Long overdue update

Weeeelll… It’s been a while. Not sure where I got up to but I think I was starting to learn Wonderwall. I’ve fumbled a fair bit more since then. Wonderwall is now starting to feel straightforward and I can now play the whole song reasonably well.
Part of the reason is that I got myself a guitar teacher, Lewis Collins. He’s been able to point out a few bad habits so I can correct those. I was anchoring with my right hand when I was picking, and that was slowing me down a fair bit. Strumming through Wonderwall still took a little while, and part of that is because I really struggle to hear the guitar cleanly in most of the tracks that I’m interested in. I couldn’t hear the pattern properly, so I was concentrating quite a lot on ‘learning’ the strumming patterns in a ‘down, down, down up, down’ type fashion. While it’s sometimes useful to look at this briefly, I’ve found the best way is to just listen to the rhythm and strumming with it to get close. What’s also helped is Guitar Pro. Downloaded onto my ipad (I got the full Mac version as well after a bit), it lets you download tracks and play them in a midi format, isolating specific voices (instruments), and playing them at any speed you want to listen at. (I.e. I can isolate the guitar track and listen to the rhythm, and slow things down to play along until I can go at full speed). This has been a massive boost, and having Lewis knowing what I’m supposed to be learning motivates me to practise more so I can show I’m improving.
With Wonderwall ‘learned’ (BIG difference between learning it and playing it smoothly and flawlessly), and just needing practise to improve. Lewis suggested learning ‘Don’t Fear the Reaper’ by the Blue Oyster Cult. I’ve always thought that sounded tricky, and I wasn’t wrong. Having said that, it’s mainly a matter of practising a few fairly straightforward sections. The challenge I have are numerous, but I think the top three are
1- I struggle to reliably move my fingers between chords. The first couple of changes are ok, and then I start to lose position on the frets AND strings and play buzzing or blunted notes.

2 – Moving between powerchords on different frets. Discovered recently while beginning to learn ‘How You Remind me’ by Nickelback, and definitely still a fretting hand issue, but different in that it’s moving up and down the fretboard rather than simply changing strings with my hand in largely the same position.

3 – a little less of a problem, and seeming to get better as I practise more, hitting individual strings can be really tough! Even when I’m looking at the strings, hitting 5433, then 6543, 6543, 6543, and back to 5433 seems to get messed up. Bearing in mind this is essentially an arpeggio (all the strings are played in a row, almost a chord played very slowly) and I’m not skipping strings or going up and down in a pattern, it’s made me realise more than ever how skilful good guitar players have to be.

With ALL of these issues, if I’m able to relax and just play, letting things happen naturally, everything becomes a lot easier. The real challenge is that I’m very conscious of not being able to do these things well and that makes it very hard to relax and just let it go. I AM improving, slowly, but surely, and each time I nail a section or even a simple chord change correctly (just so that it sounds ok is tolerable ) I start to feel I’m moving forwards. At some point, with practise and commitment, it’ll get more natural and I’ll stop thinking about it so much and play better for it.

Another guitar related happening is my discovery of the Ukulele. I bought a uke while browsing in a music shop and spotting it there. I picked it up and decided it was so cheap it was worth getting, even if I just learned ’5 Years Time’ by Noah and the Whale. Anyway, long story short I really enjoy playing the ukulele, and in some ways find it easier. It gives me a break from stressing on the guitar (which I really want to do), and lets me relax playing the uke (which is easier, but not as much of a life goal so less stressy). It also keeps my fingers hardening up if I’m slacking on guitar practise.
Fingers are much better nowadays, by the way. Calloused up and rarely very painful, I still get hard bits of callous forming and eventually flaking off, but in general I’m starting to get simply ‘toughened’ fingers. Not calloused, just thicker skin on the pads which can take more punishment.

All good, hopefully not so long before my next blog.

