Oct 13
Learning curve steepens
Ramp it up!
Hey dudes. Until last night, the previous couple of weeks lessons have been spent majoring on nothing too earth-shatteringly new. 3 main themes...
- Playing through the last few songs on my learn list. My Sharona and Roxanne still need some work! To a lesser degree, so does Ever Fallen in Love. I find those fast barre chord changes and barre into open chord changes very challenging to hit accurately...
- Jamming to backing tracks (Jam Trax CDs) in basic pentatonic pattern.
- String bends, yeeaaah baby. Learning which strings on the basic pentatonic suit the bends.
Then last night's lesson we moved onto a brand new song - a song that I think Johnny hasn't taught before. And it's a cracker. White Wedding. Brilliant.
There's a new technique for me of picking single strings from the same barre chord. Arpeggio style on the Bm. Also included are advancing difficulty single string picked phrases tagged onto the end of the arpeggio. We didn't transcribe the whole song's fill-ins, so that's for next week, but the basic Intro, Verse, Pre-chorus, Chorus sections are all written out so I could play the entire song through if I get myself up to speed.
There's a choice of which of the guitar 'parts' to play as well. In the chorus, for instance, either palm muted rhythm fifth power chords in 1+2+3+4+ or single strum full chords and let ring for 1 or 2 bars depending on where they fall in the score. Then, in the verse, (IIRC) there's also the option of stacatto'd trebly diads.
| ---- ---- --- | ---- --- ---- |
| --3-- ---3-- | 3-3 2223 |
| --2-- ---2-- | 2-2 2222 |
| ---- ---- --- | ---- --- ---- |
| ---- ---- --- | ---- --- ---- |
| ---- ---- --- | ---- --- ---- |
(1) 2 (3)+(4) 1 2 3+4+
Then on my way home I called into work to find out what was on my program for the next day and got chatting about guitar. So I gave a quick demo of my progress so far. Sure, I can't play everything perfectly, but it's beginning to come together and listeners smile and compliment my playing. Woohoo.
Now it's just a matter of finding the time to practice and learn.
A lot of stuff going on in my life, job, home... sometimes difficult to squeeze in the guitar practice.
Sep 25
Almost 1 year on!
and a HOT new song
Sensei had done some homework for this recent session. And bought a couple of new jam track CDs as well. So we began with a bit of jamming. 12 bars each alternating along with the backing CD. It's a much better way to study a few licks, bends and double stops - just watching and listening rather than strumming a 12 bar blues as a backing track myself while watching... Trouble is that my memory can't quite keep up with the ideas Johnny is throwing my way. Nor can my hands - but I hope time and practice will sort that out
Then out comes the pre-prepared written score to play from for my newest song. Sensei was right when he said it was hot! My Sharona - The Knack. What a great song to play with. Vamped alternate picking. Biased strumming. Fast A-form barre chord moves. Edgy triads. It's all there and great fun to learn. It's another fast song as well, so it'll be a while before I can keep up, I'm sure!
So that's it. My first year of learning electric guitar almost complete. Over 25 songs given to play rhythm along to and some of them pretty much mastered. I hope I can see as much progress in the 2nd year...
Sep 8
More songs??
Only 2!
We're now at the end of CD2 of sensei's song list, so I guess you could say I've reached the end of 'phase 2' on Johnny's "get real good, real fast" program...
This week the songs were Seven Nation Army - White Stripes and Song 2 - blur. Again, both great songs
Song 2 is kinda fast with a mostly ascending A form barre-chord progression which is very fiddly, what with the riff looping up to the 15th fret. The difficulty is that not only does the guitar heel get in the way, meaning I can't use my thumb behind the neck for support and stability, but the frets get close together and this has to be accounted for as each chord is fretted! The Pacifica has a less prominent heel than my arch-top, so I guess i'll 100% use the more accessible strat-style guitar for this song...
