@TheMadman_tobyjenner: Thank you so much. Very helpful and encouraging. I remembered your words “slow and steady” when practicing the Peter Gunn riff yesterday! You wrote: “Good share Z, you are taking onboard advice and making good progress.” Yayyyyyy! (blush!)
@DavidP: Thank you so much. So encouraging. And very helpful.
“You can take it slow and make small adjustments which will feel less uncomfortable.”
"I think it helps internalise by playing, saying, and hearing. I have also heard a suggestion that it is better to have a reference in front of you to check . . . "
" . . . try to get some stretch on the note played by the pinky by sliding the hand up the neck a little less. You may have to slide it for now, but slide it only enough to be able to reach the note with some stretch."
" . . .find something to raise your right foot rather than crossing your leg. I think that will be better for posture." Oh, that’s important. Thank you so much for taking the time to help.
“Once again, excellent update and progress!” Yayyyyy! (blush)
@sairfingers: Thank you! Helpful! Encouraging! You wrote: “I agree with the others that your learning log will be useful to others at the same point in their guitar journey.” Yayyyy! I really hope so!
And thank you so much for linking the Tammy Lesson 1. So . . . a while back this video had randomly shown up in my YouTube feed/suggestions. I watched a few minutes and thought, “She’s way beyond where I’m at. Maybe later.” But because you linked it and mentioned that the series answers a lot of the type of questions I might have, I went back and visited it. You’re right: It’s definitely helpful to watch. I got a lot out of video 3, for instance. It’s so kind that you took the time to share.
Hello Z,
Nice to see your vlog, it reminded me that we all started there. Maybe a simple suggestion, and maybe you already do that, but don’t forget to write down each day what you did in a logbook or something. It really helped me, I’m at my 3rd year now, and every time I take up my guitar, that book shows me what I did all those days and how I made progress. Maybe you’ll do that with your vlogs too, it will encourage you every morning to look ahead at the time you can spend with your guitar. Welcome in the community!
Chris
@Narjuna , what an excellent suggestion! Thanks so much! (I opened up my guitar journal again, and you’re right!) And thank you so much for the warm welcome. Means a lot. I’ll “see” you around the forum.
My Current Practice Routine and How I’m Faring at the A-D-E Chord One-Minute Changes
I thought readers might like to know precisely what my current practice routine is and how I’m doing with the JustinGuitar app.
I’m currently still in Module 2 of Justin’s guitar lessons. The first 3 screenshots below display the number of chord transitions I’ve made over the last 6 practice sessions of Module 2.
NOTE: CLICKING ON AN IMAGE WILL ENLARGE IT FOR BETTER VIEWING.
The fourth and final screenshot below is of my practice routine at the JustinGuitar site.
NOTE: I really enjoy my routine and feel like it is not so long that it is unlikely that I’ll complete it . . . yet it is long enough to give me peace about addressing finger dexterity, picking skill, knowledge of the fretboard, chord formation skill, etc. And it has really made a HUGE difference to add in practice at a goal song. I love ending my routine with it.
Perhaps I’ll make a video of me running through the routine. I imagine I’ll need to speed up the video to condense the 23 minutes down. I’ll see.
NOTE: CLICKING ON AN IMAGE WILL ENLARGE IT FOR BETTER VIEWING.
Yes and as I always say, remember you only need to change chords as quickly as a particular song requires. If the song you’re learning needs a quick mid beat change then that’s the one to practise. Don’t get caught up trying to reach some unachievable number with a combination you’ll rarely/never come across.
Excellent, Z, keep doing what you are doing and looks like you are close to being able to play along to songs in the App, perhaps with the tempo reduced.
Thanks for asking! I can play songs that only require 1 chord change every 4 beats. I’m trying to work my way up to being able to play songs with faster chord changes, such as “It’s Your Thing.”
@sairfingers, thank you for your advice. I really can’t figure out if I should move on from Module 2 or not. I’m wondering if I should, for example, be able to play “It’s Your Thing” before moving on. That song has a mid-bar chord change.
@DavidP , many thanks! Above, I posted a video that displays where I’m currently at with “Three Little Birds” at 100% tempo.
Thanks again for the feedback and advice, everyone! Until next time!
Another step forward, Z. Keep doing what you are doing, laying down the solid foundation.
From a playing perspective, the one thing I would suggest you start working on immediately is keeping your strumming hand moving to the beat. Quite OK to play one down strum per bar, as you did here, but stopping the right-hand moving is a bad habit and you don’t want to develop it as you begin to play songs. So work on four strums per bar and initially just play the strings on the first. If the tempo is then too fast slow it down a bit until you can get the hand moving in time.