New guitar and amp

Well I’m still strumming, but getting fed up with my cheapy cheap cheap guitar and amp and feel like its holding me back as it annoys me every time I have to retune the thing and that happens twice a day. The tremolo mechanism seemed to be wavering a hell of a lot and the guitar was never quite in tune. Soooooo….. I got a new one!

Even the missus seems to think that now I’m spending a chunk of time learning and clearly getting better (although you may not think so after listening to my video), it was worth getting something I enjoy playing. A couple of trips to a guitar shop later and test playing probably a dozen different guitars, I ended up buying one that was at the low end of my budget but looks, feels, and sounds good (to me at least, and discounting the fact that I’m still not actually very good). Out of the shop with 1 new guitar (Westfield, red lacquer, yummy looking through neck axe), 1 new amp (Chord CG-30), a new leather strap, 20ft chord and a few sundries, and I’m a happy man.
I wanted to do a comparison with my old Benson Stratocaster lookalike and amp, so I set a few bits up, sat and strummed a few bars of Wonderwall (FINALLY getting the strum pattern closer to correct), and set up my original setup, then old guitar new amp, new guitar old amp, and finally new guitar new amp which sounds wayyy better, Check out the video if you’re interested and let me know what you think.

Free falling and enter sandman

Whoooooooeeeeeee! Are we having fun yet?

Major progress this time around. No, I haven’t quite mastered the Fm chord, but I have started learning actual tracks
Free falling (Tom Petty) is one that my friend Jamie is learning on the drums, and that seemed pretty straightforward on guitar (bar the solo, anyway). I looked up a YouTube lesson for it and there it is. 3 chords pretty much all the way through, and I know them. Dm,Gm, Gm,Dm,Am all the way through. One pretty major change though. You need a capo on the 3rd fret. 2 days with a home made capo (a pencil and an elastic band – let me know if you want to know how), and I was on eBay looking for a proper one. 2 more days and it turneqd up. My brand new Jim Dunlop Capo. Easy to fit, easy to take off, and a truer sound than my home made version (maybe you shouldn’t ask after all). Another couple of days and I was round at Jamie’s jamming
we idly, it seems easier to get into playing with the drums. It could be just because I can’t hear the duff notes so well, but I had fun. Lots of fun. So much fun that 2 things happened.
1 – I got better (great innit. Playing makes me better, and I had to prove it and state the bleeding obvious- lol)
2- I agreed to start learning Metallica’s Enter Sandman

Now 2 is definitely a challenge, but I’ve got the intro riff sorted (needs practice, but it’s going well). Just tonight I looked up palm muting and that has massively improved the sound of the next bit. Right up to the big drum crash, so I’m looking forward to my next jam session.
Enter Sandman might be a long term project, but I’ve made a start and feel like I can play a bit more. Motivation is good, and I’m going to keep on and see how far I can go.

Another day another chord

Not quite another day. As you’ve already figured out by now I’m not the fastest learner. It’s taken about a week for me to move on to this lesson.

I’ve just realized that my blog states 40 years old. I’m 41 now and getting ever shorter time to become a rock god. I’ll have to get a move on!
Jamorama jam track 7 is a plucking track. I can’t really call it a solo as it’s just not that complex to listen to. On the other hand, I find it very complex to play. As always, practising helps to bed in the new moves in my fingers and it sounds pretty similar to the jam track now when I play
I’ll keep practising as well as moving on. Some of those previous jam tracks are simpler now and make me wonder how I could gave struggled so much with them.
Having completed jam 7 I’m moving on to the next lesson. It’s aim is to bring in eigth notes and strumming up as well as down. The challenge is the chord they add at the same time is F major. I’m finding F very f***ing hard.
Having to press 2 strings with my first finger seems to mean I either press super hard, or the bottom string sounds dead. Anyone have any ideas on how to fix this? I think its just a case of practise and if im true to form I’ll be blogging next week about how easy I find it. Its just feeling bad right now though so we’ll see.

Please excuse any typos today. For some reason my ipad is refusing to show me what im typing so im tapping away blind at the moment.

