too much all at once. Pick one thing to start and then add others over time.
Stuart, going back through your learning log since we both are working on grade 2 consolidation songs. Your idea about transferring the learning log content to local storage is a good idea. I don’t think that JG is going away any time soon. But it is nice to have local access in case of a network outage. I did experience the annoyance of losing all of my work when I had an account on Line 6 GuitarPort website many years ago. A year of lessons disappeared when Line 6 dropped the website subscription service. I also have online subscriptions to Guitar Techniques, Total Guitar and Guitar Player magazines accessed via app on my tablet. I had to permanently download 12 years of issue for the 3 magazines since all 3 are going away by the end of the year. So caution about nonlocal or online or cloud storage is sometimes justified.
Stuart, the book sound interesting. Some of it seem to correspond to some of the lessons that start the modules in Grade 3 - such as:
Module16 - Supercharge Your Practice with Timboxing
Module 17 - Goals and Destinations
Module 20 - The Spacing Effect and module
Module 21 - The Objective Observer
I think that I will take a look at the book. Thanks.
@SteveL_G99 Hi Steve. Interesting that some of this stuff comes up in Grade 3. I’ll be starting to have a look at that in a few weeks. A lot of what I read in the book backs up what Justin has been teaching for years. My biggest takeaway is that just banging away at the same thing over and over will NOT ‘burn it into your memory’ because this isn’t how brains work!
For anyone interested Dr. Gebrian has a YT channel where she demonstrates some of the techniques in the book.
GRADE 2 CONSOLIDATION WEEK 11
Week Ending Friday 15 November 2024
Target: 7 hours of practice. Actual: 6.25 hours
Summary Progress and Observations
Getting back into a regular routine this week after a few weeks disrupted for work. Starting to incorporate ideas from the books I’ve been reading: I’ve split practice up into 2-3 sessions of 30-45 minutes each day (after breakfast, after lunch, and after dinner) and taking time at the start of each session to set targets for that session. Now have the target of completing 3 consecutive repetitions of an item before moving on and if I mess up on the 3rd rep then it gets set back to zero - it MUST be 3 consecutive error free reps to count!
I’ve seen noticeable improvements in most areas this week, which may be because I’m just being more specific or setting more realistic goals, but it feels like progress is being made
Chords: spent the week focusing on the ‘weak’ G changes and have just 4 of these left at 80bpm. I was reminded from Justins stream this week to split chord practice into getting accurate fingering as well as the speed of the change. I was only doing the speed part and wasn’t really seeing much progress in chord quality. We’ll see if there’s an improvement next week.
Scales: started the week making errors in the Major scale at 70bpm but progressed up to 85bpm by the end of the week with no errors (3 consecutive sets of 3 reps up/down the scale, alternate picking, no mistakes). Minor Pentatonic is up to 120bpm and some reps are now without looking at either fretting or picking hands.
Rhythm: continued with Old Faithfull at 100bpm but have started using the metronome with bar breaks (3 muted bars + 1 sounding out). A bit inconsistent to start with but it’s getting better. Same deal with Accent 2&4 strumming so still some work to do to tighten these up.
Fingerstyle: continued with playing Pattern 1 but introduced chord change C to Am to save being on the same chord for too long. Improved speed to 80bpm but pushed this higher today but w/o metronome, just to see how fast I could go. Will look to increase speed next week and maybe introduce pattern 2.
Alternate Picking: using the chromatic scale and moving it across the neck and back and up the neck between frets 1 and 9. Mostly without error but haven’t managed 3 consecutive reps yet - keep working on this at 80bpm until I get 3 clean reps.
Repertoire: focus on Working Class Hero this week. Had an issue where Am chord was stopping the high E when wrapping thum around to mute the low E. Mostly sorted by the end of the week after a couple of sessions ironing this one out in line with suggestions from the book. By the end of the week the strumming is pretty automated and I’ve started to include the lyrics. Need to learn the words properly now, so that will be focus for next week. Playing Margaritaville from memory as a warmup and this is starting to get comfortable now. I seem to be using the afternoon session mostly for songs - good tips from Justins stream too so I’ll be having a think about Campfire, Developer, and Dreamers.
Griff Hamlin Blues Guitar: continued to work through this and completed the Fast Walking Blues exercise with the alternate picking at full tempo.
Singing: continued to sing major scale whilst playing on the guitar. No specific goals for this, just to practice trying to hit notes and checking them.