You can also begin to tap your foot with the beat. The left is recommended since the guitar rests on the right leg and it eliminates any foot and possible leg movement bobbling the guitar. Not sure if Justin has talked about this in the lessons you have watched so far. If not safe to park that comment for later.
On the video, I thought what great production skills to have the app visual and audio in the video. Then you took it out. I understand your rationale but would say, from Justin’s app perspective, it is quite OK to have it in the videos you make to demonstrate learning and progress. Now if you were making teaching videos on a monetised channel, that would be a different story.
As for the audio, if you take that point of view to it’s ultimate conclusion, then you would only play original songs. When you post songs, you may find YT does recognise it (sometimes in my case ) and place a copyright claim on the video. This is nothing to worry about. It just means any revenue associated with the viewing of the video would be distributed to the copyright holder and not yourself. I have never had a video blocked/taken down. I know this does happen but I think it very much depends on the copyright holder, eg The Eagles are notorious for this) and maybe the nature of the YouTuber.
I have also seen several members post videos with the app playing as a BT, sometimes also showing the app visual, sometimes not.
So for future I suggest keep the backing audio in and display the app visual if it appeals to you or will be useful when you review the video to assess progress afterwards.
Well done Z. Things are progressing nicely and your chords are becoming clean and more confident.
David has covered all the points I would have raised, so I’ll just say that I look forward to the next instalment.
Don’t forget about tapping your foot and keeping your arm moving even ln the beats where you’re not hitting the strings. It helps keep everything consistent.
Looking at the prerequisites listed for moving on to the next module I think you can comfortably put a against them all.
Since the next module introduces the upstrums it may be beneficial to practise three little birds playing downstrums on all of the beats. You could reduce the bpm of the song in the app to a comfortable tempo. Remember tap your foot to the beat and even count out loud 1, 2, 3, 4. On the app the big dots are the beats, so you will be tapping and counting 1, 2, 3, 4 along with them. The little dots in between them are the ands which the next module will introduce.
You’re making good progress and laying down some solid foundations.
I GAINED SO MUCH FROM YOUR FEEDBACK AND CHEERS. I could hug you all.
I hope to reply more fully when I get more time. In the meanwhile . . .
. . . below is EDIT 2 of Video 003. I used the same footage. The video below differs from the initial video above in that I left the music and app in this time around.
(My concern was/is that if we all keep uploading videos of songs from Justin’s app, I’m wondering if that might hurt his sales. People could just strum along to our videos instead of investing in the app. I dunno. )
SMALL NOTE ABOUT THE VIDEO:
It was challenging syncing the video of the app and the video of me playing. I felt like when I got both videos’ SOUNDS (strumming and music) synced up . . . then the VISUAL WAS SLIGHTLY OFF. Then, if I got the visuals from both videos synced up . . . then the SOUNDS were not. Oh, well.
Also, all are more than welcome to watch it, but honestly there’s no need to watch this video if you watched the prior version. I just wanted to include it for posterity’s sake.
Happy playing, all!
EDIT 2 of Video 003
Three Little Birds Music and app left in
Hi Z. Todays observation. Very interesting to watch you play along with the app.
Because at the moment you are playing one downstrum to the bar you have loads of time to change chords. Your confidence and skill is improving and on many occasions you were changing chord early and then waiting for the app to change chord and catch up with you. When you start including more strums to the bar you won’t have this luxury as you would be strumming the wrong chord.
What I’m saying here is that for this song you’re way beyond the one strum per bar stage and your chord change speed for ADE will allow that.
Thanks for uploading the second version, Z. Sounding pretty good, steady. As I expect I said before, you just want to keep that strumming hand moving, even when you don’t play the chord, 4 downs on the beat per bar.
I don’t think you have to worry about the App sales being affected by you sharing the odd recording with the App inset. But do appreciate the consideration shown. Far more likely, if anything, that your recording may serve as marketing for the App, when somebody thinks ‘that’s cool, I want it to’.
You wrote: “Good share Z, you are taking onboard advice and making good progress.” Yayyyyyy! (blush!)
I’ll “see” you around the forum.
) and place a copyright claim on the video. This is nothing to worry about. It just means any revenue associated with the viewing of the video would be distributed to the copyright holder and not yourself. I have never had a video blocked/taken down. I know this does happen but I think it very much depends on the copyright holder, eg The Eagles are notorious for this) and maybe the nature of the YouTuber.
against them all.