Seven Nation Army is such a cool track, half composed by a repeated riff, followed this time by a descending A-form barre-chord progression from fret 7/9 9 up to 10/12 12 then down through 7/9 9, 5/7 7, 3/5 5 to 2/4 4, but alternating every second time with a quick added slide 7/9, 10/12, 7/9, 5/7, 3/5 - 5/7 - 3/5, 2/4. So cool. The riff should be played with an octave pedal, which is taken out for the descending fifths, which we can do at Johnny's place, but not at home, so I'll stick with the distortion effect and mute at the bridge to make the riff feel 'chunky' and 'weighty'.
The other recent songs are progressing, albeit quite slowly. Finding the practice time lately has been a bit tricky, with loads of demands at work and at home competing for my attention. So next week I'll get the latest version of Johnny's teaching CD number 3. I wonder what songs await in 'phase 3'.
Sep 3
More difficult almost every week?
Or me being a biff??
So here I am trying to figure out how to get my hand to finger the chords of Roxanne in a clean and accurate rhythm in time with the CD.
During the previous entry I didn't have the written score to hand and was going to describe some of the chords - so I looked on ultimate-guitar.com - confusion - I didn't recognise the chords as being the same as the ones sensei wrote out for me. After I checked, I was right! I know these are all just "versions" of the song, some transcribed by ear, maybe some from a book which just names the chords without showing the actual voicings, etc... so I've decided I'm going to stick with sensei's "version".
I'm gonna have to start showing pictures of the stuff that Johnny writes out for me at some point in this blog, as the weeks pass by I'm struck more and more about how proficiently this is all presented in the written hand. Nice.
Anyways, back to Roxanne. And the chord voicings...
For the most part, the chords are played on only the top 4 strings. This means that for 4 out of the first 5 chords, the chord's Root Notes are not struck. Weird, huh? It does sound exactly like the CD voiced like this, though.
Then we get to the Fsus4 into Gsus4 phrase. Sensei wants me to play these full 6 string barre chords with the pinkie finger covering strings 5, 4 and 3, two frets above the index finger barre, but with the aim of leaving the 2nd string sounding from the barred fret and not muted by my long and stiff pinky. No way I can contort my fingers that way.
"Stick with it", says Johnny, "no-one's fingers can do that straight away".
It's difficult to try for the impossible fingering, knowing it will sound crappy, particularly when I also know that an alternative voicing of the chord is easier and would sound good! I guess being less than a year into this guitar learning means that I should stick with the teacher's lesson!
What do you think???
Sep 1
The Red Light
You Don't Have to Put On
This lesson was spent mainly playing the previous 6 practiced songs along to the music CD. Sensei played along as well, with bits of lead interspered with playing the same rhythm as me. Very rewarding. But whoa, .. very tiring on the left hand ...
The Scientist was a little scrappy, I thought, but sensei felt it sounded reasonably good.
Coz I Luv You was straightforward, but vamping each and every strum is fatiguing
Happy Hour was really good fun, but some of my root 5 (A-form) barre chords were sounding as 6thsor hitting the low E
Prince Charming was great fun as well, and played almost faultlessly, with only 1 or 2 "dull" sounding first strums on a chord change throughout the song
Golden Touch needs more practice to memorise the chord progression and play fast and accurately. Again, vamping is very fatiguing and my hand was already sore at this point, but it's certainly getting there. Sensei is going to move this song into a much later part of his syllabus, but I'm gonna persevere with it
Ever Fallen In Love worked surprisingly well, but then again, as it is so fast and punky, you can get away with a bit of scrappiness - all adding to the edgy punk vibeGreat fun, too...
Then onto a bit of jamming with sight reading and lead improv, taking turns to play the rhythm. Lead improv was using the basic Pentatonic Scale with no added notes, but bending allowed. Can't wait to begin using the added notes, but for now it's just an exercise to get the fingers moving and noodle around, trying to avoid the beginners' trap of just ascending and descending the scale.
Finally, a new song... The new song, of course, is Roxanne.
First thing that occurs to me is 'cool song'. (As sensei's selections always are!)
Second thing is a quiz - name the chords from the written chord diagrams. A couple of tricky chords to name in there.
Third thing is that the first chord change is going to be very tricky to master.