Chord changes just kill me :(

Still practicing, still picking bits of skin off the ends of my fingers (they don’t hurt now though), and still improving. At least, I think I’m improving. I haven’t religiously followed the Jamorama course this week. I’m practising the jam tracks and adding a couple of other bits and pieces I’ve picked up or looked up.  Moving between Chords A, Am, E, Em, C, D, G is keeping me busy, but it’s interesting seeing what fits together and what little tunes I can create.

Having started to experiment with strumming patterns, I’m finding that a bit tricky sometimes. The pick always seem’s to catch on one string after a few strums. More practice needed there.

Tom Petty’s free falling is definitely on the list to learn. It’s just three chords throughout (I’m conveniently ignoring the solo for now), although I do need a capo to change the notes slightly (on order), and a LOT more practice moving between G and D.

BTW – I’m learning on a cheap electric Guitar and most of the time I haven’t bothered plugging it into the amp. I can practice quietly without people nearby pointing out my all too obvious errors.  The only drawback I can see (hear?) is a bit of buzzing from the guitar body sometimes, which is not noticeable when it’s plugged in and a bit louder. Anyone got any thoughts about this?

Sitting on the porch

I’m sitting on the porch practicing my guitar strumming and fretting. A bit of an odd feeling for me really, to be this relaxed that I don’t really care what anyone passing by thinks of my fumblings.

I’ve had a full on day working, finished that, put some coving up and some new hooks in the kids room, its now a gorgeous evening. High 20C’s, I’ve got beer, I’ve got tunes (well, the Jamorama jam tracks), I’ve got a bit of time, and I’m smiling. I’m about to attempt Jamorama Jam track no 4, which brings in chords C + G, both of which I’m finding a little tricky to get my fingers around. In fact, its not so much the chords themselves, but my ongoing challenge of moving between chords that’s bugging me.
The jam tracks make it a little easier now to be fair. I thought they’d be distracting, but actually they keep me in time and force me to move my fingers. Less than perfectly at times, but its getting a little better each time.

Here’s to two new chords and linking them together !!

Sometime soon I’ll have to upload what promises to be a rather embarrassing video of me playing. Its sort of important for me to keep track and hopefully some day I’ll look back and laugh at them as I see how much I’m improving. Mark Bell
Commvault
+44 7788 818589
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6 Months off :(

Well, life got busy.
That’s my main excuse, but its a lot more involved than that really.
My motivation went through the floor, I got fed up with sore fingers and a sorer head trying to get chord changes right.
Just recently a friend of mine picked up a new drum kit. He’s very, very good for a beginner, and puts my guitar playing to shame. Having said that, when he texted me to come over and jam with him, I had to admit I hadn’t picked up the guitar in 6 Months and couldn’t play anywhere near enough to jam with him.
We went over anyway, stuck RockBand Beatles on and he played along with that. We had a great night and I swore to start practicing again, so I’m back.
Yes, I have sore fingers, BUT my chord changes don’t appear to have suffered significantly so I’m back to practicing again.
The Jamorama jam tracks are fun as well. These are something I didn’t use before and I really wish I had. We’ll see how it goes now, but I’m planning on doing a bit more regular practice, ignoring my imperfect chord changes, and getting to a stage where I can at least have fun jamming with a mate.

Wish me luck!

Mark Bell
Commvault
+44 7788 818589
******************Legal Disclaimer*************************** “This communication may contain confidential and privileged
material for the sole use of the intended recipient. Any
unauthorized review, use or distribution by others is strictly prohibited. If you have received the message in error, please advise the sender by reply email and delete the message. Thank you.”
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Jamorama Lesson 4

Its been a long time coming, but then I always told myself I was going to take this slow and steady, not shortcut (much), and actually learn how to play the guitar, rather than just learning one or two tunes. (or is that just another excuse, I’m even suspicious of myself sometimes )

I have been practicing chords A, G and D as per the Jamorama lessons regularly. Changing between them is slow each time I pick my guitar up, but gets quicker after a few minutes of playing. Lesson 3 ended with some scales and warm up fingering, which I actually find harder than the strumming! My little finger hasn’t really got with the program yet, but I’m getting the distinct impression its going to be pressed into service soon. Its challenging reaching from the 5th to the 8th fret though – Maybe my fingers really do need to be more flexible to improve.