Takeaways and Goals for Next Week
Use of Flashcards
I tried using a flashcards app this week to help me remember lyrics. I was a bit skeptical it would help much but I’m shocked at the effectiveness of doing this. Previously I really struggled to remember the words to songs beyond the first verse and chorus but a couple of weeks doing this seems to have made a big difference. I also thought I might have to do it for ages for things to stick but I started to notice the difference even after the first couple of tries.
I used an app called “Brainscape” that you can get for Mac, PC, IoS, and Android. Also, it’s a free app and isn’t infested with ads. It’s pretty easy to use to setup your own flashcard decks and I can see uses for testing notes in chords, notes in scales, key signatures etc as well as lyrics. Good way too to always have something on your phone that you can ‘play’ with when you don’t have your guitar handy.
GRADE 2 CONSOLIDATION WEEK 12
Week Ending Friday 22 November 2024
Target: 7 hours of practice. Actual 5.5 hours (+ 7.0 hours of other guitar stuff)
Summary Progress and Observations
I thought I’d done a lot of practice this week but the total hours was fewer than last week. I seem to have spent time doing other guitar stuff so must concentrate on doing the practice items first. Still seeing improvements since I revamped the routine. Introduced flashcards this week which has been really useful for memorising lyrics, super-effective in fact. On the whole it’s been a pretty good week, feels like I’ve achieved a lot
Purchased Guitar Pro 8 as it was 30% off for Black Friday. Just starting but it seems simple enough to operate.
Chords: Completed all the remaining ‘Weak G’ changes up to 80bpm. Need to be mindful of too much tension in fretting hand and shoulder, particularly with F chord variants.
Scales: Major scale started the week at 85bpm and was at 100bpm by the end (3 sets of 3 repetitions w/o error). Min Pentatonic reached 190bpm and switched to playing 2 notes per click once I reached 160bpm on 1 note per click. Both scales are alternate picked.
Rhythm: Both ‘Old Faithful’ and ‘Accent 2/4’ are played with metronome playing 1 bar then muting for 3 bars. I find high tempo (>140bpm) and slow tempo (<90bpm) tricky to keep in time during the muted sections.
Fingerstyle: Picking is more relaxed and consistent this week. Can almost get through 5 minutes at around 100bpm w/o too many errors.
Alternate Picking: I use the chromatic spider exercise between frets 1-9 with the aim of completing it w/o error. This is proving very tricky to get 3 runs in a row w/o error. I can usually manage 2 but then mess up the third. Review next week - is it lack of focus or tiredness?
Repertoire: Worked on Take Me Home Country Roads by John Denver this week. By the end of the week could play and sing from memory at a reasonable tempo. F chord to C chord change in the bridge is a problem spot. F chord is generally OK but have a problem getting to C cleanly at tempo.
Griff Hamlin Blues Guitar: started work on Hideaway Blues. Have most of the notes down so need to put pieces together and play from start to end next week. There are a couple of tricky triplet spots to work through.
Singing: continued singing to the C major scale and intervals. Getting a little more comfortable now but voice still has a limited range.
Takeaways and Goals for Next Week
GRADE 2 CONSOLIDATION WEEK 13
Week Ending Friday 29 November 2024
Target: 7 hours of practice. Actual 7 hrs 45 mins (+ 4.0 hours of other guitar stuff)
Summary Progress and Observations
Reviewing the takeaways from last week I did focus the scales part of my practice routine on the major scale shape and managed to get the tempo up to 200bpm and be able to play it starting from the top E down rather than from the bottom up as is normal for scales practice. This was tricky to start with, even though I have always played the scales both up and down. I saw somewhere that playing ‘from the top’ is important so you are used to this when soloing.
On the strumming side I focused exclusively on tempo above 140bpm and below 90bpm – this was quite problematic but there was an improvement by the end of the week. I did start to learn the second fingerstyle pattern from Justin’s Grade 4 lesson and by the end of the week managed to combine this with the first pattern at a moderate tempo, although it still needs much work to automate it at anything like a reasonable speed.
I moved away from the alternate picking exercise I was doing as I’m covering it in other exercises, particularly scales. I may go back to it later, we’ll see, but I’ll give it a rest for now. Continued getting to grips with Guitar Pro 8 and have downloaded another couple of blues courses that were on sale. At least one of them won’t be started until 2025 but it was a good deal, so I got them now.
Chords: Working through the remaining chords from Grade 1 to get them up to 80bpm. I have 8 from 94 remaining and hope I can get them done next week. The B7 changes were quite tricky to get to clean changes and took a few sessions to get them done.