Fourth is that this needs to be played accurately, with absolutely no scope for misfretted chords or poor timing.
Fifth thing I noted was that the power chord section alternates from a root 6 power chord to root 5 chords and back again. This should develop my picking accuracy - missing the low E string on the change to root 5 power chords feels as though it might be one of my current weaknesses!
Final note was the sus4 barre-chords fingering - using the pinkie finger to cover the 5th, 4th and 3rd stings, while leaving the 2nd uncovered. Nightmare!
Aug 24
Which Pentatonic...?
...both kinds! Major and minor
Just a short report on the learning from tonight's lesson.
We studied some printed music with the intention of doing a bit of improvisation, but before each piece I had to try to "identify the Key". (Dominant sevenths count as major chords, you know...)
Not such a simple task for me at the moment. (Must do some more reading!) First one was't so difficult - with chords D, A7, Em, G, A, the key must be D major.
That led to the big lesson for tonight - either the major or the minor pentatonic scales could be played over a chords in a major key, but with one main proviso: shouldn't use the minor pentatonic scale if there are minor chords in the progression!
So after a bit of improvisation it was onto the next song. Identifying the key was more tricky here as there was a key change for the chorus from C to Am. Not a massive drama, as Am is the relative minor of C !
Last bit of the lesson was a bit of improvisation concentrating on switching between the A minor and the A major pentatonic scale. Apparently this is the basis for the feel of country music - passing changes to and from the minor pentatonic and major pentatonic scales of the same note.
Some of this music theory is making more and more sense to me now. Still need to do some more reading, though
Aug 17
Readers?
Are There Any???
Just wondering whether anyone is reading this blog...
Doesn't matter if there is or if there isn't... I'm mainly writing this for my own record - kinda like a diary
If there are any readers, I should be graterful if you would comment on whether this is useful stuff here or whether it's just out of idle curiosity.
Cheerz
Mark H
Aug 15
Jam
and I don't mean strawberry
Hey dudes. Learned a few new thangs this week. 2 hours is a very acceptable lesson length, but I couldn't take on too much new stuff or else there wouldn't be enough practice time or progress during the next week for the next lesson...
So the week's lesson began with the pentatonic scale theory and the addition of a few notes within/around the scale to increase the choice of notes for jamming. Sensei actually thought I'd already got to this stage already, so I had to reel him in a bit to avoid missing some theory... we also introduced string bends to spice up the jamming and started playing around with hammer-ons and pull-offs and bends - all stuff I hadn't really tried until then and brilliant fun. Sensei also lent me a Jamming CD to copy - Jam with Blues Masters - there are tracks with no lead guitar, so from now on I'll be jamming along with backing tracks at home
A technique I also learned more about this week was palm-muting while playing shuffle rhythms. My muting had been inconsistent until Johnny mentioned sitting the edge of my palm on/along the bridge. Much more consistent and a much "chunkier" tone with power chords was the result - particularly with amp "overdrive" engaged
Then on to the next song - Ever Fallen in Love, Buzzcocks.
It's fast! Really fast.Maybe even the fastest song to learn so far...
It's a brilliant tune to play along with. The strum pattern and chord changes all feel quite erratic and edgey. I think my barre chords are now beginning to develop - at least on the electric guitar. I can't manage fast accurate changes and passing barre chord changes on the acoustic yet - maybe I should get the action on my acoustic lowered a little to make it more playable with barre chords and hammer-ons, etc...??? Still considering that one.
So it's now been 10 months since I bought my first guitar. In that time I've had nearly 9 months of lessons and have a folder with 24 songs - some of which I can play *almost* flawlesslyI'm still really enjoying the learning process and the challenge of mastering new techniques and songs.
I've now got 2 weeks of leave from work,
Maybe even a trip to Nottingham with Sensei to visit a guitar shop or 2.
See ya next week...
Aug 5
Back to Lessons
Which one to play today?