I moved onto Lesson 4  ( http://www.jamorama.com/free-guitar-lesson-four ) primarily to increase the variety in my playing. I’ve been practicing the same chords but actually Ive been messing a little bit with strumming and putting little rhythms together just to save me from getting glued to the guitar by doing the same thing over and over again. As it turns out, Lesson 4 is about Strumming rhythms. Counting, missing strums (intentionally, but I’m still doing it by accident at the moment.)

Because I seem to have been practicing lessons 3 + 4 simultaneously (Wow – multi tasking at my age! I impress myself ) I’m now hipping through Lesson 4 so fast I stopped to update my blog. This is REAL progress and it was a complete surprise to me.  Strangely, Jamorama point students to an online metronome at http://www.metronomeonline.com/ . As my earlier post indicates, I didn’t even think enough of this one to blog about it. I prefer the visual nature of the ones in my earlier posting, but then I often play at a rather subdued level to avoid bothering the neighbours. Last thing I need is a super load metronome ticking away, and I can’t get the volume up that high on my laptop anyway!

Now the really cool bit here, is that although I’ve been playing about with strumming and fretting in my own way, the Jamorama course structures this and provides further chord progressions. Even with just the three chords that I’m working with at the moment, the rhythm sounds pretty good when you follow the instructions. Speeding up chord changes is still the goal, and will continue to be practiced. With new rhythmic chord changes to go at now though, its feeling pretty good.

Oh, and my fingers SEEM to be starting to settle down. I have said that before though and they got worse, not better so we’ll see.

Roughly another 90 minutes of practice.

Fingers update

Owwwwww!

It’s ironic isn’t it? My last post finished off with saying my fingers feel much better now, and now they’re killing me

Dry skin being tortured by guitar strings for an extra hour today has caused my fingertips to start to split. They’re now covered in moisturiser and starting to feel less painful, but it puts me in mind of the split skin I used to get after a day out rock climbing years ago.  I guess I’ve stepped up my training time, but I think this is just a natural progression of fingertip hardening.

Interestingly, my wife has been sitting next to me listening to my strumming this evening and without prompting told me I was much better than last time she heard me. Sweet – at least its not JUST me kidding myself

Rock Band 3 – Mmmmmm

I’ve just seen the AMazon page for Rock Band 3. Coming out October 29th 2010 it looks pretty funky.

The new drum kit now includes 4 drums, 3 cymbals, and a foot pedal! (anyone got any Octopus mates?)  That seems pretty tough to me, but then I find the current drums (4 drums and a foot pedal) pretty tough, so what do I know .

There’s a completely new instrument – the keyboard. Now this seems really tough as it’s pretty much the same as a real keyboard, so it looks to me like there’s a LOT of keys to be getting your head (and fingers) round. Rona has just learning to play keyboard so I’m pretty sure she’s going to be interested in this one.

The guitar option appears to be much more than the previous rock band and guitar hero guitars. The main reason for this is that it appears to actually have strings! Now if the keyboard has a lot of options, I can imagine a stringed guitar being HUGELY challenging for the game. I’m going to have to give it a go and report back as I’ve only seen pictures so far but it seems as though they may have designed the instruments and game to be ‘trainers’.

If they have designed them to help learn a real instrument, I’m going to be an early adopter. The only thing thats putting me off just placing a pre order now is the price.  It seems the drum kit is £99, the game and keyboard another £99 and the new guitar £136!!!!   Thats £334 for the whole package – I can’t see it being a huge best seller for Christmas unless its spectacular. We shall see.