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How can I have a better practice routine
I found out I needed to back off and study the tab formation before i begin practice of the daily lesson.
Practice, like most things in life seem to have an ebb and a flow to them. I am in a ebb week and need suggestions on how to organize my practice better. I have played guitar long enough that my physical skills are pretty sound. I have good pick accuracy, fingers go where i want them to go, most of the time, I know the fret board better than most of our members. I know how to pick chords in the major and minor keys and can form chords up the neck using Caged formations. But my organization of lesson details is poor. I think I let my ego get in the way of good practice habits.
I was half way through todays Rhythm challenge and seemed to be struggling to remember where or what chord I should be playing next. So I stopped and just broke the lesson down instead of just barreling ahead from measure to measure. I tried to organize my approach to the printed tab. 1st 8 measures are simple enough, the 6th measure has that great Cadd9 and the single note G chord then returns to D chord 3/4 time for two more measures. So I took time out to practice that 6th measure a few times to help it flow inside of the lesson.
The 9th through 16th measure are D minor for 4 measures then G for 4 measures, pretty straight forward.
The next 8 measures have 4 measures of D minor then 2 measures of E minor and finish with 2 measures of A. that is about all I needed to know as far as how the song structure is organized, so broken down into 8 measure segments helped me know what and where my fingers needed to go for the whole song structure.
This helped me know what I was supposed to practice and In what order of chords I was supposed to use to accomplish this.
Any thoughts on how to simplify your daily lesson organization?
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2 Replies
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Jorge–
This is a great post you have put here. I think many of us have the same issue from time to time- (maybe a little scattered as far as practice-specifics goes). The “what chord I should be playing next” line really caught my eye.
This is a skill I want to improve on for sure; but I’m confused about how to actually get there; I’m thinking it has to go all the way “back” to chord matrixes (cies?), chord “families”, maybe Circle of Fifths, etc, to get a handle on “what goes with what…. next”.
My mom used to be able to just listen to the start of a song, and be able to play-along on their old piano– perfectly— before the song was even over. And with zero “music-training” outside of maybe high-school band- (back in the early 50’s). Looking back on it now (and learning how to play guitar), it was really kind-of amazing. She could just instinctively/intuitively…… hear it– grasp it– and play it.
Now and then, I’ll see a solo-guitarist perform their set and then take a few requests for songs. It’s cool to see the expressions on their face as they take a few seconds just “to remember the lyrics….. and then talk/think to themselves as they figure-out the key/ chords/ chord progressions/ etc”, and then start tinkering until they get it right…….. and then just play-away!
This is a skill I would LOVE to have.
I know this isn’t a specific suggestion of how to better organize/specific ways to practice. But I hope you get LOTS of responses! (I’ll be following-along).
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This reply was modified 3 months, 3 weeks ago by the-old-coach.
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This reply was modified 3 months, 3 weeks ago by the-old-coach.
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This reply was modified 3 months, 3 weeks ago by
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Thanks for the reply. What you said about performers going through the mental then physical acts needed to remember how to put a song together makes sense. I hadn’t thought about the procedures you mentally go through when prepping to play a song. Again I just barge in and begin picking, make some mistakes and then start again until I am organized enough to put the tune together. that’s probably tied into the fact that i pick most of my tunes by myself, at home and don’t have to be organized. I definitely would not call myself a performing guitarist. I would like to get to that level so those are things to think about and work out before hand. I am definitely weak in the organization department of practice or just noodling around trying to find new progressions to develop.
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