Sensei can be a generous mentor. Firstly, because I'd paid for the month of July and hadn't had any lessons, we agreed to make that up by doing 2 hours per week for the upcoming weeks. Secondly, we didn't just try to pick up where we left off. Thirdly, he approved of the new instrument and gave it the seal of sensei approval after a quick test drive. It sounds really fantastic through the Fender Blues valve amps in Johnny's studio.
So we began with me playing the last 3 songs I'd been given to learn: Days, 20th Century Boy and Come Together. All went reasonably well, so onto the next song...
This time it's an evolution of the 12 bar shuffle rhythm to include sevenths - I Hear You Knockin' by Dave Edmunds.
My hand feels similar to when I first started barre chords - basically it hurts. The stretch on the back of the hand to reach the power chord A7 is tiring and a bit painful. {index finger on fret 5 of bottom E string and pinky finger on fret 10 of A string} Apart from that, the song isn't too difficult, but it might be a while until my hand is flexible enough to reach A7 consistently. Here's a fragment of the score with A7 eighths on beats 3 + of bar 1 and 2 :
... | ---- ----- ---- ---- | ---- ----- ----- ----| ----- ----- ----- | ----- ----- ----- | ...
... | ---- ----- ---- ---- | ---- ----- ----- ----| ----- ----- ----- | ----- ----- ----- | ...
... | ---- ----- ---- ---- | ---- ----- ----- ----| ----- ----- ----- | ----- ----- ----- | ...
... | ---- ----- ---- ---- | ---- ----- ----- ----| ----- ----- ----- | ----- ----- ----- | ...
... | 77 99 1010 99 | 77 99 1010 99| 44 66 44 66 | 44 66 44 66 | ...
... | 55 55 5. 5. 55 | 55 55 5. 5. 55 | 22 22 22 22 | 22 22 22 22 | ...
Chord symbol notation would look like this, I guess:
.|A5A5A6A6A7A7A6A6|A5A5A6A6A7A7A6A6|G5G5G6G6G5G5G6G6|G5G5G6G6G5G5G6G6| .
Or maybe like this:
. A5 A6 A7 A6 . A5 A6 A7 A6 . G5 G6 G5 G6 . G5 G6 G5 G6
| 1+ 2+ 3+ 4+ | 1+ 2+ 3+ 4+ | 1+ 2+ 3+ 4+ | 1+ 2+ 3+ 4+ |
Anybody know any good stretching exercises to help with these fingerings???
I also realised for the first time this week how the common time (4/4) "swing rhythm" is actually constructed in the first song that sensei gave me, almost 8 months ago. After some reading on swung triplets and swing timing the penny dropped for me what the phrase "first 2 beats of the triplet tied together" actually meant.
I now understand that for each quarter beat triplet that if you don't strum the second part of the triplet and allow the first strum to sound for 2/3rds of the 1/4 beat, then the last strum of the triplet is only taking up the last third of the beat. Obviously, the next triplet strum commences quickly after the last strum of the previous one, again missing the second and strumming the third, etc.. This gives an off-the-beat or odd timing feel. Not all printed musical notation is the same, though - some scores are annotated with just the word "swing"; others show symbolically that two tied eighth beats are equal to the same symbol but with a "-3-" printed above it. All now makes sense.
Learning has taken place! Talk about slow on the uptake!
Aug 5
That Jazzy Ibanez
Sounds as beautiful as it looks
After spending a total of 4 weeks away from home it was really good to be back in the UK. What's more, my acoustic had survived the journeys unharmed, despite the way I know that baggage handlers throw luggage around. Thank-you Kinsman - the ABS case did it's job perfectly. {Even though there is a bit of flex in the lid!}
And after 4 weeks of blistering heat and blowing dust it made me smile when I saw green again. I even stood in the rain and smiled.
Then when I got home I found something that blew my mind. There was that gorgeous translucent red Ibanez jazz guitar hanging in the hook where my acoustic normally lives - an awesome surprise present from Mrs Rampant
The problem now is that my Pacifica 112V sounds a bit characterless and sterile after experiencing the Ibanez's charms. I know it's a really good instrument - so I might change the pickups at some point in the future for something with more appealing tone.
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