Scales: Concentrated all on Maj scales this week. Need to pay attention to tension in fretting hand and shoulder (I tend to grip to hard and it makes fast changes harder). Also need to be conscious of string muting as I play the scale to stop unwanted string noise. Came together well by the end of the week and tempo is up to 200bpm (2 notes per MN click) whilst alternate picking with 3 consecutive repetitions with no mistakes before clicking up the MN. Started playing from the top E and at various starting frets.
Rhythm: Continued both ‘Old Faithful’ and ‘Accent 2/4’ are played with metronome playing 1 bar then muting for 3 bars. Concentrated on tempos >140bpm and <90bpm. These remain tricky to keep in time during the muted sections. Accuracy was better toward the end of the week but I’m still frequently at least slightly ahead or behind the beat when it comes back in. More practice needed.
Fingerstyle: Added pattern 2 to pattern 1 and am working the tempo back up. Tempo is currently 80bpm playing 1 bar of p1 then 1 bar of p2 and cycling this around, including a chord change from Am to C.
Repertoire: Worked on Never Can Tell by Chuck Berry this week. By the end of the week could play and sing from memory at a reasonable tempo. Still looking for a more comfortable range to sing this in and capo on 1st or 2nd fret seems to be favourite right now. Move to a new song next week.
Griff Hamlin Blues Guitar: continued work on Hideaway Blues. Still a couple of tricky spots to work through but can play whole thing from memory now.
Singing: continued singing to the C major scale and intervals. Continue to improve but voice still has a limited range. Singing the songs as warmup exercises also seems to be helping.
Takeaways and Goals for Next Week
Practice Logs
I noted a few weeks ago that I had gone back to doing a written log, so I thought I would share what I’ve done on here. I split my logs into a Weekly and a Daily log.
For the Weekly I have bought a nice A4 notebook with decent paper and will use a 2-page spread for each week. The left side of the spread is a log of the items I’ve practiced and the right side contains my reflections on the week (this is where I get the info to write the Learning Log on here). I bought a nice notebook to encourage me to write in it each week.
For the Daily I just use an ordinary A5 notebook as I don’t intend to keep these. I just record the targets for each session at the start of the session and then note anything significant. The writing is more ‘chicken scratch’ in this book but that’s OK as long as I can read it at the end of the week!
GRADE 2 CONSOLIDATION WEEK 14
Week Ending Friday 6 December 2024
Target: 7 hours of practice. Actual 6 hrs + 8 hrs 10 mins of other guitar stuff
Summary Progress and Observations
Reviewing the takeaways from last week I did bring back in the minor pentatonic scale but started using different picking patterns rather than learning Box 2. I’m using a pattern that plays 3 notes of the scale, backs up 1 note, then plays the next 3 and so on, up and down the scale and still using alternate picking. This is harder that it sounds but I’m confident with it now and I just need to get back up to speed with the scale.
I still find myself in bad posture so need to make more of an effort with this and not slide back into bad habits. I’ve started to do more counting out loud during practice exercises and have remembered to slow down on things where too many errors creep in and build back up to tempo. This happened mostly in the chord changes and scales exercises.
I finished all 94 of the Grade 1 chord changes and have moved on to the sus chord changes. I now have 5 songs that I can play and sing all the way through from memory (mostly). I still stumble over some of the words and fluff the occasional chord so just need repetitions to get these ‘automated’ and sounding good. I will look to play these as a ‘set’ outside my normal practice routine a couple of times a week.
I’m continuing to explore Guitar Pro and have started to learn Reaper DAW software as I was having considerable trouble with Garageband not recognising my audio interface. At least the interface works with Reaper so I should be able to progress to recording some of my playing next year.
Chords: Finished of all 94 Grade 1 changes and have moved on to sus chords where I have 14 of 61 remaining. Need to stay aware of tension in the hands and shoulders and general posture.
Scales: still working both major scale and minor pentatonic scales with alternate picking. Trying out different picking patterns to break up the linear nature of the scale to improve dexterity and not get into the habit of just playing straight up and down. This requires more subtle movements in the hand/wrist than just straightforward playing the scale to quickly reach notes. Had to slow the tempo down on both scales so next week’s focus is to bring the tempo back up but with the different picking pattern.
Rhythm: still using the muted bars patterns in the metronome app and have focused on slow and fast tempo this week. Most improvement in the faster tempo which seem easier to stay in time to during the muted sections.
Fingerstyle: combined patterns 1 and 2 together and worked up to 100bpm. Learned patterns 3 and 4 this week and have them at 80bpm. Chord changes are cleaner now and picking is more accurate with less involvement with the fingernails.
Repertoire: Worked on Brown Eyed Girl by Van Morrison this week. It’s quite a fast tempo so the chord changes were not clean initially and are still not fully clean even now. Had a real problem singing this with the recording so am using the capo at 2nd fret to make it more comfortable. Need repetitions to get comfortable with this one.
Griff Hamlin Blues Guitar: finished off a couple of exercises this week: Little Mary’s Lamb (based on the Stevie Ray Vaughan song) is a fun tune so will probably keep this around. The other exercises were just chord progression stuff that I’ve covered as part of Justin Guitar modules so passed quickly over them once I was satisfied I could do them adequately.
Takeaways and Goals for Next Week
GRADE 2 CONSOLIDATION WEEK 15
Week Ending Friday 13 December 2024
Target: 7 hours of practice. Actual 5.5 hrs + 3 hrs 55 mins of other guitar stuff
Summary Progress and Observations
I’m not reaching my full practice target so need to review how I set this weekly goal and whether to substitute a ‘practice’ session for playing sessions if I miss a day or a session.
Reviewing takeaways from last week I almost got through the remaining Sus chord changes (I have 2 left to complete). I’m still working on the issue where my thumb was slipping down the neck and although better this week, it’s still an issue sometimes. I think it may be related to how hard I’m gripping the chords, so will be mindful of that in future.
I managed to get the minor pentatonic back up to 200bpm with the 3 Up/1 down picking pattern, but the major scale is some way off still. There are however too many errors and it’s not “automatic” yet. Worked exclusively on slow tempo strumming, less than 90bpm, with the metronome. This is hard to stay in time and rushing/lagging is obvious when the metronome comes back in. I did manage a couple of sessions where it was very close most of the time. Hopefully it just needs more practice to be able to do it more consistently.
I did successfully combine all 4 fingerstyle patterns and have them up to 100bpm with consistent volume and accuracy. Need to get this automated and be able to play it without looking. Struggled with the E-shape barre chords and getting them to ring out, particularly the minor and 7th shape. The major shape isn’t so bad. More practice needed.
Chords: Worked on sus chords where I now have 2 of 61 remaining. Little finger sometimes slips off the string in the C7 chord.
Scales: still working both major scale and minor pentatonic scales with alternate picking. Can sometimes achieve multiple runs up/down the scale but not consistently error free, either straight or in the 3U/1D pattern. Mostly it’s picking errors rather than fretting errors. I also noticed tension in the shoulder some days that I need to stay aware of. Minor pentatonic is at 200bpm and I can do it w/o looking sometimes. Major scale is at 130bpm but still errors. Maybe need to slow this one down again.
Rhythm: still using the muted bars patterns in the metronome app and have focused on slow tempo this week. It’s really tricky trying to stay in time with slower tempo but it got better toward the end of the week. Still rushing/lagging most times though.
Fingerstyle: combined patterns 1 through 4 together and worked up to 100bpm by the end of the week. Focus on dynamics and trying to relax posture and fretting hand. Playing without looking is the next challenge and I’ll stay at 100bpm for now.
Repertoire: Worked on Half The World Away by Oasis this week. Struggled with getting clean chord changes, particularly to/from the F so mostly I was focused on this and other problem changes rather than trying to learn the whole song. Chords are much better by the end of the week so I’ll focus a bit more on the actual song next week.
Griff Hamlin Blues Guitar: Continued play throughs of Hideaway Blues and Little Mary’s Lamb as fun tunes. Moved on to “Straight Down 6th Avenue” which practices moving E-shape barre chords for major, minor and 7th up and down the neck. Chords are not clean and fretting hand gets tired and cramps up a little so doing this in 5-10 minute bursts.
Takeaways and Goals for Next Week
GUITAR GOALS FOR 2025
These are my thoughts for what I want to achieve in 2025. I will edit this post through the remaining weeks of 2024 but will ‘freeze’ the goals at the start of January 2025.
General Goals for 2025
The above goals are further defined on a quarter-by-quarter basis below to keep a measure on progress being made (or not). Quarterly goals will be further detailed in the goals I use to set up my daily and weekly practice routines throughout the year.
Quarter 1 (Jan to Mar)
Quarter 2 (Apr to Jun)
Quarter 3 (Jul to Sep)
Quarter 4 (Oct to Dec)
wow you really know what you want Oo
so far my only goal would be to play guitar 
It’s just a plan, and the more specific you are the better you are able to see how you’re doing as you go along. The key point is “it’s just a plan” and not to stick too rigidly to it and be ready to adapt as things change
I’m a bit concerned at the amount of stuff I’m trying to get done but I’ll review the goals at least quarterly and trim back if I need to.
